At Mary's Breast

At Mary's Breast.....

I am using the book/DVD The Journey: Walking the Road to Bethlehem by Adam Hamilton, in my Sunday School class for Advent. Just started, but I am enjoying it and hope my classe will as well.

The first chapter is on Mary, and in preparing, I came across the following sentence....

"When Mary finally gave birth to Jesus and suckled him, the Son of God was fed and sustained by the milk from her breasts."

Now I know that is totally natural and in Mary's day and age the most probable means of feeding a newborn infant, but I had not really thought about it. I had tried to imagine giving birth in a stable, with the only means of support her husband (don't get me started on that) but I had not really focused on the actual suckling of the newborn King.

I remember being a young mother and breast-feeding. I was not overly confident or fond of the mechanics. It was somewhat difficult, but I loved the closeness I felt to my daughter. To sit there, knowing that she was taking from me and that what I was giving was literally life-giving. In reflecting now, I realized there was no way, at that young age, I had any idea how beautiful that experience would come to be. What I am writing, at this moment, comes not only from that experience but also from the knowlege of her life and the woman she has grown be. To see her with her children and to know that all of that began out of my body. I am sure a few years from now, her birth and the time she spent at my breast will grow even more special.

I doubt Mary, as a girl of 13 or 14, would have understood all of that. Of course, saying yes to such a role said alot for her maturity. But I cannot imagine all she faced in that tiny cave of a stable, lent itself to much time pondering the joy of birth or nursing. You never know though. God in His infinite mercy and, hopefully, in gratitude for the willing gift of her body as incubator for His Son, may have given her the wisdom and knowlege far beyond her years. To see and experience the wonder of the moment. I hope so. But if not, I imagine Mary, at a much older age, must have reflected back on those first days as His mother. What would it have felt to look back and see all that had happened because she said, "Let it be with me"!