At 92 years old, Shi Shuzhen should be relaxing and enjoying life but, instead of being at the receiving end of her family’s care and attention, the opposite is true.
For twenty years now, Shi Shuzhen has been singlehandedly attending to her 64-year-old son, Lai Yongde, who is suffering from polio and, also, from a debilitating mental illness he has had since birth. This, since the passing of her husband and second child, who both had the same mental illness as Lai.
For such a life as hers, difficult IS an understatement. Yet, despite this, she could not—no, she would not—give up: “I may get hit and hurt by him, but who will take care of him if not me?”
Because for her, it is far more dreadful to imagine her son without someone looking after him—even for just a moment.
Such is the extraordinary devotion of a mother: selfless and forbearing. So much so that, of all human affections, motherly love could well be the supreme as it is almost next to impossible for a mother to forsake her child.
That in mind, we can better grasp the weight of God’s word in Isaiah 49:15, “Can a mother forget the baby at her breast and have no compassion on the child she has borne? Though she may forget, I will not forget you!” (emphasis added)
If a mother’s devotion is sure, ever more so is God’s! As certain as the rising of the sun in the morning and the appearing of the moon in the evening, He would never forget us because—
We are His masterpiece. On surface, the human body is astounding enough. But if we would look beneath our external features and into the ‘mechanism’ that makes our eyes blink and our arms flex, we would see blood, muscles, bones, organs, veins, and nerves—every sinew and every fiber woven together intricately to work together seamlessly. This was how God created each of us: with such great precision and thoroughness. Not only that. He knows every detail about us, even as minute as the number of our hairs! Because when it comes to us, nothing escapes our Creator’s eyes.
We are His redeemed. Unlike His other creations, God made humankind by getting His hands ‘dirty’—He formed Adam from the dust in the ground. And yet, among all His creation, we were the ones to walk away from Him, the ones to pierce His heart! But did God leave? NO. Instead, He once again offered His hands, but this time, by getting it ‘bloody’—He received the harsh pounding of the hammer that nailed Him on the Cross. Now, then, if He forsook His own self for us, would our Savior ever forsake us? Could He? He did not just give us life. He gave us His life.
We are His beloved. God’s story of devotion does not stop there, though. He created us, saved us, and, one day, He would finally take those of us who accept Him into His glorious kingdom, where there will be no more death or sorrow or pain, only heavenly bliss. You see, this was the very reason why He sacrificed His life. Because He does not just plan to be with us in the here and now but, also, in the there and thereafter! Would our Bridegroom, then, leave us, after going all the way to the Cross just so we could have eternal union with Him?
In the end, we, God’s masterpiece, redeemed, and beloved, can rest assured that we will never be alone in life because He who promised—He who is our Creator, Redeemer, Bridegroom, and more—is faithful. Even more faithful than a mother.