Glory Comes Through Death - John 12:24
I got syrup in my hair today. Correction. My child got syrup in my hair today. Our morning took a quick nose dive when a spat broke out. One second, we were having a reasonably pleasant morning. The next, there was an angry outburst and a waffle was knocked from my hand straight into my hair. Seconds later, a yogurt bowl was cast from the high chair, its contents turning over on the floor. I’m not sure which upset me more: how hard it is to clean up greek yogurt or how much it costs.
Now, most of our mornings are not quite this…sticky, but a morning like this is certainly not out of the ordinary for me as a stay-at-home mom of six. In the words of Luke from Gilmore Girls, “Kids always have jam hands.” Life as a mother certainly does seem to include a lot of gooey substances, on hands, on surfaces, on me. Not to mention the diapers and the aim, or lack thereof, of boys in the bathroom. I like to say motherhood should have run in the title sequence of the TV show, Dirty Jobs.
Motherhood is messy. It’s hard. It’s often lowly work, quite literally, if you’re on your hands and knees wiping up yogurt as I was today. If I’m honest, some days it feels too lowly, perhaps even beneath me. I could be somewhere else. I could be doing something greater that involved less stickiness, something more glorious.
That’s the thing though. That’s the real heart of the issue. The problem is not really the spilled yogurt or the diapers. It’s not even my kids’ behavior. The real issue is that motherhood offends my pride. It shreds my sense of self-importance. It challenges my idea of glory.
Different Kinds of Glory
“...they loved the glory that comes from man more than the glory that comes from God.”
Did you know there are different kinds of glory? That’s what John tells us. In John 12, he tells us about Jewish authorities who did believe in Jesus, but didn’t publicly confess it for fear of the Pharisees. The reason, John tells us in verse 43 is, “they loved the glory that comes from man more than the glory that comes from God.” Two different kinds of glory, one from man, one from God.
As humans, we long for glory. We crave it. We seek it. We work hard to achieve it. And actually, that’s not wrong. That’s God-given. God hard-wired us for glory. It’s actually the whole reason we exist. Most of life is deciding what kind of glory we will choose. The problem is, because of our fallen natures, we usually go after the wrong kind. So, that begs the question. What is the right kind of glory? What does it look like? And how does it differ from the glory that comes from man? Jesus tells us earlier in the same chapter of John.
Jesus has just ridden into Jerusalem for Passover. The crowds waved palm branches to celebrate him, yelling “Hosanna!” It seems Jesus is primed for glory. He even says it. “The hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified,” (John 12:23). “Glorified” sure sounds like someone should be rolling out a carpet, bringing him a throne, and placing a crown on his head before bowing at his feet. So, if what he says next doesn’t startle you a little, you’re not really paying attention. They’re not the words you’d expect from a king who has just made his triumphal entry and whom the people expect to claim his throne and cast out their enemies.
“Truly, truly I say to you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies it remains alone; but if it dies, it bears much fruit. Whoever loves his life loses it, and whoever hates his life in this world will keep it for eternal life. If anyone serves me, he must follow me; and where I am, there will my servant be also. If anyone serves me, the Father will honor him,” (John 12:24-26).
The Substance of Glory
“...unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies it remains alone.”
So, what is the substance of the glory that comes from God? To put it bluntly as Jesus did, it’s death. It’s losing your life. It’s servitude. We want the t-shirt for Christianity to say something like, “Come be happy, healthy, and wealthy,” but really, it says, “Come die to yourself and take up your cross.” That sounds very extreme and dramatic like we’re all going to be martyred. Maybe some of us will be martyred, but often, this death is more a long series of tiny deaths we die over and over again.
Jesus bid us, “Come die to yourself as you wake up at 2 am to feed a baby. Come die to yourself as you clean the yogurt off the floor. Take a knife to your selfishness as you get back up to get your kid a drink just as you were finally about to sit down and eat your own dinner. Squash your pride as you do menial labor again and again and again to serve your family. Come and die a thousand tiny deaths in a thousand tiny ways. That’s motherhood. That’s the glory that comes from God.
The Aim of Glory
“...but if it dies, it bears much fruit.”
This glory starts with death just like it did for Jesus, but death isn’t the end of the story. It’s just the beginning. It’s never death for death’s sake. It’s death for fruitfulness’s sake. It’s death for a purpose. It’s death to temporary things in order to gain eternal things. The seed dies, Jesus says, so that it doesn’t remain alone and so that it will bear much fruit. Jesus died to reap a harvest that went beyond himself. Motherhood also calls us to die to reap a harvest that goes beyond ourselves.
I often marvel at the fact that the people went from yelling “Hosanna!” on Palm Sunday to yelling, “Crucify him!” on Friday. Maybe it’s not so hard to understand though. Jesus didn’t meet their expectations for a Messiah. The people were expecting a different kind of glory and a different kind of Messiah. The people wanted a successful king and instead, they got a fruitful king.
Sometimes, motherhood isn’t what I expected either. When it feels too hard or beneath me somehow, I think it’s because it’s calling me to fruitfulness when I’d rather be called to success. And just as most of life is choosing what kind of glory we seek, much of life is always deciding if we want to be successful or fruitful.
It’s easy to conflate success and fruitfulness. They can look similar. They both connote a certain kind of flourishing, but at the heart, I think they’re very different.
Suppose there was a tree, a great, towering tree with mighty branches and roots anchored down deep. You might say, “What an impressive tree.” Suppose though, this tree didn’t bear any fruit. The tree was impressive, but it never gave life. It never multiplied. This tree and its glory would die with it. That’s a picture of success.
Scripture tells us about a different tree in Jeremiah 17. The man whose trust is the LORD “is like a tree planted by water, that sends out its roots by the stream and does not fear when heat comes, for its leaves remain green, and is not anxious in the year of drought, for it does not cease to bear fruit.” What distinguishes this tree is its fruitfulness. This tree bears fruit despite harsh circumstances because the tree's resources are not in itself alone. This tree’s glory will not die with it because its glory was never in itself, but in multiplying beyond itself. That’s a picture of fruitfulness and a picture of godly motherhood.
Success emphasizes earthly gain while fruitfulness emphasizes heavenly gain. Success elevates the individual while fruitfulness elevates others. Success dead-ends on itself while fruitfulness multiplies itself. God’s purpose for us is always fruitfulness which is an infinitely better purpose than mere success.
The Work of Glory
“..and where I am, there will my servant be also.”
If we’re looking for earthly glory and success, motherhood is clearly not the place to look. The daily work of motherhood often feels menial and insignificant. You rarely feel like you’re succeeding at much, but more like you’re on a hamster wheel of laundry and dishes. But if we’re willing to surrender ourselves to God’s purposes for true glory and fruitfulness, motherhood is the perfect place to be.
Jesus said if we are servants, we will go where he went and do the kind of work that he did. Many of us will follow him when he takes us where we want to go. Maybe if he takes us into comfort and notoriety, but will we follow him on paths of service and sacrifice? Paths of ordinary days and humble work that no one sees?
No servant is greater than his master. If the King of the Universe washed feet, we can change another diaper. If the Spotless Lamb touched a leper, we can scrub a toilet. If the Creator of all things deigned to walk the dirt of this earth and dwell with sinners, there’s no task too humble for us.
What’s more, none of it is meaningless. Jesus didn’t just live to save us from our sins, he lived to redeem all of life. He did many extraordinary things, but he did many ordinary things too. He ate. He worked. He served. If he were here now, I’m sure he would joyfully clean up yogurt or do the dishes. His human experience shows that all of our human experience matters and all of it can be done for God’s glory. That means all the work of motherhood matters and through it, we can be the servant who is where her master is.
“Unless the seed dies it remains alone,” Jesus said. Every day of motherhood, we get to take our little insignificant seed and put it in the earth. We get to choose to bury our selfishness and pride. We get to water it over and over by loving and serving our families. We get to follow our Savior on the path of true glory. And then, we get to trust and wait to see what God is doing beneath the surface, how he is multiplying our imperfect sacrifices for the glory of his name and the fruitfulness of his kingdom.
So, if you’ve got syrup in your hair or your perfume is “scent-of-spit-up,” if you’ve got a screaming toddler and a growing pile of laundry, you’re not alone and you’re not unseen. Christ sees. Christ knows. Christ has gone before us and shown us that glory comes through death and harvest comes through sacrifice.
Written by: Emily Schuch
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