| Devotional Hours with the Bible |
Chapter 4 |
Page 6 |
“A sword shall pierce through thy own soul.” The Bodenhausen “Madonna” shows the mother and Child, and then away in the distance, in very dim outline, the forms of three crosses. The suggestion is that even when the mother of Jesus clasped her child in her arms she had some intimation of the end to which He would come. These words of Simeon to the mother are proof enough that this was the truth. The shadow of the cross fell across the young mother, with the babe in her arms. “A sword shall pierce through thy own soul.” We know, too, how soon this word began to come true. It was but a little time till the mother had to flee to Egypt with her child to save Him from the sword of Herod.
There is another picture which represents the same truth, though at a later period. The Boy Jesus is represented at the age of thirteen in the carpenter shop, and as He stretches out His arms at the close of the day, the western sun casts His shadow in the form of a cross, on which the mother looks with pained face as prophetic of His end. Many times also in the years of His public ministry the mother’s heart must have been pierced when the sword of human hate struck at Jesus. Then, when she stood below His cross, there came the worst of all the thrusting hers foreshadowed. Whenever a child suffers in any way, the mother’s heart is pierced.
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