The Sixteenth Sunday after Trinity
The Sixteenth Sunday after Trinity
September 20, 2026
St. Luke 7:11-17
Dear brothers and sisters in Christ,
The famous novelist Agatha Christie once wrote,
“A mother’s love for her child is like nothing else in the world. It knows no law, no pity. It dares all things and crushes down remorselessly all that stands in its path.”
When I hear this quote, I think of the common saying, “Don’t mess with a momma bear.” I say this endearingly, too.
A mother’s love is special; what won’t a mother do for her son or daughter? What lengths will she go to comfort and protect her little one? How many mothers would give up their lives for the life of their child?
Watching and following Lindsay Clancy’s recent court proceedings has been very challenging. For those unfamiliar, Lindsay Clancy faced trial in Massachusetts for the killing of her three young children. Ultimately, the judge declared a mistrial as the jurors couldn't agree unanimously on her guilt or innocence.
The central issue of the trial was whether Mrs. Clancy was aware of her actions, mentally stable, or affected by postpartum depression, experienced by 1 in 7 women, or, more severely, postpartum psychosis, a rare but very serious psychiatric crisis.
Now, I’m not going to act as an expert on her mental health or anyone else’s, for that matter, but this particular situation has raised many arguments and discussions across the spectrum of beliefs.
In some corners of society, Mrs. Clancy is viewed differently: some see her as a victim deserving sympathy due to the medical system’s failure to protect her, while others see her as a murderer who must be held accountable for her terrible crimes.
Ultimately, none of us can truly know her heart or her mental state at that moment. Instead, we should pray for her, for justice according to God's will, for the father who will never hold his children again, and for the three young lives lost to be welcomed into our heavenly Father’s presence.
But all of this is difficult for us because, again, when we imagine a mother, we envision that Mama Bear with immense love for her child.
And this has been true since the beginning of time.
In our Old Testament reading, the son of a widow dies; the mother immediately says to Elijah, “What have you against me, o man of God? You have come to me to bring my sin to remembrance and to cause the death of my son!” (1 Kings 17:18-19)
The widow initially viewed Elijah’s words as condemning, perceiving them as exposing her sin and linking them to her son’s death. She openly expressed her thoughts to Elijah. However, once Elijah restores her son to life and reunites him with her, she recognizes that Elijah’s words truly come from the Lord, offering life and salvation and hinting at the greater resurrection through Jesus.
Earlier in First Kings, there’s a story involving mothers: two prostitutes living in the same house each had a baby. One mother accidentally rolled onto her newborn during the night and killed him. Seeing what happened, she took the other woman’s child and put her dead child in the woman’s bed. In the morning, when she realized the child was not hers, a conflict broke out over who had the right to the living child. They brought their case to King Solomon, who finally addressed them.
“Bring me a sword.” So a sword was brought before the king. And the king said, “Divide the living child in two, and give half to the one and half to the other.” Then the woman whose son was alive said to the king, because her heart yearned for her son, “Oh, my lord, give her the living child, and by no means put him to death.” But the other said, “He shall be neither mine nor yours; divide him.” (1 Kings 3:24-26)
Once more, it is a mother’s love for her child. Out of love, she would rather give up her child to be raised by someone else than see their life end. (This beautifully illustrates adoption, where a mother unable to care for her child entrusts them to another.)
Again, in the Gospel today, we hear of another mother, another widow, whose son has died. There’s no commentary on how the death occurred, what the cause of death was; all that we know is that the corpse was being taken to the grave, where it would be laid to rest and placed into the earth.
The mother, the widow, was following behind the corpse. As a widow, this day meant she was destined to be poor, with no one caring for her. But here comes Jesus, and He sees her need and has σπλαγχνίζομαι for the woman. He has compassion.
σπλαγχνίζομαι is a deep feeling of pity and sympathy that proceeds from one’s innermost being, from the very bowels of Jesus.
Jesus goes to the woman, shows compassion, and says, “Do not weep.”
What unfolds before this mother’s eyes foreshadows the day when life and death will contend on the cross of Calvary. It foreshadows that Jesus is the Lord of life, that death cannot defeat Him, and that the grave will not contain Him.
So Jesus not only says to the young man, “I say to you arise,” but he touches death with His hands; He takes into His own flesh the sin and death that resided in the young man and gave him His life.
Once more, all of this points us to the cross, where the struggle between life and death is evident, and where Mary, the mother of our Lord, stands at the foot of His cross, watching with sadness as tears fill her eyes. She could do nothing. The boy she conceived, gave birth to, nurtured, and watched grow, whom she would do anything for, hung there for the salvation of the world.
In this moment, it was not Mary’s will be done, but her Father’s, who is in heaven.
Gut-wrenching it had to be, to witness the death of a child, no matter the age. No matter the mother, from a prostitute to the mother of our Lord.
In these biblical stories of mothers and their love for their children, we see a love that defies law and protects at all costs, even if it means destroying anything in their path. This makes it hard to understand how a mother of three could harm her children.
For good reason, you should struggle with what happened to those three little children in Massachusetts.
It’s not normal, it’s not okay, and it requires our prayers.
But we must also understand that the cause of death, for all of us, is sin. The sin that breeds anger in the hearts of some to viciously take life, the sin that alters the chemicals of the brain so one does not act as they ought, the sin that leads to the grave.
Our society and culture still struggle with the tension between life and death, but the faithful know that victory has already been achieved, and it’s the Church’s role to be the voice of that triumph. We allow ourselves to feel deep pity, sympathy, and compassion. We adopt a posture of prayer for all women who are pregnant, seeking their well-being and joyful births. We should also pray for women facing infertility, miscarriages, and the emptiness of childlessness. Additionally, we must pray for those suffering from mental illness or satanic attacks, asking that they be strengthened through the Gospel, the good news of Jesus Christ, their Savior and the Savior of all children.
We must bring the hurting, ourselves included, to the Church, a Mother above all mothers, where life and death have already fought. Like an umbilical cord, the Church is where life and salvation are present for you, the source of nourishment, faith, and safety from the darkness of the world.
St. Cyrpiran, a third-century bishop, once wrote, “He can no longer have God for his Father, who has not the Church for his mother.”
You may find this an odd statement at first, but let Martin Luther flesh it out in the Large Catechism, where he says, “The Church…is the mother that conceives and bears every Christian through God’s Word.” (Large Catechism, para 42)
And this begins at the font. At the font, we confess not only our sins, the evil thoughts that plague us and lead us into temptation and evil, but also our death with Jesus on the cross; at the font, we also confess our resurrection in Him, our new birth and life.
By your Baptism, you are a child of your heavenly Father and a member of His Church, a mother who offers comfort and refuge, even in the darkest of times. Remember this; remind your neighbor and point them to this joy, for as baptized children of God, you all belong to paradise, because your Savior Jesus Christ reaches out and touches you in your weakness and says, “arise.”
Arise to new life in Him. +INJ+
Rev. Noah J. Rogness
Pastor, Good Shepherd Lutheran Church
Tomah, WI
Good Shepherd Lutheran Church Website: www.goodsheptomah.org
The Shepherd’s Voice Podcast: https://goodsheptomah.podbean.com/
