Mother’s Day is just around the corner. Maybe that’s why I find myself feeling a bit melancholy. It has been twenty-five years since my mother passed away. Mom. Mama.

Time is a thief.

Certain memories rise to the surface more readily than others when I think about the incredibly strong, yet deeply vulnerable woman she was. Though decades have passed, her influence still lingers in countless ways—quietly shaping who I am even now.

As I often joke, I wasn’t born in California. I was born in Bakersfield. And for anyone familiar with “B-town,” you understand the distinction. Though I’ve been gone for nearly sixty years, John Steinbeck’s The Grapes of Wrath still serves as a fitting backdrop for understanding the place and the people who lived there.

In the mid-1960s, my parents made the decision to pull my older sister and me out of our neighborhood public school and enroll us in a private school after my sister—three years older than me—became the target of relentless bullying.

Needless to say, I was not thrilled.

Friends? Gone. Familiarity? Gone. Childhood relationships that had seemed permanent suddenly disappeared overnight.

Changing schools is difficult for any child. Changing schools in Bakersfield felt like crossing into another country.

I still remember picture day at the new school. By then I was trying to navigate unfamiliar hallways, awkward introductions, and the loneliness that comes from being “the new kid.” Like all the other students, I stood in line waiting for my turn in front of the camera.

Everyone had been carefully prepared for the occasion. Shirts were pressed. Faces were scrubbed clean. Hair was neatly combed into place. One by one, each student stepped forward for a final inspection before sitting for the camera. The attendant would straighten a collar, smooth a sleeve, and then hand each child a small comb for any last-minute touch-ups.

Everything proceeded smoothly.

Until it was my turn.

The attendant glanced at me and moved on.

No final grooming. No. comb.

At first, I thought maybe she had simply overlooked me. Surely it was a mistake. I shuffled forward awkwardly, unsure whether to say something. Then I noticed another boy in line—Richard. He had been passed over too.

Just the two of us. No one else.

No combs. No smiles. Just the quiet realization that somehow we had been singled out.

Even as a young boy, I understood enough to know what was happening. Children often understand more than adults realize. The omission may have seemed small to someone else, but to me it felt enormous. In a new school where I already felt out of place, this tiny act reinforced every insecurity I carried.

That afternoon, my mother picked me up from school as she always did. During the drive home came the standard maternal interrogation.

“How was school?”

“Fine.”

“How was picture day?”

“Fine.”

Then I added almost as an afterthought, “Everybody got a comb except me and Richard.”

There are few forces in nature more formidable than a mother defending her child. A mother bear protecting her cub comes to mind. My mother had nine cubs in her care, and she fiercely loved every single one of us.

I never learned exactly what she said to the school administration the next morning. Frankly, I’m not sure anyone survived brave enough to repeat it. But whatever words she chose carried enough weight that by the following day both Richard and I received personal apologies—and, yes, our long-overdue combs.

Looking back now, it would be easy to dismiss the incident as trivial. After all, it was only a comb.

But it was never really about the comb.

It was about dignity.

It was about being seen.

It was about a mother who refused to allow her child to quietly absorb a wound simply because others considered it insignificant.

As Mother’s Day approaches, I find myself reflecting on moments like these—small moments that revealed enormous love. My mother’s love was not merely spoken; it was demonstrated in ordinary acts of protection, advocacy, sacrifice and presence. Sometimes love looks grand and heroic. Sometimes it looks like making sure a little boy receives the same cheap plastic comb everyone else did.

The Apostle John wrote:

“See what great love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God! And that is what we are!”

Love and relationship are inseparable. The depth of one is revealed in the actions of the other.

Natalie Cole once sang of “an everlasting love…forever and ever.” I think every child who has truly been loved by a mother understands something of what she meant.

My mother loved me deeply, just as she loved all of her children. Yet even the very best human love—beautiful as it is—only hints at the greater love of our Creator, who sees us fully, knows us completely, and never passes us by unnoticed.

Not even for a comb.

Happy Mother’s Day.

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Pastor Mark

Mark, the eighth of nine children born to Reuben and Henrietta Meeks—dedicated church planters with nearly 30 congregations established across California’s Central Valley—is a preacher's kid who grew up immersed in faith and service. With over forty years of experience teaching, discipling, and ministering to communities, including the hospitalized and incarcerated, Mark responded to God's call to pastoral ministry. He holds degrees in civil engineering and public administration, as well as a Master’s in Theology from Fuller Seminary, equipping him to serve with both practical insight and spiritual depth.