Ben Austrian (1870-1921). Hen with Baby Chicks. Circa 1915. Cropped. Reading Public Museum, Reading, PA. Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons, https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Ben_Austrian_-_Hen_with_Baby_Chicks_-_2009.3.1_-_Reading_Public_Museum.jpg.
Tom Faletti
August 22, 2025
Matthew 23:37-39 Jesus yearns for the people of Jerusalem like a mother hen for her chicks
We have completed the material Matthew has gathered together regarding the confrontations between Jesus and the leaders of the various factions of Jews in Jerusalem. Matthew ends with a passage that is very different but is connected by the fact that both this passage and the previous passage refer to the killing of prophets sent by God. But the tone in this passage is different.
In the previous passage, where Jesus is uttering woes against the scribes and Pharisees, it would be natural to assume that Jesus’s tone was stern and judging. What is his tone in this passage?
How does he feel about Jerusalem?
What does the image of a mother hen gathering her chicks under her wings tell you about Jesus?
How does a mother’s love portray God’s feelings toward us?
This is not the only passage in the Bible that presents God using maternal images.
Read Isaiah 49:13-15
As they struggle in exile, how does verse 14 describe how God’s people (the people of Zion) are feeling?
They are feeling forsaken or forgotten by God.
How does God respond in verse 15?
God describes his relationship with them as like that of a woman and her infant, saying: “Can a woman forget her nursing child, / or show no compassion for the child up for womb? / Even these may forget, / yet I will not forget you” (Isaiah 49:15, NRSV). God is to his people like a mother to her nursing babe.
What does this tell you about God’s relationship with us and love for us?
Read Isaiah 66:13
In this portion of Isaiah, the prophet is describing the future restoration of Israel. What does God say in this verse?
God says, “As a mother comforts her child, / so I will comfort you” (Isaiah 66:13, NRSV).
How is the image of a mother comforting her child a helpful image of God’s concern for us?
Read Psalm 131
How does the psalmist describe his approach to God?
The psalmist says, “I have calmed and quieted my soul, / like a weaned child with its mother” (Psalm 131:2, NRSV).
The psalmist could have said “father” – the child has been weaned, so this is not a nursing image. But here he pictures the peace and security he finds in the presence of God as being like a child leaning into the embrace of its mother. How does that enhance our image of God’s love for us?
Can you picture yourself leaning into God’s embrace like a child to its mother? How does that make you feel?
Does this image add anything to your usual image of your relationship with God?
Read Hosea 11:1-4
Although the people of Israel have not been faithful to God, how does God describe his relationship with them?
This is not an exclusively maternal image of God, but certainly has maternal overtones. When God says he taught his people to walk, “took them in my arms,” cared for them with love like those who “lift an infant to their cheeks,” and “bent down to feed them,” how does that remind us of a mother?
Do you feel like God is helping you to grow and develop the way a mother nurtures her child? How is this image helpful?
These few verses cannot be used to construct a theology for calling God “Mother,” especially considering the massive counterweight of biblical language that explicitly calls God “Father.” Since God is not a material creature, he is neither male nor female. But he chose to become a member of the human family as a male, and Jesus called God his “Father.” That is not something to be rejected. So it is appropriate to call God “Father.”
Nevertheless, Jesus and Old Testament writers occasionally used the metaphor of a loving mother to express God’s love for us, which offers us the opportunity to explore the value of that metaphor in understanding how much God loves us.
Go back and re-read Matthew 23:37-39.
Imagine being swept up into Jesus’s arms, or under his wings. How does that make you feel? What does Jesus want you to understand about yourself and him, in these words he spoke?
Notice that Jesus’s words imply that he has been in Jerusalem many times previously. Matthew and the other synoptic Gospels tell Jesus’s story as though his public ministry included only one visit to Jerusalem. John’s Gospel shows that he has been there multiple times. Luke 3:41 tells us that Mary and Joseph and the child Jeus went to Jerusalem for Passover every year. It is unlikely that he would have stopped the practice as an adult. So Matthew’s Gospel, despite how much it covers, still only presents part of Jesus’s life in the public eye.
Picture Jesus traveling to Jerusalem (like a pilgrimage) every year for the Passover sacrifice. What does that add to your understanding of his life?
In verse 38, “your house” means Jerusalem – Jerusalem will be left desolate. This is another instance of Matthew alluding to the destruction of Jerusalem in AD 70, after the time when Jesus spoke but before Matthew wrote his Gospel.
Since Jesus has already had his dramatic entrance into Jerusalem in Matthew 21:1-11, where the people cried out, “Blessed is he who come in the name of the Lord,” verse 39 can’ be interpreted as a reference to that day. Therefore, verse 39 is often interpreted as referring to the Second Coming, when Jesus will come in glory for the final judgment. That make sense in the context of what is coming in the next two chapters, which are about the Second Coming and the Final Judgment.
Everyone will face a final judgment at the end of their life. Jesus shows patience rather than calling for an immediate punishment upon the people in Jerusalem who oppose him. How has he treated you with similar patience?
How might we imitate Jesus’s love for people even when they are rejecting him?
How might we imitate Jesus’s love for people even when they are rejecting us?
Take a step back and consider this:
In Psalm 131, the psalmist says, “I have calmed and quieted my soul, / like a weaned child with its mother” (Psalm 131:2, NRSV). You can imagine him simply being present to God: not trying to direct the conversation, not imploring God to do one thing or another, just being with God, as young child in its mother’s arms.
The next time you have a quiet time with God, don’t start with your requests and petitions. Don’t start with your sins. Start by just being with God, like a child with its mother. Jesus wants to bring all of us under his wing, close to himself. Spend some time resting in the peace of knowing that Jesus is near you and wants you near him. Like a child, lean in and enjoy just being with God.
What effect does this kind of prayer, just resting in the arms of God like a child with its mother, have on you?
How can responding to Jesus’s desire to gather you under his wings change your spiritual life?
Bibliography
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