Mother's Day 2016: Proverbs 31 Woman Series

Mother’s Day 2016: Proverbs 31

Scott Bayles, pastor

Blooming Grove Christian Church

Good morning, welcome to the Grove and Happy Mother’s Day!

Today is a special day because we can come together like this as a family for two primary reasons. One is to honor our God in heaven. The other is to honor our moms on earth. Both are lifetime tasks and neither can be confined to a one-hour get-together on Sunday mornings.

Putting together a Mother’s day message is always difficult because I don’t suppose that anything has ever been said or ever will be said that is eloquent enough, or expressive enough to articulate the true value of a mother. Ralph Waldo Emerson has said, “Men are what their mothers make them” and an old Spanish proverb says, “An ounce of mother is worth a pound of clergy.”

Mother's Day is the day when children give something back to their mothers for all the spit they produce to wash dirty faces, all the old gum they held in their hands, all the noses they wiped, and the scraped knees that they kissed. This is the day mothers are rewarded for washing sheets in the middle of the night, driving kids to school when they missed the bus, and enduring all those football, baseball and soccer games in the rain. It's a day of appreciation and celebration.

Heaven knows that mom deserves our appreciation and praise, doesn’t she? I’ve always been a big Calvin & Hobbes fan. One Mother’s Day Calvin gave his mom a handmade card and even composed a poem for her. So early that morning, he comes bounding into her bedroom and presents her with the card. She opens it up and reads:

I was going to buy a card with hearts of pink and red,

But then I thought I’d rather spend the money on me, instead.

It’s awfully hard to buy things when one’s allowance is so small,

So I guess you’re pretty lucky I got you anything at all!

Happy Mother’s Day to you. There, I said it. Now I’m done.

So how about getting out of bed and cooking breakfast for your son?

I hope none of you got a Mother’s Day card like that one. But just in case you’re feeling a little underappreciated, I’ve got a much better card for you today. It too, was handmade and even includes a poem—although it doesn’t rhyme. This card can be found in Proverbs 31—God’s tribute to moms, wives, and women in general.

This chapter was written by King Lemuel but the first verse says, “These are the words of King Lemuel, the message his mother taught him” (Proverbs 31:1 NCV). Isn’t that sweet? How many of you moms ever received a card from your kids using the letters in mom or mother as an acrostic? Well Proverbs 31:10-31 is very similar to that; but rather than using the word mom, it uses all the letters in the Hebrew alphabet. All twenty-two lines are dedicated to praising godly moms everywhere.

Verse 28-29 says, “Her children stand and bless her; so does her husband. He praises her with these words: ‘There are many fine women in the world, but you are the best of them all!’” (Proverbs 31:28-29 TLB). How many of you moms would love to hear your husband and children say that about you?

The last line of this inspired poem announces: “Give her the reward she has earned; she should be praised in public for what she has done” (Proverbs 31:31 NCV). That’s what we want to do this morning. We want to praise the moms of the Grove for what they do in our lives. So what makes moms so praiseworthy?

The rest of Proverbs 31 offers at least three characteristics of a praiseworthy mom. First of all, a praiseworthy mom is a valuable wife!

• A VALUABLE WIFE

It may seem counterintuitive, but the first quality of a praiseworthy mom, has nothing to do with motherhood. Rather, King Lemuel begins his acrostic, saying, “If you can find a truly good wife, she is worth more than precious gems! Her husband can trust her, and she will richly satisfy his needs. She will not hinder him but help him all her life” (Proverbs 31:10-12 TLB).

Now, I realize that there are some single mothers out there that are raising the kids and paying the bills all on their own and God bless them. I think we ought to encourage those moms and help them out as much as we can. But that certainly wasn’t God design for the home. No, God intended for parenting to be a team effort.

And the first characteristic of a Proverbs 31 mom is being a valuable wife—worth more than rubies and diamonds. Notice how the Bible describes her relationship with her husband. Their relationship is built on trust, they’re meeting each other’s needs (physically and emotionally), and they help each other, working together as a team.