There is a common myth among women that says “having children makes one a mother.” This notion is as silly as believing that having a piano makes one a musician. That’s because it takes a special kind of woman to be what the Bible defines as a mother.
The biblical word translated “mother” is the Hebrew word “AME” (pronounced “ah-may”), and means, “the bond of the family.” “The word also signifies a force that strengthens and holds things together.”
Though we don’t wish to lessen the importance of the father’s role in the family, I think we must confess today that mom is really the glue that holds the family together.
A father tells the story of when his family moved cross-country and he and his wife had to drive both of their cars.
His eight-year-old, worriedly asked, "How will we keep from getting separated?"
"We'll drive slowly so that one car can follow the other," the father reassured his son.
"Yeah, but what if we DO get separated?" his son persisted.
"Well, then I guess we'll never see each other again," he joked.
"Okay," said his son. "I'm riding with Mom."
In Isaiah 49:15 the question is asked, "Can a mother forget the baby at her breast and have no compassion on the child she has borne?” There is something about a mother’s love.
* It is the love that causes a graduate to look in a crowd of thousands for the face of his or her mother.
* It is the love that causes an athlete on national television to say to the camera, “Hi Mom!”
* It is the love that makes a crying baby hush when he hears Mama’s voice.
Today we are going to turn to the Bible to learn more about a mother’s love.
1.) A Mother’s Love Protects Her Child
2.) A Mother’s Love Provides for Her Child
3.) A Mother’s Love Promotes Her Child
4.) A Mother’s Love Preserves Her Child
1.) A Mother’s Love Protects Her Child
King Solomon was one of the wisest men outside of our Lord Jesus Christ who was wisdom personified. You may remember where the Bible records the LORD appearing to Solomon during the night in a dream and saying to him, "Ask for whatever you want me to give you."
Solomon asks God for discernment to govern God’s people and to distinguish between right and wrong.
In 1 Kings 3:11 -13 God says to him, "Since you have asked for this and not for long life or wealth for yourself, nor have asked for the death of your enemies but for discernment in administering justice, I will do what you have asked. I will give you a wise and discerning heart, so that there will never have been anyone like you, nor will there ever be. Moreover, I will give you what you have not asked for--both riches and honor--so that in your lifetime you will have no equal among kings”.
It wasn’t too long before Solomon would have to use this gift of wisdom. The Bible says that two prostitutes came to the king and stood before him. One of them said, "My lord, this woman and I live in the same house. I had a baby while she was there with me. The third day after my child was born, this woman also had a baby. We were alone; there was no one in the house but the two of us.
During the night this woman's son died because she lay on him. So she got up in the middle of the night and took my son from my side while I your servant was asleep. She put him by her breast and put her dead son by my breast. The next morning, I got up to nurse my son--and he was dead! But when I looked at him closely in the morning light, I saw that it wasn't the son I had borne." The other woman said, "Are you crazy! The living one is my son; the dead one is yours."
But the first one insisted, "You must be on crack! The dead one is yours; the living one is mine." And so they argued before the king. (Brooks’ paraphrase)
So then Solomon says, "One of you says, 'This is my son, who lives, and your son is the dead one'; and the other says, 'No! But your son is the dead one, and my son is the living one.'"
Here is when we see the Wisdom of Solomon on display. Solomon says, "Bring me a sword." So they brought a sword before the king. And the king said, "Divide the living child in two, and give half to one, and half to the other."
Now here is where we see a mother’s love in action. The Bible says, “ Then the woman whose son was living spoke to the king, for she yearned with compassion for her son; and she said, "O my lord, give her the living child, and by no means kill him!" But the other said, "Let him be neither mine nor yours, but divide him."
So the king answered and said, "Give the first woman the living child, and by no means kill him; she is his mother." (1 Kings 3:16-27)
Let me make a note here: Unless a mother is highly abnormal, she has a natural, God-given love for her children. This love often moves her to do some pretty heroic things in order to protect them.
About 6:00 A.M. on a Wednesday morning James Lawson of Running Springs, California (in the San Bernardino mountains) left home to apply for a job. About an hour later his thirty-six-year-old wife, Patsy left for her fifth grade teaching job down the mountain in Riverside, accompanied by her two children, five-year-old Susan and two-year-old Gerald, to be dropped off at the babysitter’s.
Unfortunately, they never got that far. Eight and a half hours later the man found his wife and daughter dead in their wrecked car, upside down in a cold mountain stream. His two-year-old son was just barely alive in the forty-eight degree water.
But in Patsy’s death the character of a mother was revealed in a most dramatic and heart-rending way. For when the father scrambled down the cliff to what he was sure were the cries of his dying wife, he found her locked in death, holding her little boy’s head just above water in the submerged car. For eight and a half hours Patsy Lawson had held her beloved toddler afloat and had finally died, her body almost frozen in death in that position of self-giving love, holding her baby up to breathe. She died that another might live. That’s the essence of a mother’s love.
Muscular Mother
A Time.com article starts out saying that in a crisis, the human body is capable of superhuman feats. Last week, by way of demonstration, a slender, ailing woman lifted the rear of a 3,300-lb. car.
Maxwell and Florence Rogers were sitting in their kitchen in Tampa. Fla. when a youngster rushed in yelling that the car had fallen on their son Charles, age 16. Husband and wife dashed out to the yard where the teen had blocked the front wheels and jacked up the rear of their 1954 Ford Ranch Wagon to work on the universal joints. The bumper jack had slipped, and Charles's right leg was pinned between the car body and the driveshaft.
The husband knew that nobody could raise the car by hand, so he started to fiddle with the jack. But the mother, Florence Rogers, 39, a 5-ft. 7-in. woman of 123 lbs., went right ahead and grabbed the rear bumper in the middle. She kept her legs straight and simply heaved with her arm and trunk muscles. The car rose enough for Charles to scramble out, with only minor bruises. But as it rose, Mrs. Rogers felt something snap in her back. X rays disclosed a compression fracture, with one vertebra crushed. But despite the injury to her spinal column, she suffered no paralysis. She was fitted with a special brace and spent some time in the hospital.
What amazes Mrs. Rogers' physician, Dr. William A. Moore III, is the fact that she could have exerted herself at all. She had been ill at home for two weeks, recovering from a rheumatic disorder of the left knee and an attack of thrombophlebitis in her right leg. This begs the question: “How high might she have lifted the car if she had been in good physical shape?”
There are numerous accounts of women exerting superhuman strength to lift heavy objects off their children or running into danger to save their children because a mother’s love protects her child.
But we can’t leave this section and go on to the next until we at least mention the love of one more mother; the mother of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.
In Luke chapter 2, forty days after Mary had given birth to our Lord, she and Joseph had brought Him to Jerusalem in accordance with the Law of Moses to be dedicated. While in the temple, a just and devout man named Simeon entered into the temple and took Jesus in his arms and blessed God said the following:
Luke 2:29 "Lord, now You are letting Your servant depart in peace, According to Your word;
Luke 2:30 For my eyes have seen Your salvation
Luke 2:31 Which You have prepared before the face of all peoples,
Luke 2:32 A light to bring revelation to the Gentiles, And the glory of Your people Israel."
The Bible says in verse 33 that “Joseph and His mother marveled at those things which were spoken of Him” and then “Simeon blessed them” and now notice what he says to Mary, our Lord’s mother:
"Behold, this Child is destined for the fall and rising of many in Israel, and for a sign which will be spoken against "(yes, a sword will pierce through your own soul also), that the thoughts of many hearts may be revealed."
Imagine as a mother, having been told when your baby is less that two months old that he will one day be the cause of sorrow entering your heart as “a sword pierces one’s soul.”
The movie The Passion of the Christ does a good job and shows the fulfillment of Simeon’s prophecy as Jesus is brutally beaten while His mother Mary watches from a distance.
Isaiah 53:2 says, “He has no form or comeliness; And when we see Him, There is no beauty that we should desire Him.” In other words, Jesus was beaten so badly that He was virtually unrecognizable.
Some have written that He was “beaten to a pulp.” And John 19:25 says, “Now there stood by the cross of Jesus His mother…”
Mary undoubtedly followed her son from Pilate’s courtyard, down the Via Dolorosa as Jesus carried His cross, to the hill of Golgotha.
She witnessed the guards driving the nails into His hands and feet.
No doubt she saw them shove the crown of thorns upon His brow.
I believe that if God hadn’t already prophesied that this would happen, Mary would have given her own life to protect her Son’s life. But she knew that the suffering of Christ was part of God’s plan so that our sins, yeah, even her own sin, would be forgiven. Jesus, Mary’s Baby, died so that we might live.
A mother’s love protects her child!
2.) A Mother’s Love Provides for Her Child
Upon graduating from high school I left home in the fall of that year to live in New Jersey to attend tech school. I was 18-years-old and My Mom would send me letters each week and I would like to share some excerpts from some of those letters from a mom to her son.
10/1/76
Chuck, Here’s $25.00 please stretch it. I will send you some next weekend so you can get home. Be careful and you can call if you get lonesome.
We really miss you around here. I am going to draw $50.00 out of your account next week and send it to you to open up a savings account up there so that you can use it for identification. A money order would be hard for you to cash without a bank account. That's why I’m sending this registered mail and it costs too much.
Love Mom
10/8/76
Dear Chuck,
Here’s $40.00. May it last to bring you home. Here is also a check for 50.00 to open up a savings account. This money is to be left in the account at all times so that if I would send you a check for $20.00 or so they will go on and cash it for you or you can deposit it and withdraw the $20.00 that the check was for because you have that much in the ban already. I hope you understand what I am saying.
Also when you open the account put me down as the beneficiary that in case anything should happen to you (God forbid) you will have a beneficiary. Just remember all I ask is that you try to do what I ask because I want to see you succeed.
One more thing… Please be careful coming home. If you leave Friday evening you will have plenty of time to get home. Take rest breaks too. I guess you say “Mom don’t think I can take care of myself” but I do; I just wouldn’t be a good mother if I didn’t worry about the ones I love.
See you when you get home.
Love Mom
It is not hard to see from these excerpts that a mother’s love provides for her child.
The truth about moms is that they may do without, but their kids won’t, if they can help it.
Someone has said, “A mother is a person who, seeing there are only four pieces of pie for five people, promptly announces she never did care for pie” (Judah Thomas).
I cannot count the times when I have had to say to my wife Debbie, “Buy something for you.” She takes the little money she makes from selling Avon products and spends it on the kids. Not only that but she has sacrificed a career so she might home educate our children for the last 19 years.
But these are the kind of the things that a mother’s love does. There are mothers that have to work sometimes as much as 12 hours a day and then come home with just enough energy to cook dinner, sit and help their children with school work and clean the house.
Prov 31:14 She is like the merchant ships, She brings her food from afar.
Prov 31:15 She also rises while it is yet night, And provides food for her household, And a portion for her maidservants.
Prov 31:21 She is not afraid of snow for her household, For all her household is clothed with scarlet.
Prov 31:27 She watches over the ways of her household, And does not eat the bread of idleness.
A mother’s love provides for her child.
3.) A Mother’s Love Promotes Her Child
A mother wants her children to be successful. She will do most anything to ensure her children are successful. But sometimes this desire to see her children succeed can become a fatal flaw in the lives of many a mother.
Rebekah wanted her favorite son Jacob to receive the birthright from Isaac rather than Esau, the firstborn. So she concocts a plan to deceive her husband into pronouncing the blessing of the firstborn on the younger son. (Gen 27:6-40)
In the New Testament we find in Matthew chapter 20, the mother of James and John coming to Jesus with her sons, kneeling down and asking, "Grant that these two sons of mine may sit, one on Your right hand and the other on the left, in Your kingdom."
Jesus responded that neither this mom nor her sons really knew what they were asking. Could her sons drink the cup of suffering that Jesus was going to drink? Were her sons able to be baptized with the baptism of suffering that Jesus was going to experience?
Mrs. Zebedee didn’t know what she was asking for her sons and sometimes a mother’s love can get in the way of rational thinking. Sometimes a mother’s love can “fog the lenses” of sound judgment.
How many teachers have faced the blind wrath of a mother’s love when “Little Johnny” or “Susie” did something bad in class? “Not my Johnny” they say. A mother’s love sees Johnny and Suzie as their “little baby.” Johnny can be 40 years old and he will always be his mama’s baby.
Let me share with you how the Bible teaches a mother should promote her child. A mother’s love naturally wants her child to succeed. A mother’s love naturally wants her child to “make something of himself.”
Generally speaking, this love often translates into plans for a child to make it through college. It translates into the child one day getting a good job. Some mothers would love to see their children be successful in sports and bring home the millions and buy mama a house.
But the Bible teaches that there are other reasons for seeing success built into the lives of our children.
Jesus says in Matthew 16:26, "For what profit is it to a man if he gains the whole world, and loses his own soul? Or what will a man give in exchange for his soul?”
In 1 Timothy chapter two, the Holy Spirit through the Apostle Paul gives insight into how a mother’s love can promote her child. The promotion she seeks for her child can actually align with God’s purposes since the creation of humanity.
(1 Tim 2:14 NKJV) And Adam was not deceived, but the woman being deceived, fell into transgression.
Paul looks back in history to the time when God allowed Adam and Eve to eat the fruit of any of the trees in the Garden but one, the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil. (Genesis 2:17)
Satan beguiled or deceived Eve and the Bible tells us and she ate the forbidden fruit (Genesis 3:6). Of course we know that she gave the fruit to her husband Adam and he ate and the whole human race was plunged headlong under the curse of sin and the penalty for sin which was death. (Romans 5:12)
God’s punishment for Eve’s disobedience was that daughters of Eve (women throughout history) would suffer pain in giving birth to children. Before the fall, God told the couple they would be fruitful and multiply. Now Eve and her daughters would have to give birth to children in pain.
With Genesis 3:16 and its link between Eve's sin and the pain of childbearing still in mind, Paul in 1 Timothy 2:15 provides a note of comfort.
(1 Tim 2:15 NKJV) Nevertheless she will be saved in childbearing if they continue in faith, love, and holiness, with self-control.
The Bible is letting us know that the godly behavior of a woman (shown by her faith, love and holiness with self-control) will be rewarded as she joined her Creator in the process of producing a generation of children who will come to know God through His Son, Jesus Christ.
When a woman is willing to bring life into the world and nurture that life physically and spiritually, she is obedient to the redemptive plan of God that mandates believers produce children who will become ambassadors of Christ. What a promotion!
It’s okay to be focused on the natural. Get them into college. Let them land a job, buy their first home—be a “mover and a shaker.”
The saying, “The hand that rocks the cradle, rules the world” is true. A mother can influence the world, positively or negatively, for good or for evil, through how she raises her children.
But sadly, many Christian mothers (and fathers) got their priorities wrong. Listen to the words of Psalms 127:
Psa 127:3 Behold, children are a heritage from the LORD, The fruit of the womb is a reward.
Psa 127:4 Like arrows in the hand of a warrior, So are the children of one's youth.
Psa 127:5 Happy is the man who has his quiver full of them;
Psalm 127:3 says that children must always be looked upon as belonging to the Lord. They are a sacred trust, a holy heritage. The rabbis of old declared that a child has three parents: God, his father, and his mother (cf. Gen. 20:17, 18; 30:1, 2). The first parent of our children, God, is holding mothers and fathers accountable for their stewardship of parenthood.
The Bible teaches that Christians are warriors. 1 Timothy 6:12 says we are to “Fight the good fight of faith.” Ephesians 6 says we are to “Put on the whole armor of God.” 2 Timothy 2:3 says that we are to “endure hardship as a good soldier of Jesus Christ.”
Psalm 127:4 says that our children are “like arrows in the hand of a warrior.” Verse five says, “Happy is the man who has his quiver full of them.” As soldiers of Jesus Christ we fight against the evil that results from sin, by rearing our children in the fear and admonition of the Lord and launching them out as arrows into the world with their spearheads coated with the Gospel.
This is biblical promotion. A mother’s love will promote her child in the things of Christ—the things that have eternal value; the things that moths won’t eat, rust won’t corrupt and thieves won’t break in and steal.
It is one thing to be proud because your child “made the team,” or “is the high scorer;” “got straight A’s,” “finished school,” “graduated from college,” “got his or her own wheels,” “bought his own house and is living large with all the “bling blings of life” but have you encouraged them on in the things of God?
This life will soon be past; only what’s done for Christ will last. I’d rather my children be poor in the things of this world but rich in faith toward God.
A mother’s love promotes her child. The Bible teaches that she ought to promote her child or encourage him or her to be successful in the things of God. This leads us to our last point.
4.) A Mother’s Love Preserves Her Child
This is different from the mother’s love that protects her child. A mother’s protection goes only so far.
You can only go but so far in protecting your child from the hurts and pains of life.
You can only go but so far in protecting your child from evil people.
You can make sure that your children eat properly and get proper medical care but somehow, some way they still come down with illnesses and disease.
You can send your children to the finest schools in order to protect them from illiteracy, ignorance and poverty.
But this kind of protection can only go but so far.
You can try to protect your child from the hurts and pains of life and from evil and disease but you are not your child’s shadow. You cannot follow them everywhere and even if you could, life still seems to have the advantage over even the most loving of parents.
This is why we need to talk about preservation. A mother’s love preserves her child.
We are living in a time where more and more of our children are dying. It is not uncommon to see on the news the report of some young person who was “just about to graduate” or who “just attended the prom” or who “recently graduated” becoming the victim of some crime or some accident.
This is why we need to talk about preservation. A mother’s love preserves her child.
What do I mean when I use the word preserve?
Paul uses the word in 1 Thessalonians 5:23: “Now may the God of peace Himself sanctify you completely; and may your whole spirit, soul, and body be preserved blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ.”
The word “preserved” comes from the Greek word tereo, tay-reh'-o and means “to guard from loss” or “to guard from injury” by keeping the eye upon
It is also used in Jude 1:1 where Jude begins his letter writing, “To those who are called, sanctified by God the Father, and preserved in Jesus Christ…”
Jude is not speaking of a physical preservation. He is writing of a spiritual preservation.
A mother’s love ensures that her child is preserved in Jesus Christ. A mother’s love makes sure that her child comes to know Jesus Christ as the Forgiver of his or her sins and the Boss or Master of their lives.
A mother’s love doesn’t wait until little Johnny is “old enough to make us his own mind.” A mother’s love doesn’t let little Susie “grow up and decide for herself which religion she will give her life to.”
We find a portrait of motherly preservation in Psalm 22:9-10 where David lets us know that preservation starts from the womb, “But You are He who took Me out of the womb; You made Me trust while on My mother's breasts. I was cast upon You from birth. From My mother's womb You have been My God.”
The Scriptures also teach that the preservation of children continues as they progress through the various stages of their life. Proverbs 22:6 - “Train up a child in the way he should go, And when he is old he will not depart from it.”
Most criminals become criminals because they weren’t preserved. Neglect in the things of God begins before birth. Psalm 58:3 says, “The wicked are estranged from the womb; They go astray as soon as they are born, speaking lies.”
But a mother’s love preserves her child!
In 2 Timothy 1:5 Paul speaks to Timothy, a young pastor, the following words: “…when I call to remembrance the genuine faith that is in you, which dwelt first in your grandmother Lois and your mother Eunice, and I am persuaded is in you also.”
This “genuine faith” that Paul saw in Timothy, he acknowledges was first in Timothy’s grandmother, Lois. Are you a grandmother? Does this “genuine faith” dwell in you? Do you know Jesus? Have you passed this “faith in Jesus” down to your grandchildren?
These days, grandparents are getting younger and younger. My wife and I became grandparents in our mid-thirties. Many are becoming grandparents even younger.
When I was growing up the stereotypical image of the grandmother had her sitting in a rocking chair, knitting a blanket. But today your grandmother may be in the corporate world wearing a business suit and carrying a laptop. To stay in shape she works out in her spandex at the gym. She parties on the weekend.
Some of our grandmothers these days are very young and are running around with lives as unsettled as their children—and then they complain about how “out of control” their grandchildren are when they ought to admit that what they see is what they have passed on.
But Timothy’s grandmother’s “genuine faith” was passed on to her daughter Eunice. Eunice then imparted this faith to her son Timothy.
Let me say something here. If you read through this passage in 2 Timothy chapter one, you will find no mention of Timothy’s father. He was either dead or deadbeat.
Timothy received his spiritual legacy from his grandmother and mother. This tells us that we can’t always blame the behavior of our children on the fact that there is no man around the house. Could it be that too many single moms are using an absent father as an excuse?
In 2 Timothy 3:14-15 Paul further exhorts Timothy, “But you must continue in the things which you have learned and been assured of, knowing from whom you have learned them, and that from childhood you have known the Holy Scriptures, which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith which is in Christ Jesus.”
Timothy was taught the Scriptures from a child. What are you teaching your children?
He knows all the latest raps and the latest dance steps.
She knows the top six American Idol contestants.
She knows how to model; he knows how to pay ball.
He knows his math; she knows classic literature.
Timothy’s grandmother Lois reared her daughter Eunice in the things of the Lord. Her love as a mother preserved her daughter so that she might do the will of God. Eunice, Timothy’s mother, taught her son the Holy Scriptures, which brought him to faith in Jesus Christ.
There is no vocation in the world more important than making certain that your children know the Lord.
* If your children know Christ then they will be with Christ for all eternity. – “To be absent from the body is to be present with the Lord.” (2 Cor. 5:8)
* If your children know Christ and you know Christ then you will be together as a family for all eternity. 1 Thess. 4:17 says “Together…we will always be with the Lord.”
* If your child knows Christ he or she will have a better opportunity of being successful in life. Jesus in Mat. 6:33 says "But seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things shall be added to you.”
* If your children know Christ and their spouses know Christ their marriages have a higher probability of withstanding the pressures of life that lead to divorce.
* If your child knows Christ he will stay clear of most trouble; he will hang out with a righteous gang-- 1 Corinthians 15:33 says it is "Evil company (that) corrupts good habits."
* If your children know Christ then you will be better off as an elderly person. The Bible says in Ephesians 6:2-3 "Honor your father and mother," which is the first commandment with promise: "that it may be well with you and you may live long on the earth." If your children know Christ and have a heart to obey Him, they are going to take care of their parents in their old age!
A Mother’s Love Protects Her Child; A Mother’s Love Provides for Her Child; A Mother’s Love Promotes Her Child; A Mother’s Love Preserves Her Child
