Text: Isaiah 66:7-13
Theme: God, the mother.
(Mother is a symbol of Nursing-Caring-Comforting).
Isaiah 66:12-13: “For this is what the Lord says: “I will extend peace to her like a river, and the wealth of nations like a flooding stream; you will nurse and be carried on her arm and dandled on her knees. As a mother comforts her child, so will I comfort you; and you will be comforted over Jerusalem.”
Greetings: The Lord is good; and His Love endures forever.
Introduction: We rarely remember God as mother. We were taught to call God as “Father”. Not a physical sense but a more spiritual. “Our Father, who art in heaven…”
But Mother’s Day is as appropriate occasion to recapture the biblical maternal images for God to help us see further truths about God. “People described God in feminine terms, not because God is actually a woman, but because feminine or maternal traits say something true about God and about their experience with God.” (Japinga, Feminism and Christianity, p. 66).
‘God, the Father’ is a biblical term (e.g., 1 Thessalonians 1:1) and not ‘God, the mother’. Though, the Bible teaches us that both men and women are made in God’s image (Genesis 1:28) and are equal before God, men and women have different yet complementary roles.
Bible is very careful to address God as Father rather than mother. Bible calls God as male because of the female character was associated with sexuality in the Semitic religions. Bible doesn’t want to give an evil notion to the creator just other religions have mentioned God as sexual being produce children, mother God concepts.
But a careful attention to the Holy Scriptures reveals that God is having more motherly character (Isaiah 66:13; Isaiah 49:15; Hosea 11:3-4; Deuteronomy 32:18). God is pictured as mother bear - Hosea 13:8, mother eagle- Deuteronomy 32:11-12, comforting mother - Isaiah 66:13. God as women in labour- Isaiah 42:2. So the motherhood is celebrated by the Bible.
The fullness of God is revealed as God the Father, and God the Mother (Genesis 1:27). Liberal theologians as well as the feminist theologians emphasised God with feminine character not as weaker vessel but a strong will power to save Herod children life a lioness as well as bear.
However, bible projects men to be leaders in the home and church; and He holds men responsible for how they exercise their authority. Since God is the Ultimate Leader, His position is best conveyed in masculine terms such as Father and King (rather than Mother and Queen).
God the Father, and God the Son are both masculine titles, and the Holy Spirit is consistently referred to with masculine pronouns. God has revealed Himself as male, and He is referred to by male pronouns throughout the Bible. There is no direct references to God as female but the motherly character is revealed and more biblical.
Today, I would like to bring out the understanding of God as mother who is
A Cherishing mother,
A Compassionate Caring mother; and
A Comforting nurturing Mother.
1. Cherishing Mother. God, the nursing cherishing Mother
First of all, God is a nursing mother. The nursing of a mother include, feeding, nourishing, teaching, and passing on the core values of the faith and life. There are many bible verses emphasis on those important roles of a mother.
Deuteronomy 32:18 says that God is the one who gives birth: “You were unmindful of the Rock that bore you; you forgot the God who gave you birth.”
Moses prayed to God regarding the burden of the children of God. Numbers 11:12 ESV “Did I conceive all this people? Did I give them birth, that you should say to me, ‘Carry them in your bosom, as a nurse carries a nursing child,’ to the land that you swore to give their fathers?”
“Can a mother forget the baby at her breast and have no compassion on the child she has borne? Though she may forget, I [God] will not forget you!” (Isaiah 49:15). Nursing mother is always gentle with her child as per 1 Thessalonians 2:7 ESV Paul says that “But we were gentle among you, like a nursing mother taking care of her own children.”
Perhaps this is what God meant when he revealed himself to Abram as El-Shaddai (Genesis 17:1). The word shad means “breast” in Hebrew. Could God be calling himself “the breasted one” as some scholars suggest? Women nourish, satisfy and pour themselves out as they breastfeed their children.
The mother and grandmother of Timothy nursed him with faith, love and fear of God. 2 Timothy 1:5 ESV “I am reminded of your sincere faith, a faith that dwelt first in your grandmother Lois and your mother Eunice and now, I am sure, dwells in you as well.” Proverbs 1:8-9 ESV “Hear, my son, your father's instruction, and forsake not your mother's teaching, for they are a graceful garland for your head and pendants for your neck.”
This name may hold a promise that God will care for God’s children in the same sacrificial, life-giving way. God creates, nurtures and loves us like a mother loves her child. Scripture tells us that God’s love surpasses a mother’s love, because even if a mother could forget the child at her breast, God could never forget us (Isaiah 49:15).
God gathers His children under His wings, as in Psalm 91:4: “He will cover you with his feathers, and under his wings you will find refuge; his faithfulness will be your shield and rampart.” Covering with feathers, it is said, is something a mother bird normally does.
2. Compassionate mother
God, the caring Mother
Exodus 34:6-7. “Yahweh, Yahweh, compassionate and gracious, slow to anger, overflowing with loyal-love and faithfulness.”
This is God’s answer to Israel’s sin: he will continue to show compassion and grace to his people. He will continue to be patient with them (slow to anger), and will maintain his covenant love and the faithfulness he promised to their fathers. This is an incredibly gracious response to an incredibly deep betrayal.
The word “compassion” in Hebrew is rakhum, and it is related to the word “womb,” or rekhem. The word itself conveys the emotion and nurture that a mother has for her vulnerable child. This relationship to the word womb also gives us a sense that compassion originates in the core of a person—a gut instinct or something that you feel in your inner being. Like the root of the word compassion, the context this word occurs in draws out this nurturing emotion.
Two mothers and one child:
A case was present to King Solomon about the surviving child: 1 kings 3:16-28: compassionate mother who was a wicked and prostitute.
The word can be translated as “deeply moved,” like when Joseph weeps before his brothers. Joseph is sold into slavery by his brothers but later elevated to a position of power in Egypt. His brothers eventually appear before him and beg for help. They think Joseph is dead, so they don’t recognise him, but he knows who they are and is overcome with compassion as he weeps. But compassion isn’t only an emotion; it also motivates action. Joseph is so moved that he reveals himself to his brothers and then rescues them from starvation.
Compassion is a deep feeling that compels someone to act for another’s good. The word compassion is used to describe God’s actions. What’s really interesting is that this word often portrays God as a mother who deeply cares for her children. Compassion is the response God has when he hears his people cry out to him, much like a mother responds to the cries of her infant.
Hosea 11:3-4 God described as a mother. God said, “Yet it was I who taught Ephraim to walk, I who took them up in my arms; but they did not know that I healed them. I led them with cords of human kindness, with bands of love. I was to them like those who lift infants to their cheeks. I bent down to them and fed them.” (Psalm 86:15).
Deuteronomy 32:11-12 God described as a mother eagle: “Like the eagle that stirs up its nest, and hovers over its young, God spreads wings to catch you, and carries you on pinions.”
In our society many mothers do reflect the loving, caring, and providing nature of God better than fathers who have often failed to live up to their God-given responsibilities. Many people would testify that they have trouble with the concept of God as Father because they associate Him with their absent or abusive human fathers. The solution is to get to know God the Father as He really is, not to substitute Him with God the Mother.
Like an eagle that rouses her chicks and hovers over her young, so he spread his wings to take them up and carried them safely on his pinions. The Lord alone guided them; they followed no foreign gods.
Jesus moved with compassion:
Matthew 9:36, Jesus is "moved with compassion" when He saw the needy multitudes exhausted and wandering like sheep without shepherd that had been tattered from cruel fleecing. Twice He was "moved with compassion" when He saw the hungry multitudes without food (Matthew 14:14; 15:32). The two blind men (Matthew 20:34) and the leper (Mark 1:41) also stir His compassion, as does the sorrow of the widow at Nain (Luke 7:13). Compassion, a fundamental and distinctive quality of God, is literally "a feeling with and for others." His compassion does not fail (Lamentations 3:22).
3. Comforting mother God, the comforting Mother
The Hebrew noun em primarily refers to mother. Greek word is metros. The pictographic Hebrew script the first letter alef is a picture of an oxen Meaning strong. The second letter mem represents water. Thus in Hebrew mother represents “strong water”. The role of a mother is a central to family life who was often seven as the heart of the home. Providing emotional and spiritual support. Therefore em symbolises the one who binds the family together and specifically plays the role of nurturing and caring with in the family and society.
God is pictured as mother bear - Hosea 13:8, mother eagle- Deuteronomy 32:11-12, comforting mother - Isaiah 66:13. God as women in labour- Isaiah 42:2. So the motherhood is celebrated by the Bible.
Isaiah 66:5-13: “As a mother comforts her child, so will I [God] comfort you; and you will be comforted over Jerusalem.” (Isa. 66:13).
Matthew 23:37 and Luke 13:34 God as a Mother Hen: Jesus: “Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the city that kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to it! How often have I desired to gather your children together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings, and you were not willing?”
Luke 15:8-10 God as woman looking for her lost coin: Jesus: “Or what woman having ten silver coins, is she loses one of them, does not light a lamp, sweep the house, and search carefully until she finds it? When she has found it, she calls together her friends and neighbours saying, ‘Rejoice with me, for I have found the coin that I had lost.’ Just so, I tell you, there is joy in the presence of the angels of God over one sinner who repents.”
Conclusion:
Lamenting mother: Jeremiah 31:15: & Matthew 2:18: This is what the LORD says: “A cry is heard in Ramah— deep anguish and bitter weeping. Rachel weeps for her children, refusing to be comforted— for her children are gone.”
The Samaritan has compassion on the Jewish victim and cares for him in love (Luke 10:25-37). Finally, the father has compassion on his rebellious son (Luke 15:20). We, too, should show compassion toward others. Jesus teaches that it should be extended, not only to friends and neighbors, but to all, even to our enemies.
