3. Mothering is ….. God’s assignment.
Some mothers complain and ask “Doesn’t being a mother takes away my identity? The answer is no. I don’t think so. I am more compassionate, creative, giving and less self centered. I am more aware of the world, more involved and I learn more in general. Maybe I don’t have time to “do” things that I used to “do”, but doing things isn’t who I am. Being a mother is who I am. It is who God designed me to be. Women will do different things at different times in their lives but who you are will spill over into everything you do. So the question really is: Is our focus on ourselves or on God? What does God have in store for you?
A woman from a church we used to attend about ten years ago had three children. I wasn’t very close to this woman but we were in a group talking at a potluck or something and the topic came up about life with small children and going back to work. I don’t remember all of what she said, but one thing did stick with me, and it made me sad. She said, “After I had to watch Barney for the 100th time, I knew I had to get out of there. “ I just thought what message did that send her to her children? That they weren’t important enough? That they were wasting her time? What is that teaching the younger women of the church? To be discontent in their circumstances. This woman’s 18 year old son was in a terrible state of rebellion and her 16 year old daughter had just found out she was pregnant.
Remember, Satan hates you and he hates your children. And unfortunately he has quite a following even among believers.
Lies from Satan:
-You can’t fulfill your dreams.
-You are “stuck” at home.
-You can’t keep up with the times.
-You can’t have a real ministry.
-You can’t stay alive intellectually because you’re just going to be watching Barney all day.
Would Lois and Eunice have believed those lies when they were raising Timothy. Would Moses’s mother; Elizabeth with John the Baptist? What if Mary the mother of Jesus response had been, “No God, I can’t carry the Savior of the world because that would seriously interfere with my ‘me time’”?
How you treat your children is the framework for their learning how to treat their children. Are you setting up a framework for a Godly legacy? Are you taking your assignment seriously? If you weren’t raised in a Godly home, stop that cycle right now. Start your Godly legacy today with your own children.
Children are not young forever. How are they going to remember you? Are you living out for your children a good, Godly role model, no matter what their age? Children are not just things we dress up, change their diapers, then kick out to the culture as soon as they turn 18. We have to invest in them, love them, teach them, train them. Your children are your primary disciples. It is our children that will carry on God’s word through the generations, but they can’t do that if we are not teaching them.
Deuteronomy 6:5-9
“And you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all might.
And these words, which I am commanding you today, shall be on your heart;
And you shall teach them diligently to your sons and shall talk of them when you sit in your house and when you walk by the way and when you lie down and when you rise up.
And you shall bind them as a sign on your hand and they shall be as frontals on your forehead.”
Children will ask questions. If you don’t teach your children God’s word, they will learn something from someone. Satan is right there to teach them if you won’t.
Proverbs 1:8 and 6:20 tells children “And do not forsake the teaching of your mother”.
The entire 31st Proverb about finding a Godly wife was written to a King, by his mother.
God tells us when He gives children to us they are like arrows in the hands of a warrior. God uses that war analogy in Psalm 127 because He wants children raised up to serve in His army. God aims those arrows to penetrate a lost world. Shape your children into arrows God can use.
If you have children or have ever watched children you know taking care of children can be hard work. It is hard work to be pregnant, It’s hard work to deliver a baby. It’s not called labor for nothing!
It is hard work to nurse a baby. It is hard work to raise children, and especially hard work to raise children for God. God understands the difficulties with raising children. How many times do we act like them in regards to God; we scream, have tantrums, throw fits when we don’t get our own way. It’s no irony that God calls us “His children”. It’s hard to watch children stumble , to cry, to learn a lesson the hard way. It is hard when you are in a battle with the enemy praying over your child’s soul.
But, God’s grace is sufficient.
Hebrews 4:16
“Let us therefore draw near with confidence to the throne of grace that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need.”
Being a mother can be full of screaming, crying, tantrums, dirty diapers, throwing up, scrubbing bathrooms, sticky messes, muddy footprints, washing dishes, load after load of laundry, little sleep, no time for a shower-You are down in the trenches of motherhood, overwhelmed and you think “Is this all there is? Is this all worth it?”
Yes, it is worth it, because….. Stay tuned for part 4.
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