"The Value of Godly Motherhood"

Here are the notes from yesterday's message at New Life Community Church.  This was the Mother's Day message entitled "The Value of Godly Motherhood".  If you would like to listen to this message, you may do so by going to our website at www.newlifesite.com.  God bless!

Mother’s Day                                                                                     Sunday, May 12, 2013

 “The Value of Godly Motherhood”

God is a Father, but He is also LIKE a mother.

Disclaimer:  This does not mean that I’m into any kind of confusion such as we find in “The Shack” where God the Father is a She.  In the words of one author:  God the Father, called "Papa," is a She.  An Aunt Jemima pancake cooking Mother. Think Whoopee Goldberg in an apron.

Simply:  characteristics of fathering and mothering are both found in God.

“As a mother comforts her child, so will I comfort you; and you will be comforted over Jerusalem.”  Isaiah 66:13 (NIV)

¹⁵ “Can a woman forget her nursing child, that she should have no compassion on the son of her womb?  Even these may forget, yet I will not forget you.  ¹⁶ Behold, I have engraved you on the palms of my hands; your walls are continually before me.  Isaiah 49:15-16 (ESV)

But we proved to be gentle among you, as a nursing mother tenderly cares for her own children.  I Thessalonians 2:7 (NASB)

just as you know how we were exhorting and encouraging and imploring each one of you as a father would his own children,  I Thessalonians 2:11 (NASB)

Who can find a virtuous and capable wife?  She is more precious than rubies.  Proverbs 31:10 (NLT)

Survey Finds Worth of Moms' "Salary"

An article in Forbes asks, "Think you can put a price on motherhood?" A yearly survey by Salary.com called the annual Mom Salary Survey attempts to put a salary on the work of American mothers. First, they broke down motherly duties into the following ten categories: Day Care Center Teacher, CEO, Psychologist, Cook, Housekeeper, Laundry Machine Operator, Computer Operator, Facilities Manager, Janitor, and Van Driver. Then they studied how many hours moms work in those categories and what the family would have to pay for outsourcing that duty. According to the 2012 survey, they determined the following:

• The average stay-at-home mom should make an annual salary of $112,962 (based on a 40-hour per week base pay plus 54.7 hours a week of overtime);
• The average working mom should make an annual salary (just for her "mom" role) of $66,969 (based on 40-hours of mothering duties and 17.9 overtime hours per week).

The article concludes, "The breadth of Mom's responsibilities is beyond what most workers could ever experience day-to-day. Imagine if you had to attract and retain a candidate to fill this role?"

1.     God GAVE us mothers.

² I give you sound learning, so do not forsake my teaching.  ³ For I too was a son to my father, still tender, and cherished by my mother.  ⁴ Then he taught me, and he said to me, “Take hold of my words with all your heart; keep my commands, and you will live.  Proverbs 4:2-4 (NIV)

“When God Created Mothers"

When the Good Lord was creating mothers, He was into His sixth day of "overtime" when the angel appeared and said. "You're doing a lot of fiddling around on this one."

And God said, "Have you read the specs on this order?" She has to be completely washable, but not plastic. Have 180 moveable parts...all replaceable. Run on black coffee and leftovers. Have a lap that disappears when she stands up. A kiss that can cure anything from a broken leg to a disappointed love affair. And six pairs of hands."

The angel shook her head slowly and said. "Six pairs of hands.... no way."

It's not the hands that are causing me problems," God remarked, "it's the three pairs of eyes that mothers have to have."

That's on the standard model?" asked the angel. God nodded.

One pair that sees through closed doors when she asks, 'What are you kids doing in there?' when she already knows. Another here in the back of her head that sees what she shouldn't but what she has to know, and of course the ones here in front that can look at a child when he goofs up and say. 'I understand and I love you' without so much as uttering a word."

God," said the angel touching his sleeve gently, "Get some rest tomorrow...."

I can't," said God, "I'm so close to creating something so close to myself. Already I have one who heals herself when she is sick...can feed a family of six on one pound of hamburger...and can get a nine year old to stand under a shower."

The angel circled the model of a mother very slowly. "It's too soft," she sighed.

Oh, but it’s tough!" said God excitedly. "You can’t imagine what this mother can do or endure."

Can it think?"  asked the angel.

Not only can it think, but it can reason and compromise," said the Creator.

Finally, the angel bent over and ran her finger across the cheek.

There's a leak," she pronounced. "I told You that You were trying to put too much into this model."

It's not a leak," said the Lord, "It's a tear."

What's it for?"

It's for joy, sadness, disappointment, pain, loneliness, and pride."

You are a genius, " said the angel.

Somberly, God said, "I know.  Isn’t she wonderful?”
― Erma Bombeck, When God Created Mothers

“When your mother asks, "Do you want a piece of advice?" it's a mere formality. It doesn't matter if you answer yes or no. You're going to get it anyway.”
― Erma Bombeck

2.     God SHAPES us through our mothers.

 

¹³ For you formed my inward parts; you knitted me together in my mother's womb.  ¹⁴ I praise you, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made.  Wonderful are your works; my soul knows it very well.  Psalm 139:13-14 (ESV)

Train up a child in the way he should go; even when he is old he will not depart from it.  Proverbs 22:6 (ESV)

Surely I have calmed and quieted my soul, like a weaned child with his mother; like a weaned child is my soul within me.  Psalm 131:2 (NKJV)

Researchers Find that Babies Eavesdrop on Their Mothers

Mark Buchanan, Your Church Is Too Safe (Zondervan, 2012), pp. 16-17 | posted 4/16/2012

 [The host] was interviewing Dr. Kathleen Wermke, director of the Center for Pre-Speech Development and Developmental Disorders at the University of Wurzburg in Germany. She was flush with a new discovery. She'd recently published results from a research project comparing the cries of newborns in Germany with those of newborns in France. The research involved extensive and precise recordings in maternity wards of infants, still swaddled, mewling and wailing. Dr. Wermke digitally graphed the pitch and cadence of those cries, and then painstakingly compared, baby for baby, those cries along ethnic lines.

What they discovered stunned them: babies cry with an accent. In France, babies consistently inflect from a low to a high pitch. It's a wah-ayyy! In Germany, it's the opposite, high to low. It's an ayyy! wah. The revolutionary element in this discovery is that the intonation pattern exactly mimics the "melody" of the mother—or, more precisely, the patterns of speech characteristic of the mother's national language …. The womb-bound baby hears this, and copies it at birth.

A baby eavesdrops on its mother for nine months. It puts its ear to the rail of her bones and listens to the train of her sorrow and gladness coming for miles. The child emerges from its mother's insides with her voice ringing in its ears, her music echoing in its own bones …. [As a result, the baby's] first instinct is to sing its mother's song.

This got me wondering …. What song do we overhear from heaven that we try to sing on earth? We may sing it poorly, squalling and squawking, but we sing it instinctually. It's in our bones. So what's the music of heaven? What's the voice of the Father that every human's heard, at least in muffled form, and every human can copy, at least in mangled form?

Love.

Love is the music of heaven. When we love, no matter how awkwardly, we hum an anthem sung perfectly, all day, every day, in heaven.

3.     We are called to BLESS our mothers.

“‘Honor your father and your mother, as the Lord your God commanded you, that your days may be long, and that it may go well with you in the land that the Lord your God is giving you.  Deuteronomy 5:16 (ESV)