Mother's Day column

Mothers should be honored every day of the year
(Published in The Bay City Tribune May 4, 2011)


This coming Sunday is Mother’s Day, a day set aside to honor our mothers. Many children, both those who are still children and those who are already grown, fathers and husbands are scrambling to find the perfect card or gift or deciding on a place to take the mothers in their lives to a special meal on Sunday.
I know I will take advantage of the day to let my mother, stepmother and mother-in-law know how much I love and appreciate them — they have all been wonderful, loving influences in my life. Only I want them to know I appreciate them more than just that one day a year. We should honor our mothers, and our fathers, each and every day of our lives. Ephesians 6:1-3 says, “Children, obey your parents in the Lord, because this is right. Honor your father and mother which is the first commandment with a promise – that it may go well with you and that you may have a long life.”
As a mother, I know what a difficult, exhausting and sometimes thankless job it can be to raise children. I also know what a blessing it is to be given the gift of children to raise. Psalm 127:3 says, “Children are a gift from the Lord; they are a reward from him.” I thank Him every day for the reward He has given me. Not only did He give me three sons of my own, He also gave me three more when He brought my husband into my life. Never will I think of any one of those six boys, three of them are young men now, as any less my son than I will another. They are all precious gifts given to me.
It isn’t always easy. In fact sometimes I wonder what I did to “deserve” such a gift. But then I think about how much they have brought to my life, how much I have learned through raising them and how much better a person I am through them. Without knowing the love a mother has for her children, I wouldn’t even be able to imagine the love the Father has for me. No matter what my boys do, my love for them will never lessen, just as the Father’s love for us never dims.
I have struggled long and hard through my life with patience. There is nothing in the world that can teach you patience like being a parent can. That isn’t a battle that I have always conquered but it is one that, with the Lord’s help, I am much closer to winning than I was before. Selfishness is not even an option for mothers. The children come first, period. Past wrongdoings of the child are put aside and forgotten, anger is overcome by a smile or a whispered word of love and all that is remembered at the end of the day is what a wonderful gift we have been given.
I Corinthians 13:4-7 says, “Love is patient; love is kind. Love is not jealous; is not proud; is not conceited; does not act foolishly; is not selfish; is not easily provoked to anger; keeps no record of wrongs; takes no pleasure in unrighteousness, but rejoices in the truth; love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, and endures all things.”
That verse says so much. It pretty much describes the love a mother has for her children. It tells us how we should love as parents, as children, as husbands and wives, as brothers and sisters on Earth and as the children of God. We show our love for God through our love for one another.
Proverbs 31:10-12 and 25-31 serves beautifully as a final word on honoring the women in our lives:
“A wife of noble character who can find? She is worth far more than rubies.
Her husband has full confidence in her and lacks nothing of value.
She brings him good, not harm all the days of her life.
She is clothed with strength and dignity; she can laugh at the days to come.
She speaks with wisdom, and faithful instruction is on her tongue.
She watches over the affairs of her household and does not eat the bread of idleness.
Her children arise and call her blessed; her husband also, and he praises her: ‘Many women do noble things, but you surpass them all.’
Charm is deceptive, and beauty is fleeting; but a woman who fears the Lord is to be praised.
Give her the reward she has earned, and let her works bring her praise at the city gate.”