“Portrait
of a Godly Mom”
Mother’s
Day Message (SBC, Sligo IE)
11 March 2018
INTRODUCTION:
If you wanted to paint a portrait of the
perfect, archetypical, godly mother, whom would you choose as your subject? Who
would be your model, your muse? Who would you ask to pose for you?
For me, my own mother would be a good choice. Although
not perfect, she was a wonderful, fun-loving, kind, godly woman. I could not
have asked for a better mom. She loved me through thick and thin. She almost
died giving me life. She started praying for me while I was still in her womb,
then after I was born she prayed for me every day of my life. She paddled me
good whenever she knew I needed it (though not nearly as often as I should have
gotten it!). She comforted me when I was hurt or sad. She counseled me when I
needed someone to talk to. She was wise and kind, and she taught me many
important life lessons. If I were painting a portrait of a godly mother, my own
mother is the one I would choose to pose for it.
But from the pages of God’s Word who would you
choose? Of the many mothers described in the Scriptures, which one do you think
best exemplifies the qualities of a godly mother? Several come to my mind:
·
Perhaps
Jochebed, the mother of Moses?
·
Or
Sarah, the mother of Isaac?
·
How
about Hannah, the mother of Samuel?
·
Or
even Elizabeth, the mother of John the Baptist?
·
And
of course, there is Mary, the mother of our Lord.
All these women exhibited admirable qualities,
ones that any wise woman of our day would do well to emulate. Yet none of these
women was perfect. They all had character flaws and failings. You might
ask, “How then could any of these mothers
serve as a model of godliness if they were indeed all flawed in some way or
another?”
I am reminded that Abraham and Moses
are both referred to in Scripture as “friends of God” yet neither one of them
was perfect either. And King David in the Bible is called “a man after
God’s own heart,” although he was guilty of both adultery and murder.
Godliness is first and foremost an issue of the
heart.
Its deepest expression is seen in a profound love for God, an unwavering commitment
to serve Him, and a genuine sorrow for our own sins and shortcomings. The
truth, though, is that God does not ask us to be perfect in this life. One day,
God Himself will change us, will set us free from sin’s bondage, but until
then, we struggle with our sin nature, with old habits, and with our
imperfections. However, God has also given us several things to show us the
way, to teach us right from wrong, and to empower us for godly living. He has
given us:
·
His
Word, the Bible, to shed light upon our pathway
·
His
Holy Spirit, to convict us of sin and lead us in the right paths
·
The
Church, to encourage us and support us in our walk with Christ
·
The
Christian family with godly parents and grandparents, to instruct us in
righteousness and to provide a healthy learning lab.
TRANSITION:
While none of the five women I mentioned a
moment ago would serve as a model of perfection, they all exhibited
wonderful qualities of godliness and they were all good mothers. Let’s think
about them for a moment and look at them individually.
MAIN BODY:
#1 Jochebed. She is introduced to us in Exodus
2:1-10 (her name is given in 6:20). We know very little about her except that
she and her husband, Amram, were both descended from the priestly line of
Levi. They were slaves in Egypt under bondage to Pharaoh. Their first child was
a daughter whom they named Miriam. Later, after the birth of their
second child, Moses, Jochebed had a third child whom they named Aaron.
Hebrews 11:23 includes Amram and Jochebed in the “Faith Hall of Fame” because
of their courage to defy Pharaoh’s edict to destroy all the boy babies of the
Hebrews. To save his life, Jochebed made a little basket out of reeds and set
baby Moses afloat on the water, entrusting him to God’s mercy, believing that
the Lord would save her child. If a single word could describe Jochebed, I
think it would have to be the word, “COURAGE.”
This is a quality that all mothers need,
especially today. Raising children has never been easy, but it is even tougher
today because of all the horrible influences that constantly bombard our lives
and the lives of our children. Mothers today need courage to confront ungodly
schools, filthy media choices, gang influences, substance abuse, on-line sexual
predators, and immoral and dishonest attitudes, just to name a few things. It
takes courage to stand up against the flow of our culture and provide a little
shelter of sanity, love, stability, and holiness. [Illustration: A
mother is like a rock in the middle of the river, creating a calm safe place
for the little fish.]
#2 Sarah. She was the wife of Abraham, and eventually
became the mother of Isaac. If any single word describes Sarah, for me
it would be the word, “STEADFASTNESS.” Sarah’s name means
“princess” and it was a name well deserved because of her demeanor and
comportment. Scripture records that she was a beautiful woman, not only on the
inside, but on the outside as well. Abraham loved her and was very proud of
her. Even though she was barren until she was ninety years old, she held
Abraham’s undivided love and loyalty.
But Abraham was not always a wonderful man, and
not always a great husband. At least twice he made decisions that put Sarah in
grave danger, and yet, she always stuck by him. She was steadfast in her
conjugal devotion, even though married to a less-than-perfect man. She was
faithful, despite being mistreated, helping her husband grow to become a real
man of God.
Her unselfishness and steadfastness were
finally rewarded when, as recorded in Genesis 17:15-22, God miraculously opened
her womb and said: “I will bless her, and indeed I will give you a son by
her. Then I will bless her, and she shall be a mother of nations; kings of
peoples shall come from her.” She is also mentioned in Hebrews 11:11 as an
example of faith because: “…she considered Him [God] faithful who had
promised.”
Today we need more godly mothers who will
provide for their children this same example of steadfast love and devotion for
their less-than-perfect husbands. In a day when families are being blown apart
by unfaithfulness and divorce, children need to see their mothers as steadfast
examples of uncompromising love toward both them and their fathers.
#3 Hannah. She was the mother of Samuel
and is introduced to us in the first chapter of the Book of 1 Samuel. Hannah’s
husband was a godly man named Elkanah and he loved her dearly, but verse
6 tells us “the Lord had closed her womb.” To be barren in Israel was a
great shame, both for the woman as well as for the man, because it meant that
their family line would be cut off with no one to carry on their family name
and heritage. This certainly bothered Elkanah, but for Hannah it was a daily
torture as she saw other women with children and received their constant taunts
because of her barrenness. She wanted to be a mother. She wanted a child of her
own. God’s Word tells us that in her great distress she constantly prayed to
the Lord and wept bitterly. Yet her sorrow never turned to anger against God.
She loved God, and she knew that He is faithful, and that He answers prayer.
If a single word can describe Hannah, I think
it would have to be the characteristic of “HOLINESS.” Her
devotion to God and her desire for a son led her to make a solemn vow to the
Lord, recorded for us in 1 Samuel 1:11: “O Lord of Hosts, if Thou wilt
indeed look on the affliction of Thy maidservant and remember me, and not
forget Thy maidservant, but wilt give Thy maidservant a son, then I will give
him to the Lord all the days of his life.”
Having made this commitment, God gave her His
peace, and so “…she went her way and ate, and her face was no longer sad.”
Verse 19 says: “And the Lord remembered her, and it came about in due time,
after Hannah had conceived, that she gave birth to a son; and she named him
Samuel, saying, ‘Because I have asked him of the Lord.’”
That
child that Hannah dedicated to the Lord grew to become the godly prophet,
Samuel, one of the greatest men in all of Scripture. Chapter 2, verse 21 tells
us that after the birth of Samuel God gave Hannah and Elkanah three more sons
and two daughters, making 6 children in all. But Samuel, her firstborn, her
miracle baby, was always special to Hannah.
To this day, mainly because of the example of
Hannah, parents bring their children to dedicate them to the Lord. My mother
dedicated me to the Lord when I was just a couple of months old. I dedicated my
three children to the Lord. Many of you have done the same thing. We know that
children are a gift from God, loaned to us for a few short years to love and
train and nurture, so that they will grow up to know, love, and serve God, but
they don’t belong to us. They are given to us in trust, to raise for
Him.
Hannah,
in an act of holiness and devotion to God, gave Samuel back to the Lord, and
just look what God did with him! What will God do today if a mother gives her
children over to the Lord and raises them to serve Him, living out before their
watching eyes a life of consistent personal holiness?
#4 Elizabeth. This woman, the mother of John the
Baptist, steps onto the stage of Bible history in the Gospel of Luke,
chapter 1. We are told that both she and her husband, Zacharias, were
descended from the priestly line of Aaron, and Zacharias was a priest who
served in the Temple in Jerusalem. Luke 1:6 describes them in this way: “And
they were both righteous in the sight of God, walking blamelessly
in all the commandments and requirements of the Lord.” The next verse tells
us, “…they had no child, because Elizabeth was barren, and they were both
advanced in years.”
However, along with those advanced years came a
character that had been well-formed and well-tempered. Elizabeth was a woman
who had walked with God for many years and had seen a great deal. The first
word that comes to my mind when I think of Elizabeth is “WISDOM.”
The Bible says, “The fear [reverence] of the Lord is the beginning of
wisdom,” and Elizabeth certainly knew God in a personal way and reverenced
Him.
Moreover, God knew the hearts of both Elizabeth
and Zacharias and chose to bless them in a marvelous way with a very special
child, one who would need all the wisdom his parents could possibly give him. I
am speaking, of course, of John the Baptist, the man who Jesus Himself
described in Luke 7:28 as, “the greatest man among those born of women.”
When the time came to name their baby the
relatives of Elizabeth and Zacharias insisted that he be named after his
father, following the custom. However, it was Elizabeth who spoke up and
answered them saying: “No indeed; but he shall be called, John!” for
this was the name the angel Gabriel had given them for their son. Elizabeth, in
her wisdom, knew that obeying God is the highest priority.
We also see in Luke, chapter 1 that Mary, the
mother of Jesus who was a cousin of Elizabeth and was herself pregnant by
miraculous conception, went to stay with Elizabeth and Zacharias for the last
three months of Elizabeth’s pregnancy, staying until after the delivery just to
help. I believe that those 3 months together were filled with long talks as
Elizabeth poured her wisdom into Mary. I believe that those three months were
of critical importance in Mary’s life, and may well have been a major
sustaining influence through times of great sorrow and suffering she endured later.
#5 Mary. The mother of Jesus was, by her own
testimony, of all women the most blessed, for to her was given the privilege of
bringing into this world the Savior, the Promised One, the Messiah. Why was she
chosen above all others? We really do not know. That is a question we have
asked about ourselves, and about other people, both during times of testing and
times of great blessing— “Why me?” The answer is that God makes sovereign
choices.
In fact, we do not know very much about Mary
except that she was a young woman, probably still a teenager, from the city of
Nazareth, and that although she was engaged to be married to a carpenter named Joseph,
she was, in fact, still a virgin, never having had sexual relations with Joseph
or any other man. She was a dear young girl who loved God and trusted Him
completely, submitting her will to His.
When the angel Gabriel announced to Mary that
she would, through a miracle, become the mother of the promised Messiah, she
simply believed God and humbled herself beneath His mighty hand. To me the word
that best describes Mary must be, “PURITY.” Certainly, she was
not perfect as some claim, for she was human like the rest of us. But she had a
godly purity not only in the physical sense, but also of heart and mind, an
attitude that characterized her all through her life.
We know too, that Mary lived with Jesus right
up until the time when He began His earthly ministry, at approximately 30 years
of age. That was a long time to live under the same roof with the perfect,
sinless Son of God. She had been carefully chosen by God the Father, for she
was entrusted with the care and nurture of that One who would one day reveal
Himself to be, “the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.”
CONCLUSION:
Which of these five women should we use today
as a model for our portrait of a godly mother? Indeed, I believe that this is
going to have to be a group portrait with all five of them included. We need Jochebed
for her COURAGE. We need Sarah for her STEADFASTNESS. We need Hannah
for her HOLINESS. We need Elizabeth for her WISDOM. And we need Mary
for her PURITY.
Looking around the room this morning I see some
godly mothers here who could easily pose for this portrait we’ve been
discussing. I see some women with these same qualities that I have just
described. I am thankful to God for my own mother, who was a model of godliness
to me for many years. I am thankful for my wife, Ramel, who has been a
wonderful mother to our three children and a fantastic grandmother to our army
of 14 grandchildren. And as one of the pastors of this church, I am thankful
for all the godly women among us, whether you be mothers or not, because each
one of you is a precious gift from God. So, in closing I just want to say thank
you to all you moms, and stepmoms, and grandmothers. I want to thank all you
aunties, who in some cases fill the role of “mom” for someone. Today is the day
we honor all of you because of the impact you have on our lives and the lives
of our families and children, and the blessing you are to this congregation.
