Ephesians 6:2-3 “’Honor your father and your mother,’ which is the first commandment with promise: ‘that it may be well with you and you may live long on the earth.’”As I’ve talked with my friends about their growing-up years, I am made acutely aware that, for some obscure reason, the Lord had blessed me and my husband with uncommon childhoods.
Ours were the exceptions. We grew up in almost idyllic homes. Homes where the parents loved each other and their children. Homes where the fathers were not abusive, but sober, responsible, steady wage earners. Homes where the mothers spoke of the love of God to their offspring. Homes where the Lord and His Word were revered. Homes where weekly church attendance was required of all family members. Homes where honorable traits were modeled. Homes that are still intact five decades later.
We are truly blessed. Today I honor the mothers of those two extraordinary homes, my mother, and my mother-in-law.
My mother gave birth to five children and nurtured us at her breast in an era when bottle-feeding was the “norm.” When I was a pre-schooler, she provided foster care for two infants, and later befriended a string of underdogs. She resisted the societal push to work outside the home until the youngest child was in school. She fed us nourishing meals, then took us for walks, where she taught us to observe God’s creation. She brought us home and made us take naps with her.
(At this point, I’ll digress. “Lay still, Hester,” Mom would mutter in fatigue. I thought she had designed a special form of torment – how in the world could I possibly lay still? Later, as a mother of toddlers and preschoolers, I understood the challenges of suppressing their energy. Sometimes I’d wearily look at their angelic sleeping faces and think, “Alas! They are only re-charging their batteries!”)
My mother baked and decorated special cakes for our birthdays. She sewed our clothing. (I fondly recall the jumper with the orange fish she appliqued to the pocket, made when I was about 5.) She remodeled her own outfits. Her creativity was partly inherited from her mother and father, who made quilts, crocheted and sewed.
We were very poor and my mother’s creativity saved the day on many occasions. It seemed to me that she could conjure meals from nothing. When it came to household needs, she could make something that we needed from something we already had at hand. Her motto must have been: “Make do. Do without. Use it up. Wear it out.”
She taught me to sew when I was nine. She taught me mostly because I was so picky about my own clothing – even then! – and she was disgusted that I didn’t appreciate the time she put into sewing for me! I’m so thankful for her patience in teaching me that valuable skill.
She tried to teach me how to cook and clean, but I managed to wriggle out of those responsibilities. To this day, I regret missing out on that training. As you can tell, I wasn’t the easiest child to raise! Sorry, Mom, for being such a toot.
She let me take care of my baby sister, thirteen years my junior. That was an honor and a privilege, and I treasure that time. My sister and I had a very special relationship. I learned so many valuable things about child care and loving a little one from that experience.
My mother was constantly singing, and making up little Scripture ditties to help her memorize the Word.
She found money for piano lessons for my siblings and me.
The thing that impresses me most about my mother is her servant’s heart. She just turned 70 and still – with her limited physical abilities – she makes herself available daily to help my father and others around her.
She has fully supported my father throughout their whole marriage. Theirs has been one of mutual respect and enduring love.
I could go on and on.
I love you, Mom, and I’m so grateful that the Lord placed me in your care and tutelege. I’ve learned so much about the Lord, love and living from you. Thank you for providing a stable home in the face of daunting hurdles. Thank you for teaching me, yet today!
My mother-in-law is one remarkable lady. I’m especially grateful that she gave birth to my husband, and spent herself training up him and his siblings. She and Dad did a great job and, as a result, I am married to an equally remarkable man.
She earned her teaching certificate at age 68 and has been teaching full-time in the public schools for the last four years. Not only does she hold down an outside job, but she manages to care for an ailing husband, to pick up after her live-in grandson, and to help care for her 95-year-old mother. Through it all she manages to maintain an upbeat spirit.
Her motivation is a love for the Lord and a love of people. She cares deeply about her family, and shows it in a myriad of ways. She takes literally the Lord’s command to love her neighbors; she is constantly doing something for one of them. She loves to cook; her hospitality has blessed not only family members, but countless friends and strangers down through the years.
Thank you, Mom, for embracing me as your daughter, for your patience with my immaturity and unkindness in the early years, for loving, supporting and encouraging our family.
Uncommon homes. Yes. I am honored to be the daughter of these two fine women. I pray that the Lord will bless them with many more productive years of service to the Lord, that He will encourage them as their bodies refuse to obey their ambitions, that He will carry them through the later years of their life with victory and courage.
Thank you, Lord, for our mothers.
Hester
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