Yes, still bring your wife or mother breakfast in bed, but more importantly, share the following truths with her.
Recall how good it feels to come home after a hard day’s work? Or after a vacation? Even after an extended time away out of the country? Or what about the relief of making it home after driving through a storm? There’s a sense of comfort one can relate to from experiencing these situations.
Imagine how much more comforting it would be to return to your homeland and property after banishment and captivity…for seventy years! This is the comfort God would provide for His people by keeping His promise. This is the same type of comfort He likens mothers as providing.
As one whom his mother comforts, So I will comfort you. (Isaiah 66:13)
This is the Lord God speaking. So it’s incredible that God chooses mothers as His “go-to” example for comparing His comforting nature. You must know the context of Isaiah 66 to be astonished at the limitlessness of this comparison.
The prophet Isaiah is relaying God’s words to a people who’d be exiled from their homeland in the 6th century B.C. to suffer as captives and slaves – seventy years of Babylonian captivity a major part of it. But God would free them through the Persians – a return and rebuild in Jerusalem would follow.
What’s the Connection?
We all recognize it. When a child needs comforting, only Mom will do, no matter how hard Dad tries. Often, it has to do with intuition and recognizing the needs or cause of despair. This generally characterizes all females, mothers or not. I observe it in my teaching colleagues all the time.
Moms give great guidance and instruction, too. They work tirelessly on an endless variety of things. However, since suffering will accompany humankind until the Lord Jesus returns, comfort may absolutely summarize the greatest gift they supply.
Blessed are they that mourn: for they shall be comforted. Matthew 5:4
God has promised that there is relief in and after the mourning. Much of our mourning should relate to the spiritual state of our nations, communities, families, and private lives. However, there’s no doubt that He largely fulfills the promise of comfort over personal despair and strife through mothers.
There’s also a great spiritual intuition with females, once again following the lead of the Master Comforter, Jesus. Men might make great theologians, preachers and teachers, but women are far more sensitive to emotional and spiritual needs. When the male disciples wanted to turn children away from bothering Jesus, He rebuked them and said:
Suffer little children, and forbid them not, to come unto me: for of such is the kingdom of heaven. (Matthew 19:14)
Although Jesus used this situation to primarily show that we need to empty ourselves of pride, and display the innocence and humility of children to be His followers, we certainly see a mother-like quality in His interaction as compared to His male disciples, continuing in the closing:
And he took them up in his arms, put his hands upon them, and blessed them. (Mark 10:16)
It is even more awesome when we realize that God living in us, the Holy Spirit, was considered the Comforter who would come down to live in us when Jesus was resurrected and ascended to heaven.
But the Comforter, even the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, he shall teach you all things, and bring to your remembrance all that I said unto you. (John 14:26 ASV)
Other versions call this Comforter, “the Helper.” This certainly takes us back to Creation, when God observed that the earth and life was incomplete, and the situation “not good,” without the necessary helper, woman (Gen. 2:18).
Women should authentically observe their true value, worth, and identity as a close intimate connection and reflection of their Creator, in all Persons of the Trinity.
Close to Home
It’s impossible to do justice in the attempt to honor mothers and the motherly nature of all females on Mother’s Day. There aren’t enough words, gifts, or acts to return the grace and service they’ve extended. Although as husbands and children, we certainly should make it a goal all year-long to speak more respectfully and complimentary, and to give more thoughtful things and increase service to them.
A few years ago, on Mother’s Day, as a type of gift to my wife, I wrote a letter to my two teen-aged children, sharing why we ought to appreciate and honor their mother. It included details of her many talents and skills which she freely shares, the gifts and guidance that she openly shares, and the love and service that she richly shares.
At the time, I didn’t summarize it in the category of comfort. But I believe I would now. The comfort, peace and security of having a loving and wise mother and wife in the home and family is a treasure that goes beyond any earthly treasure. It’s a gift that covers and helps withstand any and all hardship, toil, or snare.
The danger with any comfort is we become too comfortable. Let’s not become so comfortable nor ever take for granted the wives, mothers, and other special females who contribute so much.
I think back to several articles over the last year. Themes like: honoring parents brings freedom; permissive parenting brings destruction; males generally need to show more common courtesy; and parents would literally and figuratively sacrifice their lives for their children.
These themes, and frankly anything with worth and value, indirectly or directly have their source in God. God is big, and His ways are greater than our ways and His thoughts higher than our thoughts (Isaiah 55:9).
When He thought of mothers, He thought in the grandest terms. He thought of a human gender that could take on His comforting nature. Mothers are not gods but they certainly can and do reflect the nature of the one and only true God.
Happy Mother’s Day. May you see yourself in a new light, shining directly from your Creator.
Comentários