This morning my mind was on mothering. I guess it was because I've been hearing commercials and getting e-mails about Mother's Day. Of course, I thought of my own sweet mother and the memories of my childhood that are precious.
One distinct memory I have in my first five years is the smell of her face. She used Cover Girl makeup and I can remember thinking how soft she was and how sweet she smelled.
Kindergarten was very frightening to me. I remember coming home from school and curling up in my mother's arms in a rocker and making sure I was close to that sweet smell of "my" mother. A little phonograph sat on a stool next to the rocker and she would play a record as she rocked me.
I remember sitting in a big walk-in pantry off of the kitchen and playing by the hour with a cardboard family my mother made me out of poster board. The dad wore a business suit and went to work each day. I had a house (upstairs and downstairs!) where the mom and dad slid into their bed (neat slots) the baby had a nursery and my cardboard oven and refrigerator actually opened! My mom drew the mother in different positions. She might be at the stove, sitting on the couch, dressed in her lovely nightgown and robe ready for bed or pushing her shopping cart. I had a little grocery too, with a chubby butcher who actually had little meats to take in and out of his meat case!
It took time for my mother to make that for me, but she created more in my heart than just a cardboard family. She created a love for her, her values, family with a mother at home and a dad at work. Her afternoon of drawing something for me had big dividends in her life.
Another memory is that of always knowing that my mother was there. If I was playing outside she was just a call away. Sometimes I would run in just to be comforted by seeing her in the kitchen. As a newly married bride I remember walking down to chat with her one day and she wasn't there! I remember wondering what was wrong, or who had got sick! I also remember the little prick of irritation--mom was supposed to be there where she belonged.
When my husband was pastoring in another part of Tennessee we would get newsletters from a Christian legal group educating you on problems that could affect the church. One newsletter was on teenage suicide. This was back in the 80's or early 90's. I remember that it said that over 60% of teens suicide notes faulted the mother for "not being there when I needed you".
Scripture makes it clear that a child left to himself will bring shame to his mother. (Proverbs 29:15) That word "left" means to send away, to dismiss, to let loose, to give over. Who have we given our children over to so that we can do what we want with our time. The government, a daycare facility, the television, a computer, even our church and its activities or grandma?
Scripture also clearly defines where our lives are to be spent as wives and mothers. (Titus 2 and Proverbs 31 for starters!) It would do us all good to ask how much time we are spending outside of our God-given domain. This time includes the computer and the tv and the telephone--not just the mother that walks out the door to punch a time clock each day. It also includes being a busy beaver in ministry work outside of the doors of your home. Make your home the core of your ministry. There is plenty to do from within its walls that will minister to others. Even one trip a day out of the home can destroy proper priorities in a woman's life.
Remember Superwoman is a figment of someone's very active imagination. Something is going to use up your time and how anyone can find time to do more than her domestic duties that God has given her in His word is beyond me. Something is going to go undone, and it's usually the ones that should be at the top of our list!
Beside the fact that it damages our children (when we find other things more important to us than they are) women are missing so much that cannot be reclaimed and is so wonderfully valuable.
Go buy a little piece of clothesline and string it up at your daughter's height. Buy some little clothespins at the craft store. Pick a warm, sunny day and get her two dishpans and fill one with sudsy water and one with warm rinse water. Help her wash her dolly's clothes and hang them up. You can be the neighbor lady or the grandma of the baby. After they're dry let her help iron them and put them away.
I can promise you that this will be one of those "Mom, do you remember when?" moments in your life.
Take your little boy and go outside and help him make a town in the dirt. Little streets for his trucks and a little field for his tractors. Name his little town with him. Get down on the ground and play with him! He won't forget the day you did that when he is grown.
Women are so busy today chasing valueless things and it breaks my heart. Each generation is showing the loss of their spiritual moorings and I firmly believe that the mama that wore an apron, cooked hot homemade meals for her family, found pride in the white shirt she had neatly pressed for her husband and loved sitting in the evenings reading to her family is why the word of God is being "blasphemed" now instead of revered. (Titus 2:5b)
Let's each one have a "heart to heart" with the Lord and decide that we're going to keep our chicks under our wings. It doesn't take money it takes being there. If this message was taken to heart by the saved women that each one of us know it would revolutionize and revive America. You can't do it for anyone else, but you and I can decide that we individually are going to do it.
It is my prayer that each of my "daughters" and "sisters" that read this will "stand perfect and complete in all his will" (Colossians 4:12) in this area of your life. Let's hold each other up and "pray and obey" together. The dividends are eternal!
One distinct memory I have in my first five years is the smell of her face. She used Cover Girl makeup and I can remember thinking how soft she was and how sweet she smelled.
Kindergarten was very frightening to me. I remember coming home from school and curling up in my mother's arms in a rocker and making sure I was close to that sweet smell of "my" mother. A little phonograph sat on a stool next to the rocker and she would play a record as she rocked me.
I remember sitting in a big walk-in pantry off of the kitchen and playing by the hour with a cardboard family my mother made me out of poster board. The dad wore a business suit and went to work each day. I had a house (upstairs and downstairs!) where the mom and dad slid into their bed (neat slots) the baby had a nursery and my cardboard oven and refrigerator actually opened! My mom drew the mother in different positions. She might be at the stove, sitting on the couch, dressed in her lovely nightgown and robe ready for bed or pushing her shopping cart. I had a little grocery too, with a chubby butcher who actually had little meats to take in and out of his meat case!
It took time for my mother to make that for me, but she created more in my heart than just a cardboard family. She created a love for her, her values, family with a mother at home and a dad at work. Her afternoon of drawing something for me had big dividends in her life.
Another memory is that of always knowing that my mother was there. If I was playing outside she was just a call away. Sometimes I would run in just to be comforted by seeing her in the kitchen. As a newly married bride I remember walking down to chat with her one day and she wasn't there! I remember wondering what was wrong, or who had got sick! I also remember the little prick of irritation--mom was supposed to be there where she belonged.
When my husband was pastoring in another part of Tennessee we would get newsletters from a Christian legal group educating you on problems that could affect the church. One newsletter was on teenage suicide. This was back in the 80's or early 90's. I remember that it said that over 60% of teens suicide notes faulted the mother for "not being there when I needed you".
Scripture makes it clear that a child left to himself will bring shame to his mother. (Proverbs 29:15) That word "left" means to send away, to dismiss, to let loose, to give over. Who have we given our children over to so that we can do what we want with our time. The government, a daycare facility, the television, a computer, even our church and its activities or grandma?
Scripture also clearly defines where our lives are to be spent as wives and mothers. (Titus 2 and Proverbs 31 for starters!) It would do us all good to ask how much time we are spending outside of our God-given domain. This time includes the computer and the tv and the telephone--not just the mother that walks out the door to punch a time clock each day. It also includes being a busy beaver in ministry work outside of the doors of your home. Make your home the core of your ministry. There is plenty to do from within its walls that will minister to others. Even one trip a day out of the home can destroy proper priorities in a woman's life.
Remember Superwoman is a figment of someone's very active imagination. Something is going to use up your time and how anyone can find time to do more than her domestic duties that God has given her in His word is beyond me. Something is going to go undone, and it's usually the ones that should be at the top of our list!
Beside the fact that it damages our children (when we find other things more important to us than they are) women are missing so much that cannot be reclaimed and is so wonderfully valuable.
Go buy a little piece of clothesline and string it up at your daughter's height. Buy some little clothespins at the craft store. Pick a warm, sunny day and get her two dishpans and fill one with sudsy water and one with warm rinse water. Help her wash her dolly's clothes and hang them up. You can be the neighbor lady or the grandma of the baby. After they're dry let her help iron them and put them away.
I can promise you that this will be one of those "Mom, do you remember when?" moments in your life.
Take your little boy and go outside and help him make a town in the dirt. Little streets for his trucks and a little field for his tractors. Name his little town with him. Get down on the ground and play with him! He won't forget the day you did that when he is grown.
Women are so busy today chasing valueless things and it breaks my heart. Each generation is showing the loss of their spiritual moorings and I firmly believe that the mama that wore an apron, cooked hot homemade meals for her family, found pride in the white shirt she had neatly pressed for her husband and loved sitting in the evenings reading to her family is why the word of God is being "blasphemed" now instead of revered. (Titus 2:5b)
Let's each one have a "heart to heart" with the Lord and decide that we're going to keep our chicks under our wings. It doesn't take money it takes being there. If this message was taken to heart by the saved women that each one of us know it would revolutionize and revive America. You can't do it for anyone else, but you and I can decide that we individually are going to do it.
It is my prayer that each of my "daughters" and "sisters" that read this will "stand perfect and complete in all his will" (Colossians 4:12) in this area of your life. Let's hold each other up and "pray and obey" together. The dividends are eternal!
1 comment:
Reading about your memories and then your thoughts on moms at home was enjoyable. I am so glad my mom was always "there" for me as a child (and even now via phone sometimes!). It truly does make an important difference that is not forgotten.
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