Mother's Day

I have wonderful children. My mother had four children, I being one of them would like to think that I was wonderful. However, I don't think I was. My children are so much more loving and giving than I ever was, or that I picture myself as being.

Every Mother's Day, even after I left home, I DID send my mom at least a card. Being far removed from Runnemede by several hundred miles, and in the days before the Internet when sending a gift to a far away place wasn't so easy, I did little to let my mom know how much I appreciated her. I called her, unfailingly, every Mother's Day to tell her I loved her and that I really missed her. And I did miss her, terribly.

I guess that hardest thing about leaving family and cleaving to one's husband is leaving one's mother. My mom, the woman whom I would love to be like, and probably never will. I'm so much like my father, who was probably 180 degrees different from my mom. My dear mother was kind, sweet, had a servant's heart, and everyone loved her. My dad was strong, non-affectionate, had a giver's heart, and not everyone loved him, because he said things that needed to be said, and often got himself in "trouble" because of his speech. Not unlike his eldest daughter.

My mom was a mother from beginning to end. Her life revolved around her children. Sorry to say, her daughter, while she dearly loved her own children, was not the "Leave it to Beaver" type mom her own mother was. I didn't spend all day in the kitchen baking cookies. It really wasn't until I had to take care of my mother before she died and decided she wanted to die at home, that I realized all the sacrifices my mom made so that her children would know that they were loved, adored, and took second place only to her husband in her heart. The first place in her heart was for her Lord, Jesus Christ. My mom lived Christ.

I am now getting to be the age I thought I would never become. My mom was always "old". And now I'm actually older than my mom was when I left home. Much older. Yet when I left Runnemede, at 23, my mom was only in her 50s. Not so old, although I thought she was very old. Now, I know what I missed when I was training my own children, and I wish I could take back all the not so mom-like things I did as a mother.

I've talked to several other women at church and they all have the same insecurities about their own child-raising experiences that I have. But the proof is in the pudding, so to speak.

My husband and I have three wonderful, God-fearing, saved-by-grace, children, and 13 grandchildren learning to love the Lord because of what their parents (my children) are teaching them. My children want to be servants as Christ was a servant. They want to be as close to the Father as Christ was. Even when the burdens and distractions of each day pull them away from that goal, they all have the same goal, and are all teaching their children to do the same.

What more can a mother ask for? Not much, if anything. I am so glad I had the mother I did, that God gave me to my mom and dad, late in their life after being told they would never have children. I am so glad God opened my mother's womb and she had me and three other children for her to adore, love, and serve. And, I praise Him who is the giver of life that he allowed me to give life to three children and train them up in His way. Blessed by the Name of the Lord.

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