A Mother’s Influence – Mother’s Day 2019

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Being a mother is hard work!  It can be an emotional roller coaster.  Yet a mother’s influence can last a lifetime affecting a child’s choices and even those of the grandchildren.  In the Bible we read about several godly women who were fantastic mothers.

Jochebed (Moses’ mother)

Jochebed (Exodus 2) gave birth to a baby boy.  According to the king’s law, she should have thrown her baby boy into the Nile river.  Instead, she hid him for three months.  Then, finally, she set him afloat in a specially made basket.  In God’s perfect plan, Pharaoh’s daughter found him and adopted him.  She paid Jochebed to nurse him for her.  This mother’s influence in the formative years would show up later as Moses refused to be called the son of Pharaoh’s daughter.

Hannah (Samuel’s mother)

Hannah had a problem.  In her day people thought it was a curse to be childless.  She prayed and vowed that if God would give her a son, she would give him back to God.  That is exactly what happened.  She had a son and when she had weaned him, at still a very young age, she took him to live in Shiloh to live at the tabernacle.  One might think that growing up in the house of God would have created his good character, but it didn’t work out that way for the priest Eli’s sons.  They were wicked men.  God set these in contrast to each other, showing the godly character of Samuel against the wicked nature of Eli’s sons.  How did Samuel turn out so godly?  More than likely this was through his mother’s influence on him in his early years.

So, moms,  don’t get discouraged when being a mother is hard.  You haven’t finished your job and the outcome is yet to be seen.  Instead, teach your children to know God and trust him.  Leave them a godly example and pray for them.  Then trust them to God and see what he will do!