A Mother's Love

As I was praying for a mother who was rushing her 18 month old to the doctor today I could not help but share that overwhelming sense of worry. If your a mother you know what I am talking about. It overcomes you like a wave crashing against the beach and you feel the entire ground shifting beneath you as you struggle to keep your footing and your eyes locked on the Lord. It's a feeling like nothing else when you hold your sick child in your arms and know that there is nothing in your power you can do to right the circumstances.

Not long ago, I was in this mother's shoes. I sat playing with my children in the playroom and looked up to see my youngest boy staggering around, then he collapsed in a heap on the playroom bed and went into convulsion. He stopped breathing and began to turn blue. My world began to sway, my heart froze in mid-beat, my body reacted faster than my brain could process, as I scooped him up and ran to the phone. In my mind I was calm, my heart was screaming for help from the Lord, I was dialing 911 - - and I kept repeating "God has a purpose, God has a purpose". Anyone on the outside in those first few moments would have thought I was nuts. This is not the only time though my heart has broken for my children nor will it be the last.

However, as I prayed for this woman and her child I was introduced to a new part of God - one I knew in the back of my mind: But here he was saying to me today - - "Come, see who I really am..."

I have always heard that a mother's love is different than a fathers. It is because we are created differently, with different natures. However, it is more than just that. This child, these children that God has given me - will always be a part of me. I carried them for nine months in my womb, I felt the first signs of life, their first movements, their first attempts at breathing (hiccups). I talked to them, fed them, sang to them, rocked them, loved them from the very beginning. No matter what time brings they will always be a part of me. Even when the cord was cut and they took their first breaths on their own I still felt connected. I remember holding each of them and breathing them in - amazed at such a creation. And when trials happen, and bullies come, and sickness attacks, and accidents befall them, and bad decisions are made, and I see them hurt as they walk through something difficult or try to reconcile a mean world to a loving God - - - My heart breaks over and over, because no matter what they will always be a part of me.

I know that I will experience more heartache for my children as time passes on. There are many mothers right now agonizing over the choices their children have made, many that spend night after night praying they return to the Lord. Some right now sit at the side of a hospital bed praying for healing that may or may not come, or they are watching as their child walks through a valley of suffering or heartache.

Today God reminded me that sometimes I see him too much as a father and a friend, I forget his nurturing side. The side that I am created in the image after. You see it says that in the beginning was The Word and the Word was God and God was with The Word (John 1:1). The Word of course referring to Jesus Christ. God knows, personally, intimately a mother's heart! This is why he had Simeon tell Mary that a sword would pierce her soul. He knew the very agony and pain that Mary would feel (not to discount a father's love or the agony and pain a father feels in any way - we women are just a little more emotional), he knew her very heart! He knew that she would feel as if a part of herself was being ripped apart as she stood and saw the pain of Jesus, because she had carried him and loved him and cherished him the way mother's do. He wanted to prepare her, let her know that he was the I AM, and he would hold her during this time of suffering so that his plan could be complete.

Jesus was a part of God. God himself endured the pain of seeing a child suffer at the hands of a cruel world. We are created by him, a part of him, in his image: He suffers and grieves for us when we make mistakes that cause us pain, when we turn our backs. This very mother's heart is the what compels him to give us another chance. The father in him sets the boundaries and punishes when punishment is due, but the nurturing and love come in the form of a mother's heart - sensitive beyond measure to the pain of the children, longing to see things set right.

May I never forget that my heart is known by father, in an intimate, personal way. He created me, as a mother, to always be a part of my children - to have a driving, insatiable need to pray for them and see them come to Him. He also knows exactly how to comfort the mother's heart that is broken in pieces, no matter what caused the pain. When all the world doesn't seem to understand and our earthly fathers can not console us and our husbands can not share the motherly ache and heaviness in our hearts because it is so deeply ingrained, God Can and will. He knows - we are created in his image just as man was (each different sides of the character of a mighty, wonderful God).

Take heart in your times of grief and worry mothers - trust your heart in the Lord. You are dear and precious to him. He will handle it with care, after all he created it.

Be Blessed