This week’s “Guest” article is by Rachel Jankovic, a writer at Desiring God, daughter of pastor/writer Doug Wilson, and sister of exceptional Christian fantasy writer N.D. Wilson. The “Guest” part of the post is because I don’t actually know Rachel, so please be sure to check out the link below for her full article. For Mother’s Day this year at our home church, Agape Fellowship in Pinson/Birmingham, I read the entirety of Rachel’s post as a letter to our congregation. It is equal parts challenging and encouraging, which was actually a little unnerving to me. You see…I’m a little bit afraid of getting a bunch of moms mad at me – especially on Mother’s Day! The other pastors at the church like to make fun of me for the way I handled Mother’s Day and Father’s Day during my first year as pastor there in 2008. The story goes that my Mother’s Day message that year was incredibly positive and waxed on and on about how heroic and awesome our mothers are; but the Father’s Day sermon was filled with nothing but gritty challenges for the dads to get off of the mat, step up their game, stop fumbling the ball, and whatever other sports metaphors I could come up with. While I don’t remember the contrast between the two messages being quite so stark, I suppose the gist of it is true…I am much more comfortable strongly challenging dads than moms. Thus, challenging the moms of our congregation on Mother’s Day this year was not a very natural thing for me, but Jankovic’s article is just so good, and so needful to hear that I gulped down my fears, and read it. Here are three excerpts worth paying attention to. Do yourself a favor, and read the whole article too.
Here are three amazing excerpts:
Motherhood is a Calling: by Ranchel Jankovic
1. IT’S NOT A HOBBY
“Motherhood is not a hobby, it is a calling. You do not collect children because you find them cuter than stamps. It is not something to do if you can squeeze the time in. It is what God gave you time for.Christian mothers carry their children in hostile territory. When you are in public with them, you are standing with, and defending, the objects of cultural dislike. You are publicly testifying that you value what God values, and that you refuse to value what the world values. You stand with the defenseless and in front of the needy. You represent everything that our culture hates, because you represent laying down your life for another—and laying down your life for another represents the gospel.Our culture is simply afraid of death. Laying down your own life, in any way, is terrifying. Strangely, it is that fear that drives the abortion industry: fear that your dreams will die, that your future will die, that your freedom will die—and trying to escape that death by running into the arms of death.”
2. THE QUESTION IS HOW
“The question here is not whether you are representing the gospel, it is how you are representing it. Have you given your life to your children resentfully? Do you tally every thing you do for them like a loan shark tallies debts? Or do you give them life the way God gave it to us—freely? It isn’t enough to pretend. You might fool a few people. That person in line at the store might believe you when you plaster on a fake smile, but your children won’t. They know exactly where they stand with you. They know the things that you rate above them. They know everything you resent and hold against them. They know that you faked a cheerful answer to that lady, only to whisper threats or bark at them in the car. Children know the difference between a mother who is saving face to a stranger and a mother who defends their life and their worth with her smile, her love, and her absolute loyalty.”
3. HANDS FULL OF GOOD THINGS
“When my little girl told me, “Your hands are full!” I was so thankful that she already knew what my answer would be. It was the same one that I always gave: “Yes they are—full of good things!”Live the gospel in the things that no one sees. Sacrifice for your children in places that only they will know about. Put their value ahead of yours. Grow them up in the clean air of gospel living. Your testimony to the gospel in the little details of your life is more valuable to them than you can imagine. If you tell them the gospel, but live to yourself, they will never believe it. Give your life for theirs every day, joyfully. Lay down pettiness. Lay down fussiness. Lay down resentment about the dishes, about the laundry, about how no one knows how hard you work.Stop clinging to yourself and cling to the cross. There is more joy and more life and more laughter on the other side of death than you can possibly carry alone.”
Again – Read the Full Article HERE.
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