A Mother’s Love-- 1 Kings 3:16-28

Mother’s Day has a very special place in the hearts of the majority of people in America. Hallmark estimates that 150 million Mother’s Day cards will be sent this year (but only 95 million Father’s Day cards), making Mother’s Day the third largest greeting card holiday of the year.

 

U.S. Americans spend an average of $105 on Mother’s Day gifts, $90 on Father’s Day gifts. The phone rings more often on Mother’s day than Father’s day. The busiest day of the year at car washes? The Saturday before Mother’s Day. What mom thinks still matters.
 

Mom and Dad were watching TV when Mom said, "I’m tired, and it’s getting late. I think I’ll go to bed." She went to the kitchen to make sandwiches for the next day’s lunches. Rinsed out the popcorn bowls, took meat out of the freezer for supper the following evening, checked the cereal box levels, filled the sugar container, put spoons and bowls on the table and started the coffee pot for brewing the next morning. She then put some wet clothes in the dryer, put a load of clothes into the washer, ironed a shirt and secured a loose button. She picked up the game pieces left on the table and put the telephone book back into the drawer. She watered the plants, emptied a wastebasket and hung up a towel to dry.

She yawned and stretched and headed for the bedroom. She stopped by the desk and wrote a note to the teacher, counted out some cash for the field trip, and pulled a textbook out from hiding under the chair.

She signed a birthday card for a friend, addressed and stamped the envelope and wrote a quick note for the grocery store. She put both near her purse.

Mom then washed her face with 3 in 1 cleanser, put on her Night Solution & age fighting moisturizer, brushed and flossed her teeth and filed her nails.

Dad called out, "I thought you were going to bed." I’m on my way," she said. She put some water into the dog’s dish and put the cat outside, then made sure the doors were locked. She looked in on each of the kids and turned out their bedside lamps, hung up a shirt, threw some dirty socks into the hamper, and had a brief conversation with the one up still doing homework.

In the bedroom, she set the alarm; laid out clothing for the next day, straightened up the shoe rack. She added three things to her 6 most important things to do list. She said her prayers, and visualized the accom-plishment of her goals.

About that time, Dad turned off the TV and announced to no one in particular. "I’m going to bed." And he did...without another thought.
 

Today, we celebrate a mother’s love but we do so from an unconventional Mother’s Day passage.

 

If you are a mother or would like to express the love of a mother, I want you to know something. The love that you express or withhold is a life-changing influence that impacts your children for the rest of their lives.

There is an interesting passage that that underscores a mother’s love. While the main theme is the wisdom of King Solomon, it also shows us how he wisely appealed to a mother’s love. Read the text.

This passage doesn’t moralize about harlotry. It doesn’t moralize about the wretched behavior of the woman who stole the other woman’s baby and lied about it to the king. It doesn’t moralize about the summary execution of a helpless innocent child. What it does do is show us a king who is smart enough to appeal to the loving maternal instinct in order to find the truth.

This passage recognizes TWO KINDS OF MOTHERS.
1. There are Mothers who are characterized by the spirit of selfishness and heartless cruelty.

These are the mothers who you can never please. They are bitter with life. Hateful and armed with a thousand reasons why life is unfair, they pour out their vengeance on their friends and families. These are the mothers who walk out when things get hard. They leave the family high and dry. They don’t care who they hurt, just so long that others close to them aren’t happy either. They project on to the significant people in their lives all of the hurt that has accumulated over the years.

2. There are Mothers who are characterized by the spirit of self-sacrificing love.

No price is too great. Here’s a woman who had a child. The child had no father that was in the home, but she is committed to loving this child dearly. Think about what she had been through. At first, she was bereaved. Imagine waking up and finding your baby lifeless. Then, she discovered that she had been robbed as well! We don’t know how long the woman had been living with this lady who had taken her child! Solomon was wise enough to use one of the most powerful forces in the universe to get to the truth – a mothers love. Solomon knew that the love of a mother for her child – even if it meant separation from her child – would remedy this dilemma. You see it’s a great love that is willing to suffer an even greater loss in order to give a child what they need. Mothers don’t offer perfection; they offer sacrifice.

Quotation: Sydney J. Harris (1917-1986) said, “Real mothers are not perfect because they usually start out young. The commonest fallacy among women is that simply having children makes one a mother-which is as absurd as believing that having a piano makes one a musician.” “The most important occupation on earth for a woman is to be a real mother to her children. It does not have much glory to it; there is a lot of grit and grime. But there is no greater place of ministry, position, or power than that of a mother. Phil Whisenhunt - Edy, Draper’s Book of Quotations for the Christian World (Wheaton: Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., 1992).”

I recently came across a true story that happened during the Holocaust. Solomon Rosenberg, his wife and their two sons were arrested and placed in a concentration camp. The rules were simple. As long as they did their work, they were permitted to live. When they became too weak to work, they would be exterminated. Rosenberg watched as his own father and mother were marched off to their deaths and he knew that his youngest son David would be next because he had always been a frail child. Every evening Rosenberg came back into the barracks after his hours of hard labor and searched for the faces of his family. When he found them they would huddle together, embrace one another and thank God for another day of life. One day he came back and didn’t see those familiar faces. He finally discovered his oldest son, Joshua, in a corner sobbing and praying. “Josh, tell me it’s not true.” Joshua turned to his dad and said, “It’s true. Today David was not strong enough to do his work and so they took him away.” Mr. Rosenberg then asked, “But where is your mother?” Joshua could barely speak and finally uttered, “When they came for David, he was afraid and cried and so mom took his hand and went with him.”

Thank you mothers, for holding our hands and walking with us in our darkest hours – for sacrificing convenience and ease so that we might have companionship. Thank you for overcoming the bitter and negative life experiences and instead of projecting that on to us, you have shown us only gentleness and kindness. And for this, we owe to you a great debt.

In everything that you’ve needed to know, somewhere along the line a mom probably taught you. Let’s revisit some of those lessons:
•  My Mother taught me LOGIC: "If you fall off that swing and break your neck, you can’t go to the store with me," as well as, "If everyone else jumped off a cliff would you do it too?"
•  My Mother taught me MEDICINE: "If you don’t stop crossing your eyes, they’re going to freeze that way."
•  My Mother taught me TO THINK AHEAD: "If you don’t pass your spelling test, you’ll never get a good job!"
•  My Mother taught me TO MEET A CHALLENGE: "What were you thinking? Answer me when I talk to you... Don’t talk back to me!"
•  My Mother taught me HUMOR: "When that lawn mower cuts off your toes, don’t come running to me."
•  My Mother taught me how to BECOME AN ADULT: "If you don’t eat your vegetables, you’ll never grow up.
•  My mother taught me about GENETICS: "You are just like your father!"
•  My mother taught me about my ROOTS: "Do you think you were born in a barn?"
•  My mother taught me about the WISDOM of AGE: "When you get to be my age, you will understand," or, "I will explain it all when you get older."
•  My mother taught me about ANTICIPATION: "Just wait until your father gets home."
•  My mother taught me about RECEIVING: “You are going to get it when I get you home.”
•  And the all time favorite thing my mother taught me, JUSTICE: "One day you will have kids, and I hope they turn out just like you. Then you’ll see what it’s like! I can’t wait!

Mary Ann Bird wrote a short story entitled "The Whisper Test." It is a true story from her life. I’ve shared it before but I think it’s so fitting that I share it again today.

"I grew up knowing I was different, and I hated it. I was born with a cleft palate, and when I started school, my classmates made it clear to me how I must look to others: a little girl with a misshapen lip, crooked nose, lopsided teeth and garbled speech.” When schoolmates would ask, ’What happened to your lip?’ I’d tell them I’d fallen and cut it on a piece of glass. Somehow it seemed more acceptable to have suffered an accident than to have been born different. I was convinced that no one outside my family could love me.

"There was, however, a teacher in the second grade that we all adored -- Mrs. Leonard by name. She was short, round, happy -- a sparkling lady. Annually, we would have a hearing test. I was virtually deaf in one of my ears; but when I had taken the test in past years, I discovered that if I did not press my hand as tightly upon my ears as I was instructed to do, I could pass the test. Mrs. Leonard gave the test to everyone in the class, and finally it was my turn. I knew from past years that as we stood against the door and covered one ear, the teacher sitting at her desk would whisper something and we would have to repeat it back ... things like, ’The sky is blue’ or ’Do you have new shoes?’ I waited there for those words that God must have put into her mouth, those seven words which changed my life. Mrs. Leonard said, in her whisper, ’I wish you were my little girl (as told by Spencer Morgan Rice, "The Drama of God," Trinity Church, Boston).’"

Perhaps today, on this day when we celebrate a mother’s loving influence, you’re more torn up inside than joyful because you’ve had some experiences along the way that have hurt you deeply. There have been some painful things that have happened in your life and Mother’s Day brings all of that back. Well maybe you can hear the Spirit say, “I wish you were my little girl.”

And if you are a mother, and you would like to get your family as well as your own life on track spiritually today, I would like to extend to you the Savior. By believing in him you receive from him an enablement to begin living life and parenting children and running a home according to his life-giving teachings.