God's Love Gift

And God Said

Have you ever thought about the power behind those 3 words? When God says something things change don’t they. He spoke and a world existed. He spoke and things appeared on our world. But when God speaks, it also conveys His thoughts. His thoughts are powerful, they’re humbling and they know what’s best for us.

Genesis 2:18 NKJV

18 And the Lord God said, “It is not good that man should be alone; I will make him a helper comparable to him.”

Since tomorrow is a very special day that we celebrate every year. I want to spend some time this morning contemplating this helper that God decided to make.

Genesis 2:21–25 NLT

21 So the Lord God caused the man to fall into a deep sleep. While the man slept, the Lord God took out one of the man’s ribs and closed up the opening. 22 Then the Lord God made a woman from the rib, and he brought her to the man. 23 “At last!” the man exclaimed. “This one is bone from my bone, and flesh from my flesh! She will be called ‘woman,’ because she was taken from ‘man.’ ” 24 This explains why a man leaves his father and mother and is joined to his wife, and the two are united into one. 25 Now the man and his wife were both naked, but they felt no shame.

Do you notice the word made there, the Hebrew word is banah. It means “to build”. Adam’s rib formed the basic material from which his companion was “built.” The woman was formed for inseparable unity and fellowship of life with the man, and the mode of her creation was to lay the actual foundation for the moral ordinance of marriage. She was “to stand by his side as an equal, to be loved and protected by him” God led the woman to Adam. Adam is called a “son of God” in Luke 3:38 and this woman should properly be called the daughter of God. God her father led her to Adam and presented her to him. This first marriage covenant is appropriately called the covenant of God. (Prov 2:17, Mal 2:14) It implies His authorship of this sacred institution.

Why didn't God make her from the dust as he had made her husband? Why this kind of miracle with such an elaborate procedure? God knew the offence it would cause in the 21st century and yet he made woman this way. Why? What is the significance of this?

Because it was God alone who made woman in this way Adam could never tell Eve, "Remember all you are you owe to me. You came about because of my initiative, my plan, my prayers and my skill." No. Adam was in a virtual coma, totally unconscious, and God alone was at work devising and accomplishing the creation of woman. Woman’s creation was the climax of all of His creation, the culmination of the creation story. Woman is what she is through an act of God; her design and her gifts are all due to the Lord. "I am what I am by the power and love of God," every woman can say. Woman was to be a companion and a helper for man, to be one with him and to cheer and encourage and bless him. Man in turn was to be her strong provider and confidant. The husband is to obtain the pure affection of a woman’s heart, and the wife to soften and improve her husband’s character and give it completeness - these then would fulfill God’s purpose for them. When you have experienced this I believe that it is the most wonderful and special gift that God can ever give us. That was His original intent. This original intent so mimics that relationship that God wants to have with us if we will cultivate it. But it’s the gift within the marriage gift that I want to look at today.

We know from the Bible that man and women are 2 parts of one flesh as said by God. And it also good that men and women are different. Would I get any disagreement with that? Guys, would we want women to be just like us? How about you gals? Would you want the guys to be like you? No of course not. You may have heard me say this before, I think that God gave men and women different attributes of Himself. We each have different parts of God within our nature. (That’s another whole sermon in itself) Did you know that our word “sex” comes from a Latin word meaning “to divide or separate,”? Masculinity and Femininity. These words are usually associated with male and female and they are definitely different. Both sides of the fence have some of both, but they are lopsided depending on which sex you are and it’s that way by design.

“Masculine and feminine can be understood only in terms of each other; basically they are opposite and complementary qualities. They are like darkness and light. It is very hard to understand darkness except in terms of light, and light except in terms of darkness. They are two extremes on a continuum.”

God said the 2 are part of one.

God’s Gift to the Human Race

We can see and feel from our own experience what Adam must have felt when he saw the woman for the first time and said “At last” He saw before him the most exquisite being that God had so far presented to him. He saw beauty beyond his imagination, he saw an end to his loneliness, he saw the companion he had felt he was lacking. When he said “This is bone of my bone and flesh of my flesh”, he realized that he was looking at the other half of himself. Adam was formed ready for this companion.

For the rest of us males, it happens in many different ways. For some I’m told, it’s an instantaneous process. For other the Lord, if were listening, lets us know over a matter of time as we realize that there is an a depressing hole in our lives when that special someone isn’t around. However it happens, the result, if mentored by the Lord, is a special reality that only grows and matures over time and deepens our relationships to that oneness that can only happen in the trilogy that God originally intended that marriage should be.

Husband, Wife, and God.

Guys what do you find in your spouses or fiance that makes them desirable? I’m sure I would get answers like beauty, caring, loving, helpful, insightful...

If you look up what Solomon had to say, you’ll find 19 specific things that a virtuous woman or wife should possess in Prov 31:10-31. The list is pretty daunting actually. God has endowed my wife, our wives, our daughters with traits and abilities that we could never even hope to posses.

I saw this on Facebook and it think it fits very well..... I don’t mean to say that women or superior to men, but lets face it God gave our women abilities that He only wanted them to have to be our support group. It was a perfect design and it still is.

Has God’s design been left untouched by sin? No. All those special attributes, Satan has exploited in so many different ways. I have met so many women who have to deal with this, some in just one from others in multiple compounded ways. I see more probably in nursing than others might. The list of things that women deal with has been going from the first couple down to the present. I won’t dwell on them, because we all now at least one aspect of the list personally whether we are male or female and that knowledge hurts very much.

I know the thoughts are out, so I’ll say it. I thought it was mother’s day tomorrow. But can you have a chicken before and egg? What about a maple tree before the seed? You can’t have a mother without their being a girl to grow to womanhood. The process of getting there has so many facets to it. I’ll just say that God is amazing.

I fully believe that God’s love gift has 2 very important facets and you can’t have one without the other. Women or young women that spend time in God’s presence produce Godly mothers. The word mother brings so many mental images into our minds. For some of wonderful images, others not so good. The very first came into existence with this statement in the Bible.

Genesis 3:20 NKJV

20 And Adam called his wife’s name Eve, because she was the mother of all living.

Eve or the Hebrew word Chavvah means life. Have you ever thought about the fact that Adam gave the name “the living one” to his wife in faith, seeing in her the “mother of all living” at a time when his death sentence had just been pronounced. Instead of rebelling, Adam fastened his eye in faith upon his Judge (God) and claimed the promise he had just received, and, before she even gave birth to her first-born, called her, hopefully, “the living one.” Faith was indeed to him “the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen” (Heb. 11:1).

The Bible doesn't tell us how long that Eve lived, but Adam lived 930 years. If she lived even closed to that time, she must have watched with joy and sorrow as motherhood developed in this new world not just for herself but for others as well. She had the first joy of experiencing love, affection and intimacy with her husband. She experienced the wonder of a new life growing within her and then the pain and ultimate joy/love of delivering and holding her first child, the first child created by a human couple. I’m sure the wonder/love of motherhood was at it ultimate and praise for God was boundless at that time.

But in a sinful world there is pain and heart hurt. Hurt because ache doesn’t seem to adequately describe what mothers more than any other individual must endure in this world. Men are better, at least a good share of the time, in compartmentalizing the things that happen that are difficult to deal with. Mothers/women have been given emotions (men have them too but we don’t express them much) and use them in ways that men are at a loss to understand. More often than not women will remember things that men probably heard and wanted to remember but that is far as it went. For women they will see and here things, an emotion will get attached to that thought and it will remain there until she needs it again. Tell me guys if this is not true? I know it is, because I’ve seen it happen many times with my girl. If I’m wise, sometimes I’m not, I will take what she says and not try and contradict because 95% of the time I prove myself wrong. Those emotions are hard to control at times aren’t they women. Emotions as only understood by women and God are one of those special attributes that I talked about. A part of God given to them alone.

Genesis 4:8 NKJV

8 Now Cain talked with Abel his brother; and it came to pass, when they were in the field, that Cain rose up against Abel his brother and killed him.

The first murder. An inconceivable act at that point in time. Do we think much about murders today? We hear about them on a daily basis. Do they affect us? They don’t involve us so we pretty much space them off. What if it where your own?

Eve had two sons. She loved them both as only a mother can love them, not to mention the fact they were as near as we can tell her first two children. Cain was the murder and her Able was murdered by him. I don’t think it is possible to imagine the pain and unbelief and despair that went through her mind. You mothers might be able to imagine. It hasn’t stopped since that first episode. This act and the corresponding emotions happen every minute of every day somewhere in the world. It destroys some mothers, others look to the God the only one that can truly help a person get through that kind of emotional upheaval.

As you think of the grief that comes from something like this, how many times do we see this grief play on in the bible. I think of Samson and how Manoah’s wife was barren and the angel appeared and promised them a son. He grew up and did what he pleased and didn’t follow his parent’s instructions and was eventually killed all because he didn’t follow the word of God. I’m sure she must have worried and pleaded and begged for him to listen to there instruction. Eventually he was killed. A mother’s worst nightmare.

Naomi must have considered herself lucky as she headed to Moab with her 2 fine sons and husband. We all know the story often told in those days for so many families. Naomi’s husband passed, then both of her sons. She went away from Bethlehem Naomi and returned,

Ruth 1:20–21 NKJV

20 But she said to them, “Do not call me Naomi; call me Mara, for the Almighty has dealt very bitterly with me. 21 I went out full, and the Lord has brought me home again empty. Why do you call me Naomi, since the Lord has testified against me, and the Almighty has afflicted me?”

In Solomon's day things were no different.

1 Kings 3:16–22 NKJV

16 Now two women who were harlots came to the king, and stood before him. 17 And one woman said, “O my lord, this woman and I dwell in the same house; and I gave birth while she was in the house. 18 Then it happened, the third day after I had given birth, that this woman also gave birth. And we were together; no one was with us in the house, except the two of us in the house. 19 And this woman’s son died in the night, because she lay on him. 20 So she arose in the middle of the night and took my son from my side, while your maidservant slept, and laid him in her bosom, and laid her dead child in my bosom. 21 And when I rose in the morning to nurse my son, there he was, dead. But when I had examined him in the morning, indeed, he was not my son whom I had borne.” 22 Then the other woman said, “No! But the living one is my son, and the dead one is your son.” And the first woman said, “No! But the dead one is your son, and the living one is my son.” Thus they spoke before the king.

Hannah had a grief as well

1 Samuel 1:1–2 NKJV

1 Now there was a certain man of Ramathaim Zophim, of the mountains of Ephraim, and his name was Elkanah the son of Jeroham, the son of Elihu, the son of Tohu, the son of Zuph, an Ephraimite. 2 And he had two wives: the name of one was Hannah, and the name of the other Peninnah. Peninnah had children, but Hannah had no children.

1 Samuel 1:4–6 NKJV

4 And whenever the time came for Elkanah to make an offering, he would give portions to Peninnah his wife and to all her sons and daughters. 5 But to Hannah he would give a double portion, for he loved Hannah, although the Lord had closed her womb. 6 And her rival also provoked her severely, to make her miserable, because the Lord had closed her womb.

Because of sin, grief and trials have to be apart of this world. We know it, we see it every day in form or another. The Bible tells why this hast to happen. But if we look, we can also see in the Bible how God brings joy out grief and trials for mothers.

Ruth 4:13–17 NKJV

13 So Boaz took Ruth and she became his wife; and when he went in to her, the Lord gave her conception, and she bore a son. 14 Then the women said to Naomi, “Blessed be the Lord, who has not left you this day without a close relative; and may his name be famous in Israel! 15 And may he be to you a restorer of life and a nourisher of your old age; for your daughter-in-law, who loves you, who is better to you than seven sons, has borne him.” 16 Then Naomi took the child and laid him on her bosom, and became a nurse to him. 17 Also the neighbor women gave him a name, saying, “There is a son born to Naomi.” And they called his name Obed. He is the father of Jesse, the father of David.

As for Hannah, while they were at the temple,

1 Samuel 1:10–11 NKJV

10 And she was in bitterness of soul, and prayed to the Lord and wept in anguish. 11 Then she made a vow and said, “O Lord of hosts, if You will indeed look on the affliction of Your maidservant and remember me, and not forget Your maidservant, but will give Your maidservant a male child, then I will give him to the Lord all the days of his life, and no razor shall come upon his head.”

1 Samuel 1:19–20 NKJV

19 Then they rose early in the morning and worshiped before the Lord, and returned and came to their house at Ramah. And Elkanah knew Hannah his wife, and the Lord remembered her. 20 So it came to pass in the process of time that Hannah conceived and bore a son, and called his name Samuel, saying, “Because I have asked for him from the Lord.”

God has given Mothers a special strength that also comes from God.

1 Samuel 1:24–28 NKJV

24 Now when she had weaned him, she took him up with her, with three bulls, one ephah of flour, and a skin of wine, and brought him to the house of the Lord in Shiloh. And the child was young. 25 Then they slaughtered a bull, and brought the child to Eli. 26 And she said, “O my lord! As your soul lives, my lord, I am the woman who stood by you here, praying to the Lord. 27 For this child I prayed, and the Lord has granted me my petition which I asked of Him. 28 Therefore I also have lent him to the Lord; as long as he lives he shall be lent to the Lord.” So they worshiped the Lord there.

I have often pondered the strength that Hannah posses to follow through with her vow. Weaning from Jewish tradition was done anywhere from 18 months to 5 years. It is general considered probable that Samuel was weaned some where between age 2-4. Would you have been able to give up your baby at that age to the Eli to live in the temple where no mothers and women were allowed?

Mary the mother of Jesus was considered to be relatively young at the time she was visited by the angel probable around the age of 14. When it became evident that she was pregnant she would have condemned, judged, and the potential for stoning was still a possibility. God never left here side and she and Joseph were guided through the whole pregnancy. Cheyenne or Sam would you have been able to stand up under that kind of scrutiny?

There are so many more examples of mothers and there love and how the Lord protects them. I’ve only scratched the surface.

2917 “Mom’s Just Perfect”

A small boy invaded the lingerie section of a big California department store and shyly presented his problem to a woman clerk. “I want to buy my mom a present of a slip,” he said, “but I don’t know what size she wears.”

“Is she tall or short, fat or skinny?” asked the clerk.

“She’s just perfect,” beamed the small boy. So she wrapped up a size 34 for him.

Two days later, mom came to the store herself—and changed it to a 52.

3618 That Precious Name!

Mother! That precious name,

Forever more the same,

Earth’s greatest word.

Though ages past have flown,

No sound was ever known,

Like that dear name alone,

Or ever heard.

From childhood’s earliest day,

She guarded all our way

With tenderest care.

She shared our every woe,

Each cherished hope did know,

Heard every whisper low

Of childish prayer.

Our Mother! God to Thee

In deep humility

We lift our praise:

Keep those we love the best

Through every trial and test,

And may they ever rest

Safe in thy care.