Mother's Day

Motherhood Lessons from Sarah

Happy Mother’s Day:

This mothers day I want to talk about Sarah in the Bible..>And I hope you will stick with me as I take some pastoral License and imagine what her advice might be to mom’s today

But first, who was Sarah?

She was married to Abraham

She had the promise of God to have a child but she was barren

They had major infertility issues

If you read her story she reached the bottom end of hopelessness on many occasions

Many mothers struggle with infertility, I know many people who have struggled with this

It is a powerless feeling

And you can either run to God and rest in him or run from God and resent him

Even when you can not see his hand moving fully in your life, you can run toward him.

Trust him, because your father in heaven sees you and loves you

God promised Sara that she would have a son waited 25 years

she became the mother of one son

Isaac

And if you were to read her story you might find the good, the bad and the ugly of motherhood

While kids can bring out your worst, they need your best:

For Sara, infertility brought out her worst side…

She was so desperate for a son…That God promised her by the way

that she tells her husband to go sleep with the servant girl and take that child

I mean there is comparison and insecurity

Kids can bring out the worst and they can bring out the best

Three things that you need to know that will bring out your best

So here are 4 things you need to know and 4 things you need to do

1. Children are God’s gift to you

Genesis 21

The New International Version Chapter 21

6 Sarah said, “God has brought me laughter, and everyone who hears about this will laugh with me.” 7 And she added, “Who would have said to Abraham that Sarah would nurse children? Yet I have borne him a son in his old age.”

This is something God had done

Isaac means “laughter”

and she sees this entire event as funny because she is so old…but Children are a gift from the Lord.

The New International Version Psalm 127

3 Children are a heritage from the LORD,

offspring a reward from him.

4 Like arrows in the hands of a warrior

are children born in one’s youth.

5 Blessed is the man

whose quiver is full of them.

They will not be put to shame

when they contend with their opponents in court.

Children are God’s gift to you

And I am not old enough to experience this yet but apparently grandchildren are God’s gift to you for not killing your children

This gift from God caused Sarah to worship

Let the Joy of the children that God has gifted to you to worship the giver Because with every gift, it is more about the giver than the gift.

Mom’s Part of how you give your kids the best

Is by first giving God your best

Because when you give God your best: He is freed up to raise up your best within you

See we are all going to worship something or someone in this world and if it’s not God then it is too small to bring out your best

2. God has purposes and plans for them

God had a bigger purpose and plan for Sarah

Sarah had Isaac

He became the father of Jacob

Jacob’s name was changed to Israel

Through the nation of Israel came who? the promised messiah

Who you raise matters! God has a purpose and a plan for you!

3. God is always doing more than a mom can see

therefore let the awareness that there are God sized plans for your kids cause you to pray

Mom’s, this is one of the most significant things you will do for your children is to pray, pray for them and over them, persistently

Prayer is how you gain the power of God to bring out your best

I know I am talking to mom’s here but this is for all of us

Prayer is one of the ways that God moves in us to bring out our best, otherwise what comes out under pressure is often our worst.

It’s how you gain the wisdom of God to know how to parent

God whispers to moms that gives you hints and clues to how to parent

prayer is how you get to peace in the midst of worry in a chaotic world

Flip with me to Philippians 4

The New International Version Chapter 4

4 Rejoice in the Lord always. I will say it again: Rejoice! 5 Let your gentleness be evident to all. The Lord is near. 6 Do not be anxious about anything, but in every situation, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. 7 And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.

Did you see verse 5: “The Lord is near.”

Do we live that way, the Lord is near always So by faith, we need to live like we know the lord is near

Do you see how the text says next?

In every anxiety and in every worry, and in every situation that we need to bring that to the Lord...

and then literally it says the peace of God will guard your hearts and mind

This word guard, the way it is used in biblical times is to post watch over something...

Its like when you guard a prisoner...

So Mom’s Prayer for your kids leads you to parent out of peace and God transcends your situation with his peace and actually posts his peace as a guard to watch over your heart

So many times we let anxious thoughts get the best of us and we parent out of our fear.

But MOM’s ARE SUPPOSED TO WORRY!

Right?

The first time My brother and I stood on top of a 10ft halfpipe My mom worried

A couple of weeks ago Emma and her friends wanted to walk down town and buy candy…Its less than a mile away

I said, Sure honey I think that’s great....

We planned a route for her to go so I knew where she would be

An hour later I am texting desiree pictures of the girls walking home as I am stalking them from the car across the street...

Dad’s worry too...

But here is my point, Yeah…Mom’s and dad’s your supposed to worry, but it is what you will do with it that will lead you to parent out of fear or out of peace

Do you attempt to manage all of your fear and anxiety…Or do you bring it to a Holy god through prayer

Do you settle your worry in payer ?

This is what brings out your best!

When you can parent out of peace rather than panic it will transform your parenting

There is literally nothing to small mom’s

And there is nothing too big....Bring it to him

There is another point that I think Sarah would tell you:

4. You are raising God’s kids

Abraham was instructed by God to sacrifice Isaac

Now if you don’t know this story its already going to sound strange

And here is the deal, this story in the Bible is bizarre and in order to understand it you need some theological training and biblical context to really mine to true meaning out of that scripture

See God was accomplishing a number of things through this story

God was showing that he loved Isaac more that Abraham and Sarah…And by the way, God loves your kids more than you do.

And that Isaac was first God’s and not theres

And that even if Isaac was sacrificed they believed that God could and would raise him from the dead …Because he is all powerful all loving and fully able

See there are things that Abraham and Sarah needed to know about God…Things that needed to be present in their relationship with Isaac

because

You can fall in love with the gift but distance yourself from the giver when you become a mom, and that is a problem

And you might know the story, God intervened and did not allow Isaac to be sacrificed…God communicated to Abraham and Sarah that Isaac is God’s first

Do you know that? That your child is God’s first?

Once you are aware that they are God’s Kids first there are 4 things you ought to do:

1. Conquer Comparisons

We live in a society that is constantly comparing one another…Oh my goodness…Little kids already know the value of society is wealth so they inherently want what other have

When Emma was a baby she kicked off every pair of shoes and socks that we put on her…Day one it was like no feet coverings for me...

Then try and go to church in the winter time with a baby that didn't have socks on.....Oh MAN We heard about it!

And we are like…yeah we know she kicks them off, we keep trying to put them on!

Well my son always had socks on…And we were like…we get it, your the perfect parent and we need help

The New International Version Chapter 16

16 Now Sarai, Abram’s wife, had borne him no children. But she had an Egyptian slave named Hagar; 2 so she said to Abram, “The LORD has kept me from having children. Go, sleep with my slave; perhaps I can build a family through her.”

Abram agreed to what Sarai said. 3 So after Abram had been living in Canaan ten years, Sarai his wife took her Egyptian slave Hagar and gave her to her husband to be his wife. 4 He slept with Hagar, and she conceived.

When she knew she was pregnant, she began to despise her mistress. 5 Then Sarai said to Abram, “You are responsible for the wrong I am suffering. I put my slave in your arms, and now that she knows she is pregnant, she despises me. May the LORD judge between you and me.”

6 “Your slave is in your hands,” Abram said. “Do with her whatever you think best.” Then Sarai mistreated Hagar; so she fled from her.

The comparison game will bring the worst out of you.

Sarah dealt with this

All of her decedents dealt with this

Until one day God Gives this big extended family “The talk” His 10 commandments and he had these 10 things to say and one of them is “Don’t covet”

Don’t look at what your neighbor has and compare it to what you have because you will get eaten up with Envy and discontentment…or Pride

But either way it will eat you up and undo you

In other-words, don’t play the comparison game

So mom’s, if you want to break from the worst coming out of you then you need to free yourself up and overcome comparisons

There is another thing that I think Sara would tell us

2. You have to overcome insecurity

This is just on the heals of overcoming comparisons

We have all had some sort of insecurity or self doubt

And if you haven’t then you are just lying

Mom’s you have to settle: Where is the first measurement of your worth in life?

Either you are going to get this externally, by popular opinion or peoples comments or you are going to going to find this internally through Christ himself

The prolific Author Eugene Peterson gave this translation of Colossians 1:27-28

The mystery in a nutshell is just this: Christ is in you, so therefore you can look forward to sharing in God’s glory. It’s that simple. That is the substance of our Message.

In other words, Moms: If you can find your security in BEING CHRIST IS IN YOU!

Then you can get so freed from being controlled by the world of insecurity that the best of you can come out for your family and your kids

Where do you find your identity and security?

There is a third thing I think Sarah would say to do

3. Discipline Patiently

Proverbs 26:13

The New International Version Chapter 23

13 Do not withhold discipline from a child;

I have learned so much from my wife on this.

Desiree just knows inherently how to be a mom. She is like a compass that points true north for all of her friends.

Desiree’s friends will call her with kid issues and ask what to do about it and she will give them the best advice you have ever heard..

I keep telling her that she needs to write a book or have a podcast...

But I just remember when the girls were really little she would discipline them, and then just sit down and tell them,

“I will discipline you, until you can discipline yourself”

and now our kids largely can self discipline

We don’t even have teenagers yet but still I can hear Desiree saying to her friends, if you don’t discipline now, you will pay for it when they are teenagers!

Discipline is one of the gifts we give to kids

You may think when I say Discipline I am just talking about spanking....No not at all...

A discipline is something you train in…My discipline in my masters program was theology and I trained and trained in it..

I practiced researching, I practiced study, I practiced preaching and writing so that one day, when I am in the position I am in now, I have good enough habits to be a good pastor

Discipline and correction is a gift that you give your kids. It is HAVING THE LONG GAME IN VIEW...

It might be cute when they are 2 to do something terrible…and you know what…Its funny when they are 2

But if they keep doing that thing in Junior high, they will get suspended...

Discipline is training and correcting your kids

It is a gift to them!

4. Win what’s important

Jesus said, in Matthew 6 Seek first the kingdom of God

Why? Because not all things are equally important!

Mom’s and dad’s what do we disciple our children into believing is important?

Winning at soccer?

Having money?

Being Popular?

Because society doesn't celebrate when people’s character is in the right place.

But you can!

You can with your kids every day!

Mom’s and dad’s having character is huge

some things are more important than others

And Jesus said that seeking first his kingdom was what was most important

Are you showing your kids that through your life?

You have a huge calling ordained by God

T his world will never get better than the quality of adults that we have and how they were raised by their parents

Your calling is so huge because you are defining the future

Let’s pray