Mother's Day

This morning we are celebrating the women in our life that help raise you, teach you, and care of you. Mother’s have played an important roll in all of our life. Some are still here and other have gone on.

For some people it can be a difficult time. There women who have experienced infertility or miscarriages or who are still praying for God to bless them with a godly husband and family. Some may be grieving the loss of a mother or a child. And some may be feeling as if they’re failing at motherhood altogether. You could feel like any one of this things.

In the weeks leading up to the second Sunday of May, we’re surrounded by flowery cards filled with sappy sentiments about how wonderful our mothers are.

In church, we’re often pointed to the example of “the Proverbs 31 woman,” who gets up early, stays up late, and somehow manages to perfectly balance selfcare, motherhood, and a career. But for many women this ideal looks nothing like their real lives, and the disconnect leaves them feeling broken, hopeless, and like failures.

This morning we are be look at two women if the Old test that went though the feeling of brokenness, hopeless and like the feeling of failure.

So if you have your bible turn to 1 Samuel 1:1–8 first and put something there to mark it. Now turn to Ruth 1:1-14. If you do not have you bible you can follow along on the screen in a few minutes.

before we look at the passage today. I have a question for you. So think for a moment.

How does God see the mom who doesn’t have everything perfectly figured out?

What is his heart toward the mothers who are praying for children who have walked away from the faith? Does he hear the moms who are grieving children taken from life too soon, or the women who long to be mothers but whose time has not yet come?

The answer: he sees them as his daughters, and he loves them just as much as the mothers who—externally at least—appear to have it all together

All through out Scripture, we see examples of mothers who are exalted.

Mary Jesus mother

Timothy mother and grandmother

mother who struggled. Sarah and Elizabeth mothers who longed for children well into their golden years before their prayers were answered

We see stories of mothers celebrating, grieving, and doing whatever they can to keep their children alive in the midst of tyrannical decrees and famine.

Naomi

In the book of Ruth we see a family and a nation in crisis. Not only was there a famine affecting the entire region, but the people of Israel had forgotten God and the work he did for Israel when he brought them out of Egypt into the land of promise (Judges 2:10).

We do not know much about Naomi’s family before their move to Moab, it’s safe to assume she did her best to care for them. But when she went with her husband in search of food, she didn’t just leave her hometown—she left her community and any relationships that meant something in her life.

In the following ten years, Naomi would meet grief after grief as the family she’d spent her life nurturing slipped through her fingers, one after another. Before we reach the end of the first chapter, we find Naomi with her widowed and childless daughters-in-law, scavenging for food in a field owned by another man (v. 6).

Ruth 1:6–14 CSB

6 She and her daughters-in-law set out to return from the territory of Moab, because she had heard in Moab that the Lord had paid attention to his people’s need by providing them food. 7 She left the place where she had been living, accompanied by her two daughters-in-law, and traveled along the road leading back to the land of Judah. 8 Naomi said to them, “Each of you go back to your mother’s home. May the Lord show kindness to you as you have shown to the dead and to me. 9 May the Lord grant each of you rest in the house of a new husband.” She kissed them, and they wept loudly. 10 They said to her, “We insist on returning with you to your people.” 11 But Naomi replied, “Return home, my daughters. Why do you want to go with me? Am I able to have any more sons who could become your husbands? 12 Return home, my daughters. Go on, for I am too old to have another husband. Even if I thought there was still hope for me to have a husband tonight and to bear sons, 13 would you be willing to wait for them to grow up? Would you restrain yourselves from remarrying? No, my daughters, my life is much too bitter for you to share, because the Lord’s hand has turned against me.” 14 Again they wept loudly, and Orpah kissed her mother-in-law, but Ruth clung to her.

Naomi

Some might think that Naomifamily fleeing Israel during the famine as a lack of faith, Ruth would never have made her bold confession (Ruth 1:16–18) if she hadn’t witnessed examples of their faith in some way during her brief marriage. Nor would she have trusted in Naomi’s God if she hadn’t seen evidence of him at work in Naomi’s life before and after the death of Naomi’s husband and sons.

Hannah

This women was the first wife to a man named Elkanah. He had a second wife. This second wife had children but Hannah was childless. Every year this man would head up to Shiloh the place of worship to offer a sacrifice to God. He would give more to Hannah cause he loved her more but the Lord kept her for conceiving.

1 Samuel 1:6–8 CSB

6 Her rival would taunt her severely just to provoke her, because the Lord had kept Hannah from conceiving. 7 Year after year, when she went up to the Lord’s house, her rival taunted her in this way. Hannah would weep and would not eat. 8 “Hannah, why are you crying?” her husband, Elkanah, would ask. “Why won’t you eat? Why are you troubled? Am I not better to you than ten sons?”

Hannah was taunted

Family dynamics aside, instead of finding

compassion from someone who was privy to her innermost grief, she was

mocked (1 Samuel 1:6). Instead of finding support from her husband, she was made to feel guilty for not being content (v. 8). And instead of finding understanding when she entered the house of the Lord, she was accused of living a life of sin (vv. 12–14)

Although Hannah was deemed a failed, sinful woman by her culture’s standards, her faith in God never wavered. Instead, she allowed him to use her grief to draw her into a deeper place of trust, one where she could entrust the life of her long-prayed-for son to his safekeeping. And when she brought three-year-old Samuel before the Lord, she brought a boy who had witnessed his mother’s faith and who shared her passion for the Lord a hundredfold (1 Samuel 1:24–28).

What can we all learn for these two mother? We all know that we should treat our mother right, love them, and show that we care for them too. But there more we can learn.

We are all called to support those around us

No one should feel like Naomi or Hannah. All women should be loved and support because they are member of the some body.

Colossians 3:12–16 CSB

12 Therefore, as God’s chosen ones, holy and dearly loved, put on compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness, and patience, 13 bearing with one another and forgiving one another if anyone has a grievance against another. Just as the Lord has forgiven you, so you are also to forgive. 14 Above all, put on love, which is the perfect bond of unity. 15 And let the peace of Christ, to which you were also called in one body, rule your hearts. And be thankful. 16 Let the word of Christ dwell richly among you, in all wisdom teaching and admonishing one another through psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs, singing to God with gratitude in your hearts.

Motherhood is not a only road

Motherhood is not a road that’s meant to be walked alone. We as a church have a privilege and a responsibility to come alongside mothers and women who long to be mothers: to encourage, lift up, and offer physical help as needed.