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To honor your mother is a wonderful gift from God
because it helps you to appreciate all that her life means.
Mother's Day is very personal to me
but I don't want to mention any names in my family--
But what I would like you to do is think about the title of today's message.
It is entitled
Arise and call her 'blessed'
As I was calling in that title of the message to our secretary putting the bulletin together, she asked,
"When does that happen? When do the children arise and call mother 'blessed'?
I know because I am a professional minister:
"It happens at your funeral, dear."
At your funeral, your children will arise and talk of all these wonderful things that you taught them.
They will be crying... at all that stuff
I think maybe Mothers Day is an opportunity for us to to think,
not only of the legacy our mothers passed on down to us but...
Do you remember your Grandma?
Do you know anything about your mother's mother or your father's mother?
Have you learned anything about your great-grandparents?
In the year 2005, I got on the internet and I looked at the census...
--from when my great-great-grandfather came over to America.
I learned what his name was and realized I had named my firstborn son
with the same name my great-great grandfather had been given by his parents.
He moved from Ireland to New York state and met a woman when he was
eighteen or nineteen years old.
As I sit in the front row on a new Mother's Day, I'm thinking about this legacy that we have.
If you can think about your grandmother or your great-grandmother...
--anything you know about them...
See, I didn't know anything about these old people in our family tree until I dug in as an adult.
My Grandma wanted to talk to me about the stuff she knew but
sometimes children are too immature--even teenagers--
to spend the time with Grandma when she wants to pass along some of the stuff that she learned.
We just don't have the patience for the old people until maybe at the funeral
or later on in life when we wish we would have been listening, asking more questions.
So, to 'give honor where honor is due'
These people who lived out their lives before us:
Many of them struggled in ways that we've never known
because most parents want better for their children than they had
and they're willing to sacrifice that you might have it a little easier than they had it.
With that general principle in mind, I give you the very best I have to give you from the New Testament
and the Old Testament:
Honor Mother today.
Honor her by giving some time thinking about your family
In this room, every single one of us had a mother and on Mother's Day
I notice that many people take the time to think about those surrogate mother figures that they had in life...
--those school teachers or neighbors or maybe an aunt...
--even a big sister...
--somebody that God brought along in your life to nurture you at specific times in your lives.
This is a good day to do things God's way and
'give honor where honor is due' for the sacrifice that has been made.
I know on Mother's Day it's an opportunity to present that card...
Sometimes people just go into the drugstore or to the grocery store...
and they hunt to try to find that perfect card for the mother figure in their life.
Sometimes its last minute... and mothers understand that.
You can see it's colored in.
This might have been done in Sunday School or at School.
The teacher passed out some handouts and let the children color in
but this particular Mother's Day picture is somewhat tragic..
--if you know the story of Bambi.
Can you imagine giving a Bambi card for Mother's Day?
Happy Mother's Day!
--if you know the story...
If not, you might want to see somebody with the Disney collection and learn the story of Bambi.
Well, it's a good thing to give the card while you have a chance to give the card.
Sometimes, we have some adults in our lives that think, "Mom's really gonna like this..."
Probably all of us have done something like this.
Probably... even for those of you who run a tight ship at home,
and you pitch the 'junk'...
Some of you probably still have some pictures of little hands
somewhere because you just couldn't bear to throw it out...
--because it means something to you.
Sunday School teachers, Children's Church leaders, TeamKID leaders...
Vacation Bible School workers who think about the little hands
are helping this church become the church that does things God's way.
Both Old and New Testament: Honor Mothers...
Arise, and call her 'blessed'
Sometimes we try to top what we did last year
Maybe you're one won that bought Mother a dozen roses...
So, this year...
Here's what two dozen roses look like, Mom.
In our house we like to do--throughout the years... 'Breakfast in Bed'
--but it didn't quite look like this.
As the pastor of Bell Road Baptist Church, I am drawing upon my early years in this calling.
Early on, at an altar, when I was praying for the mother of my children when she was in a hospital bed...
--going through an emergency, even a life-threatening emergency
I spent a night in prayer and the Lord talked to me about the Bride of Christ and gave me a new understanding of Proverbs 31.
That I could look, as a pastor that is to feed the lambs,
the Bride of Christ, the Church...
I could look at Proverbs 31 as the ideal, composite picture of a woman
and it could always be my ideal to help the church be the Bride of Christ.
The Bride of Christ has children...
--if we allow the church, in a feminine archetype,
--if we allow the church as being that one who nurturers and influences little babes in Christ...
--bringing new children into the Kingdom of God through spiritual birth...
--and not abandoning those children at birth but raising them up the way that they should go.
Here's the Hebrew alphabet.
There's twenty two characters in the Hebrew alphabet
There's more characters up here because of certain letters that have different sounds
Today, we're going something about Proverbs 31.
you know that King Lemuel's mother is speaking to him about what kind of a woman makes a good wife.
In Proverbs 31 starting in the tenth verse
--throughout the rest of those verses--
we see a poem that is written based upon the first letter of the alphabet...
'Alef' you see...
In Hebrew, you read from right to left
So the first letters up here in the top corner of our illustration
This is an opportunity for you to think about your mother or your grandma with this biblical technique of 'acrostic'
That is where you take your mother's name.
My mother's name started with an 'F'
I could just think about a sentence that starts with the letter F that might help me remember my mother
I might think for my mother (from my memory) 'Firm'
She was a 'Firm' mother...
--maybe your mother if it started with the letter 'F'--
--you might think "Fun... My mom was fun"
I don't really remember my mother as much in the idea of 'Fun' as in 'Firm'
She was a good mother in her firmness.
This acrostic, Proverbs 31, starts out with this first letter 'Alef'
The keyword that starts that Hebrew sentence is the word for 'woman'
or... "A wife of noble character, who can find?"
"She is worth far more than rubies."
I want you to think about your mother, about your grandmothers
I want you to think about the church as being a virtuous church
This is the ideal.
We all know that in this world--even starting with the mother of all, Eve...
Every single mother throughout history has fallen short of the glory of God
And there has been no perfect church body
There has been no perfectly virtuous local church
Yet Proverbs 31 is given to us as representing
one generation passing down to the next generation how we can strive for the very best.
On this Mother's Day, we're considering "who can find a virtuous woman?"
"She is worth far more than rubies."
That's that keyword it starts with 'Bet' that letter 'B'
"Her husband safely trusts in her and lacks nothing of value."
This is wonderful
This is the wife at her very best...
--that she lives such a godly life that there is trust in the home.
And as a church that we strive to live such trustworthy lives among one another
that there's no time wasted with thoughts of conspiracy...
--with factions in the church...
--with the procurement of political power so that we might fight in the church.
There is no division in the ideal composite...
That virtuous woman:
Mom
Grandma
Sunday School teacher
That virtuous woman lives a trustworthy life and the men in her life trust her completely.
They lack nothing of value.
"...and portions for her servant girls"
This prosperous woman has much responsibility
She has a household...
Many people depend upon her to be faithful
--not just her flesh and blood but others who look to her for some form of stability and reliability.
Part of this has to do with her industriousness.
I think upon the women who served out their lives so that I might be born into this family...
--So I might grow up with honor in my mind... my memory for them
I think about those early mornings,
these women in my family tree who rose early
"while it is yet dark" and for some, stayed up late while the candle was burning...
--putting the final touches on whatever it was you needed.
And thinking about the church--
Oh, it would be a wonderful thing
if we could be the ideal woman as the church: Bell Road Baptist Church
If we would be the church that arises while it's still dark
and provides food for the Family of God
and portions for anyone who comes here to serve in any way
that there would be food in the Father's house
I love the creativity that God shows us
is in this composite picture
This ideal virtuous woman... that she is future-oriented.
She can look upon a field in and consider that a future lies in that field.
As a member of the Body of Christ, as I allow myself along with brothers and sisters in the blood-bought Bride of Christ,
I sat here on the front row during Praise and Worship
and I watched two little girls in the front row looking at their Daddy playing the drums...
--watching their mother sing...
I'm so pleased to be a part of the church that is thinking ahead...
--thinking about these who are right now, at the onset of their young married life,
--raising their family that is just still so small
--but thinking that it is not going to be all that long before that's 'Grandma' and 'Grandpa'
The potential of these young ladies being raised the way that they should go...
-- and saying that is no better place to be on Mother's Day than in the Father's House.
--that He trusts her completely with His children.
She considers a field and buys it...
She possesses the potential energy of a field
and out of her earnings she plants something in that field...
expecting growth.
We know that if we plant a vineyard,
there is pruning that must take place...
--fertilization...
There is some digging,
weeding,
watching and praying,
and harvesting and trading,
continually putting one foot in front of the other,
continually putting one prayer after another... after another...
--moving from faith to faith in our homes and as the church, the Bride of Christ.
I love the fact that this letter, this letter that starts out this sentence...
the word for perception
Seeing: that consideration in looking ahead...
--thinking ahead...
starts this thought that "she perceives that her trading is profitable."
There might be some time when, Moms, we need to be optimistic.
We need to know that if we have planted good seed in good soil...
--and we have watered in due season...
and we have prayed to the God who waters the field for us from the sky...
We understand that some plant,
and some water,
-- but God gives the increase.
We need to put our faith, O woman of God, we've gotta put our faith
in the promises of God.
If we will plant in due season, we will reap a harvest.
If we raise our children up in the way they should go, that when they are old, they will not depart from it.
This is the perception I'm thinking about...
She perceives that she's not wasting her time!
Sometimes it 'feels' like it... Doesn't it, Mom?
Sometimes it feels like years have been wasted...
You've forgotten all those many mornings when you got up when it was yet dark...
so that you could do the thing that needed to be done that day...
because God had blessed you to have a right mind...
--and you were clothed in the right kind of clothes to do the hard work of 'mothering'...
--relying upon the virtues of God moving through you.
That's going to take some eyes to see beyond the natural eyesight
That's gonna take the mother that says, "Lord, will you give me spiritual eyes?"
"Will you give me the kind eyes that the pastor was talking about during the worship service?"
These little girls were exposed to 'Country Gospel'
[sings] "Have a little talk with Jesus; tell Him all about your troubles."
Our Choir Director picked that because he wanted it for Mother's Day
I thought, "there might be some 'mother' in his life, somewhere along the way,
--that he just knew was going to be especially pleased"
--with some toe-tappin', Southern Gospel for a Choir selection...
It's not 'high church' but Mom likes it.
That was the intent.
I hope, as always, that the Bride of Christ is perceiving...
--that Her Work, Her Labor, is not in vain...
--that God will establish those whose thoughts are fixed on Him and His Ways.
At your funeral, ladies,
maybe your son or your daughter,
if the pastor would ask, "Now, did your Mom sew? Did she crochet?"
He's got it in his mind that he's going to preach Proverbs 31 at her funeral.
"No... Mom--I never saw her sew; I never saw her crochet."
"No, she wasn't a knitting kind of Grandma."
but this virtuous woman, she's busy with the industry of her hands.
and in this picture, this virtuous woman, she holds tools
with which she can make something out of basic elements...
--something that is going to bless you...
--or protect you...
--or comfort you...
I did have a knitting Grandma
and on those cold, Christmas mornings, I loved to get some knitted booties from Grandma.
Sometimes there were some pretty awful colors...
But nobody's gonna see 'em!
They accomplished the purpose.
I'm thankful for those virtuous women who left behind a quilt,
or an afghan...
--some sort of tapestry...
--some covering or protection.
that if, Mom... or you (Grandma) weren't the type to hold a distaff or a spindle in her hands or her fingers
you could give some type of thought to "what did she do?"
Maybe during the war, she worked in a factory and put food on the table...
--and, unfortunately maybe in your generation,
you would have snubbed your nose at it...
But the family she provided for
enjoyed food in their bellies because of her industrious hands.
At most funerals, when the children are arising to call their mothers 'blessed'...
Most funerals have some story where Mom had some aspect of her personality that brought laughter into the home.
In the church, I think about this virtuous woman,
the Bride of Christ, the church that is not worried about tomorrow.
--But the church that says, "God will provide for us."
He tells us not to worry about tomorrow but to praise Him today...
--and to do those little things that he tells us to do...
--to be obedient to the promptings of God.
Jesus said, "If you love me, obey my commandments."
Something as simple as honoring mother on Mother's Day is obedience to the Bible--both Old and New Testament.
Something as simple as that can help you to face tomorrow.
There is nothing to worry about:
You, O Church, can laugh at the days to come because you are a woman who trusts God.
Sometimes, in the folly of youth, little girls get a bad mouth on them
or start to use their tongue in ways that are sarcastic or mean-spirited...
All temptation is common to man...
If the church does her job right,
and Moms, Grandmas, if we do our jobs right,
we can teach the little ones how to say no to that loud woman, Folly...
--and all her course jesting.
and 'bless' the women to become women of God...
--who have faithful instruction on their tongues... who speak words of wisdom.
I am one fortunate soul that had grandmothers who were not foolish in their old age...
--but who wanted to pass on godly wisdom.
I would strive, as a church, that we would want to be a church who opens her mouth with faithful instruction... with wisdom and grace.
See, Mother's Day is not just time for the kids
It's also time for the husbands.
I think, in the church, it's just time for all of us to honor motherhood everywhere we go.
I was reading a post from a single mom.
She was reflecting on last year's Mother's Day...
and what a sad day it was in her life.
She was out in the park on Mother's Day
by herself with her little children...
--lamenting and mourning the circumstances which had led to her being alone on Mother's Day with no supportive party there...
Somebody, a stranger, came up to her and gave her some flowers and said, "Happy Mother's Day"
The day is yet young...
If we can spot 'motherhood' around anywhere, we would do well to bless mothers on this very special day.
Of course not just today... but all the days that we have.
I thank the Lord, from this front row, being able to stand next to a little girl who is unchurched...
--for coming to church because one who is babysitting her is committed to a local fellowship
--and watching this little girl raise her hands
and sing the songs...
I thank God that we have the opportunity to influence, even children from homes that are not yet serving the Lord.
We will not eat the bread of idleness.
Our children will arise and call mother 'blessed'
because we also praise her.
As a pastor sometimes I walk alongside young families.
Everybody has an opinion on how you ought to raise your kids... Everybody has an opinion on it
and a lot of times it's...
"Well, when we were kids, they used a beat us into submission!"
You know? Praise God for those good old days! They would send us out after a switch!"
I'm sure those were wonderful memories...
"They'd send us out after a switch!"
Yeah...
Generations raise their children differently and discipline differently...
--but you know what mothers need more than anything is 'affirmation'
and mothers, like children everywhere,
they need you to catch them doing something 'right' and affirming that.
As a pastor, I have had my opinions along the way...
I raised my kids a certain way.
It wasn't haphazard...
Thought had gone into it...
and prayer had gone into it...
It didn't always line up with the same way others had their house rules.
But as a pastor, I never tried to ever lay guilt on a mother for doing things the way she chose to do them.
I felt the best way... (and I still do)
The best way to help that mother become the woman that God wants her to be is to acknowledge
"You are God's ordained mother for that child...
--for those children."
Even a pregnant woman carrying a baby in the womb...
--to be able to affirm that mother..
"You're choosing life for this little one and God will get you through one day at a time."
On Mother's Day, whether we're a mother who was served 'Breakfast in Bed' today
--or a mother who didn't get any cards from anyone...
--because your kids just aren't doing what you think they ought to do on this day.
It doesn't really matter because Mother's Day is for all of us.
To be part of this human race...
To do it God's Way...
There are all sorts of forces tearing against God's Way
On Mother's Day, every year is an opportunity
for us to affirm God's Authority and God's Way of doing things.
There are always exceptions to the ideal.
Maybe a little child's parents are killed in a car wreck...
--a little child is in an orphanage and doesn't get to have a normal childhood...
Maybe in your situation, you did not have a normal childhood.
I didn't.
I didn't have a normal one, but God blessed me
maybe, more abundantly than if it had been a normal childhood.
I think if God has given us a responsibility for a woman on Mother's Day
--a step mom.. and you still haven't made your phone call...
--to be able to share those words with that woman...
Maybe you're 'the husband' and you just haven't done anything special...
--or you gave a card...
--or you bought some flowers..or you did something...
--brought some candies...
But what a blessing for her to hear you say:
"Many women do noble things...
but in my book,
You're the very best."
Some would think, "That's a cheesy Hallmark Card right there"
But that's the bible!
That's what a good word of praise sounds like!
Many women (and there's lots of them)
Many women do noble things...
buy YOU,
according to me...
YOU surpass them all
That's a good thing for kids to hear Dad saying.
That's a good thing for grandchildren to hear about Grandma.
In our society we tend to make fun of the old folks
Yeah, when people get old, their eccentricities become more exaggerated, don't they?
I think it is alright for us to make fun of ourselves as we're getting older...
but it's unbecoming for younger generations to mock their ancestors.
Today would be a good day to honor your father and your mother... that's God's best.
Forget what Hollywood tells you to do...
There's lots of ways we can poke fun and laugh
but it doesn't please God like this word of affirmation:
Many women do noble things but, in my book, you surpass them all.
That doesn't cut anybody down.
That's affirming mothers everywhere.
That's affirming women everywhere.
--but in my book you're extra-special because I've been paying attention to you.
I think at this time it would be good for us as a church
to give a round of applause to anybody who is a mother
If you have given birth to a child,
anytime in your life,
would you stand?
I want to start out as the church and affirm these women who, today,
are showing godly fear...
--this wonderful fear of the Lord that compels them to come to church on a Sunday morning instead of saying,
"It's Mother's Day... I want a Cruise."
"It's Mother's Day... I want a Brunch."
On Mother's Day, these ladies are saying,
"To be in the House of the Lord is about the best thing I can think of on Mother's Day."
Would you join me and applaud them?
This doesn't minimize any other woman in the congregation...
--because if God chose for you to never have children, that's His gift to you...
--and His gift to the world through you.
As I said, I didn't have a normal childhood
I don't think my mother would have chosen for herself
early in life to have her life here on earth end the way it did,
but she chose to trust God
and I hope you will choose to trust God.
Our applause goes out to every person in this house today because YOU are the woman of virtuous character.
YOU are brothers and sisters in the church of Jesus Christ and He calls us his Bride.
He chooses to look to us as what we're going to become...
--sanctified in Him
--spotless and blameless as he washes us in the water of his Word and by the blood of the Lamb.
--as he washes us and presents us to Himself.
--that you might have a along life in the land that God is giving you.
I thank the Lord for this Proverbs 31
Such a wonderful picture of God's best for the human race
that we would aspire to raise up a little girls and little boys
to hold out for the very best God have for them.
Now, I want to consider Jesus in his relationship with Mom.
We don't really read a whole lot of stories about Jesus and his mother.
Mothers, wouldn't it have been great if God would have shown, in the Scriptures...
--teenager Jesus 'giving honor where honor is due?'
--obeying His mother in front of everybody
so that there might be more Sunday School lessons about submission to mother...
--and duties to mother...
Instead we got the little baby Jesus, you know...
She's doing it all there
He is just showing up... and letting her nurture Him.
We have the twelve-year-old Jesus and and he's kinda already a teenager before His time, you know?
"Did you not realize I would be about my father's business here in His House?"
We have the adult Jesus where Mother is asking him to do something about the wedding...
and He says, "Woman, my time is not yet come."
So we don't have a whole lot about Jesus and His relationship with mother...
but at this most critical time in human history,
in the seven sayings of Jesus from the Cross, we have this:
We have a son's 'care' for His mother.
This is the church...
and God blesses us to be born into families and
Sometimes if we have not been able to grow up in our family of origin,
God adopts the stranger, or the orphan, into a family.
God blesses us in the human race to have family ties...
--but in the Church, there is a family tie that transcends the immediate bloodline.
The same Jesus that got up from the table on the night he was betrayed and washed the feet of his disciples,
--and told them they ought to do this for one another
if they're going to obey him and be His followers--
That same Jesus, hanging from the Cross looks upon the woman who gave him birth...
--and chooses to take care of her by calling upon one of His disciples...
--the one who Jesus loved him--
and saying, "This is your son; this is your mother."
That special relationship--
--No bloodline... but affirmation that, in the church,
there is a responsibility and an interconnectedness that Jesus wants us to explore and to possess.
I thank the Lord for this short verse.
"From that time on, this disciple took her into his home."
So, to close our message today, I just want to consider that near the cost of Jesus stands His mother.
"Woman, here is your son."
To the disciple, "Here's your mother."
To whom have you God-given responsibility?
It might not be the tie of blood or the history of being raised in this household...
--but even late in life, God gives you one...
--to have a special connection.
In some ways you take care of him,
and in some ways he takes care of you.
Sometimes, she ministers to you in a way nobody else is going to be able to...
--and you accept all responsibility to care for her and provide for her.
Comfort her when needed and affirm her.
I would like to go beyond it...
For the church, it's not just mother and son...
It's just all of us taking responsibility for each other
--Knowing the other person by name
--Getting to know what their joys are in life and celebrating joy with them
--Getting to know what their burden of their hearts are
and being trusted to enter in and to offer, through your presence,
to carry that burden along with him or her.
"Arise, and call her blessed"
[Gary Avery] I GO TO HIM IN PRAYER
HE KNOWS MY EVERY CARE
AND JUST A LITTLE TALK WITH JESUS MAKES IT RIGHT
NOW LET US HAVE A LITTLE TALK WITH JESUS
LET US TELL HIM ALL ABOUT OUR TROUBLES
HE WILL HEAR OUR FAINTEST CRY
AND HE WILL ANSWER BY AND BY
NOW WHEN YOU FEEL A LITTLE PRAYER WHEEL TURNING
AND YOU WILL KNOW A LITTLE FIRE IS BURNING
YOU WILL FIND A LITTLE TALK WITH JESUS MAKES IT RIGHT
NOW LET US HAVE A LITTLE TALK WITH JESUS
LET US TELL HIM ALL ABOUT OUR TROUBLES
HE WILL HEAR OUR FAINTEST CRY
AND HE WILL ANSWER BY AND BY
NOW WHEN YOU FEEL A LITTLE PRAYER WHEEL TURNING
AND YOU KNOW A LITTLE FIRE IS BURNING
YOU WILL FIND A LITTLE TALK WITH JESUS MAKES IT RIGHT
JUST A LITTLE TALK WITH JESUS MAKES IT RIGHT
MAKES IT RIGHT
JUST A LITTLE TALK MAKES IT RIGHT!