As a mother, there is a constant,
uncomfortable battle that rages inside of me. It is not the big or dramatic:
Will I raise my children to love God? Will I train them to obey Him? Do my
children belong to Him? Those big questions were settled a long time ago.
The constant battle of motherhood is
more subtle, more everyday, more hideable.
At the center is one question: Will I
sacrifice?
The Everyday Question isn't answered
one time, with the birth of a child, with the planning of school, or with the
decision to discipline. This question — Will
I sacrifice? —
is
answered everyday.
It’s answered when a child wakes
early with a need, interrupting my quiet hour alone with the Lord. It’s
answered when a sick child keeps me from worship and adult interaction at
church on Sunday mornings. It’s answered when I am emotionally spent, but a
child’s behavior requires my patient, purposeful response. It’s answered as I
systematically teach my special-needs son how to interact with others.
In motherhood, the Everyday Question
is answered every time a child’s concern or need must come before my own. (And
as every mother knows, this is most of the time.)
Too often, I attend to necessary
tasks — leaving
the stove to help with pant buttons, helping to search for a beloved toy,
excusing myself from a conversation at church to take tired children home for a
nap — while
my heart grumbles: If I just had one
moment to complete a task or have an adult conversation without an
interruption.
The Everyday Question asks not just
about my duties, but also about my attitude: Will I joyfully pour out my life
as a fragrant offering before the Lord for the benefit of my children? Will I
serve my children out of obligation and duty, or will I serve out of the joy of
serving God Himself? Will I die to myself so that I might live to God in the
specific calling He has given me as a mom?
The Everyday Question must be
answered everyday.
Because motherhood is not so much
the big, dramatic acts of sacrifice, but the little, everyday, unseen ones.
Because
we can have a clean house and obedient children and not sacrifice. Because
we are so easily deceived to think we can live for ourselves and be faithful to God in our ministry as
moms.
Jesus said that those who live for
themselves will have an unfulfilling life, but those who lose their lives for
His sake will really experience life.
As parents, our self-death for Christ’s sake not only produces fruit in our own
hearts, but produces fruit in the hearts of our children, fruit that grows by
the power of God. Let us choose to joyfully give of ourselves for our children.
Everyday.
"For we who are alive are
always being given over to death for Jesus' sake, so that his life may be
revealed in our mortal bodies" (2 Corinthians 4:11).
"For the love of Christ compels
us, because we have concluded this: that one has died for all, therefore all
have died, and he died for all, that those who live might no longer live for
themselves but for him who for their sake died and was raised" (2 Corinthians 5:14–15).
