A TRIBUTE TO MOTHERS

The first commandment with promise is to honor father and mother.
 
The first commandment with promise is to honor father and mother. "Children, obey your parents in the Lord: for this right. Honor thy father and mother; which is the first commandment with promise; that it may be well with thee, and thou mayest live long on the earth." (Ephesians 6:1-3)

There are many reasons for honoring mother, but, of course, the greatest is that the Heavenly Father enjoined it as a sacred commandment upon the children of the race. God saw the need for preserving our society. Of course, for a mother to receive the greatest honor, she must be honorable; and for her to receive the greatest praise, she must be praiseworthy. This is understandable and implied...according to the Word of God.

WE HONOR MOTHERS BECAUSE:
  • We Owe Them Our Lives.
    We are blood of their blood, flesh of their flesh and bone of their bone.
    At travail of body and anxiety of mind, they have made our lives possible.
    Through their sacrifices we have been given life.
    The perception of the race...in love and honor is the basic service upon which all future progress depends.

  • They Are Our Homemakers.
    This is God's wisdom and correct arrangement.
    Mother is the heartbeat in the home; and without her, there seems to be no heart throb.
    She is the pulse in the home; and when she is gone, the life current is weak.
    She is light in the home; and when that light goes out, shadow falls over it.
    She is life in the home; and when she dies, the home seems dead.
    It takes more than architecture to make affection; pictures to make purity; vases to make virtue; and clothes to make character. The wisest mother, understanding this, sets her heart and hands to the nobler task of converting a house into a home.
    God, in making woman the keeper of the home, extended to her the glory of being the pillars of our society; for the home is truly the foundation of the world.
    So long as our people recognize this sacred thought and hold it dear in their hearts, there is hope for us.

    "So long as we have homes to which men turn at close of day;

    So long as we have homes where children are and women stay;

    If love and loyalty and faith be found across those hallowed sills,

    A stricken nation can recover from its gravest ills."     Grace Noll Crowell

  • They Are Our First Teachers.
    From the viewpoint of education and influence, the first few years of a person's life are the most important. Therefore, we are indebted to mothers for the most vital part of our training. It is then that consideration for the rights of others is more easily learned, if ever mastered; then unselfishness is usually acquired, if ever; then obedience is more likely to be learned, if ever learned. In those early years the foundation of character is laid; the disposition is formed; the bent of life is made. It takes a heart to touch a heart. This is why mother remains our favorite teacher.
    1. Consideration for the rights of others...
      Is society in distress today because this is a problem?
    2. Unselfishness...
      Is society today enamored with self more than being a servant to others?
    3. Obedience to the proper authority...
      Is society having a problem with disobedience today?


  • Their Loyalty...
    A loyalty so unbreakable that the story of motherhood has come to mean the story of loyalty.
    When others condemn us, she finds something to praise;
    When others abandon us, she remains;
    When others seek to destroy us, she---though weak and feeble---works frantically to save us.

    Mary...the mother of Jesus stood by her son...condemned to die.

    "Now there stood by the cross of Jesus his mother" (John 19:25).

    An army could not keep her away.


    "Her love outlasts all other human love,

    Her faith endures the longest, hardest test,

    Her tried loyalty through a lifetime proves,

    That she's a friend, the noblest and the best.     "Grace Noll Crowell


WE CAN HONOR MOTHERS BY:
  • Providing Her for Her Physical Care...if she has need.
    Jesus did this...His provision for His earthly mother was one of His last earthly acts. As He was dying, He made arrangements for John to care for His mother. The Bible instructs: "If any man or woman that believeth have widow, let them relieve them, and let not the church be charged." 1 Timothy 5:16.
  • Loving and Petting Them Now...
    They are easy to love, because love begets love. We love them because they first loved us.
  • Living the Praises due Them.
    Mothers deserve much honor, and the best way for children to bestow it upon them is to be honorable.


       "Tributes are but empty phrases,
       If in words alone they dwell.
       We must live the praises due her,
       If we'd honor mother well."

GREAT QUOTES FROM OTHERS ABOUT MOTHERS:
  • "A mother's heart is a child's schoolroom."     Beecher

  • "All I am or hope to be, I owe to my angel mother."     Abraham Lincoln

  • "I tried to be a skeptic when I was a young man, but my mother's life was too much for me."     Cecil

  • "No language can express the power and beauty and heroism of a mother's love."     Chapin

  • "Honor women! They entwine and weave heavenly roses in our earthly life."     Shiller

  • A good mother is God's poem.

  • A partnership with God is motherhood.

  • "You painted no Madonnas on chapel walls in Rome;
    But with a touch diviner, you lived one in your home."     T. W. Fessenden.


"Not what you get, but what you give, not what you say, but how you live; Giving the world the love it needs, living a life of noble deeds.

Not whence you came, but whither bound; not what you have or whither found,

Strong for the right, the good, the true...these are things mother taught you." Author Unknown

"The greatest battle that ever was fought...Shall I tell you where and when? On the maps of the world you will find it not; it was fought by the mothers of men."     Joakuin Miller

Prayer for Mothers...
Our Father in Heaven, we are grateful that you have given the world mothers, the makers of men, the torch-bearers of life, the foundation of civilization. We thank you for our own dear mothers who bore us in great travail and loved us all the more for the pain we brought; who suffered for us in body, mind and soul; who gave us a warm feeling of security by their tireless sacrifices and undying devotion; for the agony with which they watched over us in sickness and nursed us back to health; for the sorrow that pierced their hearts when we were foolish; for the smiles of appreciation and joy that played across their faces when we achieved some little accomplishment; for the thousand little tasks they performed daily to make life better for others.

Dear God, if we have been selfish and thoughtless and have taken the fruit of their labors as our due without showing appreciation, forgive us this sin.

O, God of our being, we implore you to grant support, patience and courage to deserving mothers that they may not break under their heavy burdens in life's most strenuous tasks...as each new day dawns, may faith undimmed and optimism unclouded shine anew in their hearts.

And for us we pray, our Father, that the hallowed memories of such illustrious mothers may lift us to higher living...May we live the praises due them.

In Christ Jesus' name we pray.       Amen
 
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"Look, he is coming with the clouds," and "every eye will see him" (Rev 1:7)