I want you to turn back in your
Bibles to, well, we'll be dealing with a selection of verses, but
if you will, you can start in Psalm 139. I know we read the
closing verses of the book of Ruth, and I did that just so
that you can set your eyes upon an account that our women's theology
class has been engaging in now for this semester. And so you
really cannot know the joy of Naomi and Ruth, as is described
in the fourth chapter, until you understand something of the
troubles they went through. In fact, you can't understand
anyone's joy thoroughly unless you understand some of the troubles
they go through. Joy is the product of overcoming
troubles and landing safely in the hands of a God who got you
through that trouble. That's the difference between
happiness and joy. Happiness are things that occur
in your life that often are happenstance and they may be events that out
of the accomplishments of your own hands, you have achieved
some goals and so you feel good about that. There's nothing wrong
with happiness at all, but do not mistake happiness for joy. Joy is always the byproduct of
overcoming trouble remember that now when you meet a person that's
happy a happy person is different than a joyful person a joyful
person is always always someone who is exhibiting exhibiting
a fullness of delight and thanksgiving because God has delivered them
out of some troubles and And that's the case in chapter four
of the book of Ruth, which is not where we're going to develop
it. I would encourage you if you
haven't ever gone through the book of Ruth to get our whole
women's series around it. You will learn a lot about a
faithful God who takes his people through troubles that we enter
into because of our own misdoing. And he still brings us through
on the other side because of his faithfulness to himself.
And so we've got two sisters here. in our account that are
rejoicing, rejoicing, rejoicing, rejoicing in the fact that God
has brought them through some real difficulty. One of the things
I stated as well to our sisters in our going through the book
of Ruth, we're dealing with biblical theology. And this will help
you as today's message is about mothers and women in general,
but mothers, because only women can be mothers. Properly speaking,
I'm gonna get that right now, before we find ourselves launching
into the very debatable confusion that's wreaking havoc in our
culture. Only women can be mothers. And
what I told our sisters when we first started our series in
the book of Ruth is, God made you, he formed you women. He
structured you women to endure trouble. This is where we're
going to launch our thoughts today, that women are designed
to endure trouble. It's the place where God uses
you best and uses you most in trouble. And in the context of
trouble, your difficulties become a platform for God's glory. So I'm going to say that again
just in case you're far, far, far from the peaceful shore of
gospel terminology. Because a lot of you may, you
know, right now the pancakes are setting in, then the French
toast, and I know you only got about 40 minutes before you're
going to disappear. I mean, I know that. I understand that. But
I'm going to do my best to lay down some principles about motherhood,
and I hope you can comprehend the gospel in it. Motherhood,
as a consequence of being a woman, Is again a calling to suffering
It's a calling to suffering and suffering for you becomes a platform
for God's glory I'm gonna see if I can make that good in a
moment But for you young daughters that are aspiring to motherhood
what you're trying to get to you You're trying to achieve
your PhD in suffering now. I want you to understand that
because mothers go through trouble and The analogy that we have
been made to work with in the Book of Ruth is the analogy of
the harvest, because Bethlehem is the house of bread. And the
Lord Jesus Christ is the seed. He's the seed of which the whole
Bible speaks about. You know that, right? We are
all seeds. Either we're godly seeds or ungodly
seeds. You guys make sure the AC is
working in here, okay? Because, you know, menopause
is setting in and I can see the fanning going on. We are all
seeds. We're all seeds. And we are the
byproduct of the collaborative effort of the man and the woman. And God has purposed that the
human race constantly proliferate along the line of seed time and
harvest, the production of families, the fruitfulness and joy that
comes along with family. So the fourth chapter of Ruth
is about two women who come out of dire straits of losing everything. losing husbands, losing land,
losing property, losing money, losing a sense of themselves. Who is Naomi? We've talked about
that before. Naomi is a recovering pessimist. Y'all know anything about that?
Who allowed her identity to be swallowed up by her circumstances,
so much so that she changed her name from Pleasant to Bitterness.
Have you been there? And that's what we mean by trouble.
By trouble but in the fourth chapter, she's reowning her name
pleasant because she's the most blessed woman in the city We
do believe that better is the end of a thing than the beginning
thereof, right? People of faith know that the end of the matter
is going to be to the glory of god and our eternal good Although
for a season if we need to we're going through trouble Mothers
are meant to go through trouble You're meant and designed for
trouble. And as I was speaking to the analogy of the seed, someone
has to sow the seed. Isn't that true? And generally
as a rule, this is not an absolute, but it's a principle. The men
go out and sow the seed into the ground. Do they not? The
son of man is the sower. The seed is the word of God.
But the seed being the word of God is reflective in all of culture,
all of life. All of commerce, all of business,
all of education. We are sowing seeds when we are
seeking to reap a harvest of anything. Is that not so? And
men have been typically known to go out to sow the seed. But
who are the women? The women are the soil into which
the seed is sown. The women are the soil into which
the seed is sown. I know you never thought about that before,
but it's true. So I want you to think about this. Which one
is easier? To sow the seed or to receive the seed and deal
with the seed's germination process? Which one is more challenging
and difficult? To go out there and to sow the
seed, just cast and brought the seed. You free to sow seed. That's
what men do, sow seed. Right, are you hearing me? And we can do it good too. We
can sow that seed good. But it's the woman who has to
receive that seed Accept that seed, allow that seed to germinate. It has to break down, die, take
on a whole metabolic change. It has to take root downward
and then spring forth fruit upward. And do you understand that the
dynamic taking place in the soil with the seed breaking down constitutes
trouble? If you could hear the soil, If
it could become personified when the seed hits it and starts going
through the death process, the soil would be crying because
of the challenge that's taking place in the process of the seed
being sown. Are you guys hearing me? Women
are like soil that receives the seed. They have to endure difficulties. They have to endure troubles.
But they get the blessing of being the vehicle by which the
fruit comes out of it. That's a good analogy, isn't
it? That's a good analogy. That's a good analogy. And this
is why Eve is called the mother of all living. She's the mother
of all living. And so who and what are mothers? This is beginning to work on
our first point. What are mothers? They are sisters.
They are aunts. They are wives. They are girlfriends. They are grandmothers. They are
great grandmothers, et cetera. The mother plays multiple roles
of relationships, does she not? Multiple roles of relationships.
And even in that analogy of the multiple roles of relationships,
she's like a kaleidoscope. She has to meet people's needs
everywhere. This is why personally I love celebrating during the
time of worship specifics like, we're not at our first point
here, specifics like Mother's Day and Father's Day and Christmas
and And Resurrection Sunday, I love it because I see the wisdom
of God. Let me see if I can make this
good to you too. In our present culture, the goal of the enemy
is to destroy everything that's good. His goal is to destroy
everything that God set up. His goal is. And when we are
ignorant of the will of God, we participate in the destruction
process of it all. 50 years ago, this church would
have been packed all the way up to the steps with families.
with families because they would have understood how important
it is to honor their mothers. But the enemy has gotten in and
broken down the family so bad that come Mother's Day, our Father's
Day, anniversaries like that, we're a little embarrassed because
the family structure is so toe up. Am I making some sense? And
it's the job of the church. It's the job of the church to
maintain a biblical worldview. Teach our children what's important
to God not what's important to the culture and not what's important
to us What's important to God and one of the roles of moms
is to sustain that tradition? To sustain that biblical worldview
one of the roles of dads is to sustain that tradition Reinforce
that worldview so that we don't look like the world ladies and
gentlemen when it's all over if the world has its way There
will be no families no family We would be a monstrosity of
human ingenuity that has no reflection of the glory of God that He intended
when He created man and woman. In the beginning God created
him, male and female, in the image of God created He them.
And He said let's make them in our image and in our likeness
that they might glorify us in the earth in the proliferation
of seed, that is children and families and having dominion
over the world as they walk in love. walk in communion, walk
in subordination to one another, being able to cooperate and reciprocate
and do all of the things that a loving communion is called
to do. Am I making some sense? See,
only the biblical model reaffirms and reaffirms this paradigm.
And your job in mind, Christian, is to live up to that model,
particularly whatever office you are called to. The young
men They are called to an office as we'll see next month when
we deal with Father's Day. They're called to aspire to being
strong young men that are capable of taking on and perpetuating
the model of family. And therefore they are to interact
with women wisely and appropriately and in a gracious fashion so
that they can have a complementarian relationship and produce the
outcome that God wants to when the seed is sown into their lives. And so for us mothers, carry
multiple hats, as do men. I love Father's Day. I'll be
right back at it again next month. I love propping up my men. In
this culture, we need to prop our men up. Is that true? Our
brothers need to be propped up, not tore down, not neglected,
not abused, propped up. But our sisters do too. And definitely
we need to give high honor to our women, particularly those
of you who are sitting by your wives today. I want you to be
a little bit embarrassed, fellas. Don't look at your wife right
now. I want you to be a little bit embarrassed because you probably
have not honored them like you should have. This is between
me and you, fellas, not them. But they deserve it. They deserve
it for a lot of reasons. One of the biggest ones is, is
they married you. No, I'm just telling you the truth. They married
you. That's huge. It's huge. Women cannot be wimps. Point
number one, mothers are amazing creatures. One of my sisters
said, amen. When I received that first point
from the Lord, I said to myself, now Jess, what do you mean by
an amazing creature? That's almost oxymoronic. It
carries with it a little bit of sci-fi connotations. An amazing
creature. The term creature can be a good
euphemism. It can be other things. But I
want you to know that in God's book, the term creature means
the direct product of his handiwork. And mothers are the direct product
of the handiwork of God. They are amazing, amazing, amazing
creatures. And as I think about it Psalm
139 verse 14 part a says this you've heard it before But I'm
just gonna lift up one line out of this just to meditate on it
Psalm 139 14 as David thinks about God's goodness in his life.
He says I will praise thee For I am what fearfully now, I'm
gonna talk about that in a minute. You guys are fearful too and
wonderfully made Do you see that? wonderfully made Let me just
lift that word wonderful up out of the text for a moment because
women are wonderful. The word wonderful there is a
very unique term because the term literally means to be distinguished,
to be distinct. It means to be separate and unique.
Now watch this. What David was saying is, you
have made me distinct. You have made me unique. You
have actually separated me from the rest. And I am one of a kind. That's what the term means. So
stay with me for a second if you're not asleep yet. Women
are one of a kind. They are unique, they are distinct,
they are prodigious. The calling of a mother, particularly,
is very unique. Very unique. It is a major design
on God's part for the sustaining of all life. a major design on
God's part for the sustaining of all life. And it's a subject
in its own right worthy of full investigation. A mother is a
unique thing. She is wonderful. Most of us
as sons can easily let fall off of our lips concerning our mothers.
Man, my mother's wonderful. And especially when we think
about all that they have done to take care of us and raise
us up. And all of the things that they've
had to endure to deal with us and all of the things surrounding
us. I'll talk about that in a little bit here. But when we talk about
mothers being amazing creatures, it's because God separated them
and raised them up to a level and given them a prescription
of life called motherhood that by analogy, now I want you to
get this as an analogy, I'm gonna drop. The mother is almost like
a utility knife. The man said, yep, Yeah, now
watch this. I know it's not romantic, but
we're not talking about our wives today. We're talking about our
mothers. So I'm not getting romantic,
okay? Like a utility knife. You know, a utility knife has
multiple applications, doesn't it? It can cork the screw on
a bottle. It can cut things up, dice things. It can unscrew things, right?
You got screwdrivers on it, Phillips and flatheads. And a mother is
a utility knife, a multi-purpose faceted creature that can do
a bunch of things. Is that true, ladies? A bunch
of things. You guys are skillful at that. So I like the analogy
of the utility knife. Because they can cut you too,
see. Like, see, so they can defend you. After they cook the food
and provide for you, they can defend you. And they can keep
the husband in the place. Now, isn't that interesting too,
when the husband go to fussing with his wife, how while she's
cooking, she can threaten him with the skillet and the spatula
and the knife, and he get to backing up. It's a strange relationship,
isn't it? Every creature that God makes,
he gives them the ability to survive, adapt, and also protect
themselves. And I'm going to show you in
a minute as we get to our further points that moms are not to be
played with. That's been my experience. They're just not to be played
with because they're utility knife. I keep a couple of utility knives.
I don't know about you, but I do. Couple in my car nearby. Good, good thing to have. I got
one, been with her for 37 years. Good thing to have. Point number
one, under the first point of mothers are amazing creatures,
they are an arsenal of wisdom and blessing when found in the
way of the Lord. They are an arsenal of wisdom
and blessing when found in the way of the Lord. I will not talk
long about what it means to be outside of Christ. We can argue,
and you won't get an argument out of me, that there are many
mothers who did not know the Lord Jesus, who nevertheless
were a great blessing to their families. I understand that.
But boy, I'll tell you, apart from Christ, we can mess it up.
Apart from Christ, we can mess it up. And apart from Christ,
we can really diminish the glorious calling of motherhood, fatherhood,
whatever the case may be. But how much of a blessing it
is when a mother understands the God who made her and gave
her her calling and who draws from his strength to do what
she's called to do. She's an amazing blessing. And
mothers, right now, you may be in a mode or a situation right
now where your children are not giving you the props like they
ought to. Just hold on, they will. Just
hold on they will because the trouble is coming to them At
a level where they're going to be forced to reflect upon did
my mama have to go through all this In order for me to have
what I have And then they're going to realize that what pastor
just stated was true They are amazing creatures and they are
worthy of at least one day out of 365 To be honored. So some of you need to be calling
your mothers today Texting your mothers today visiting your mothers
today because they are glorious glorious creatures. And so The
second thing I want to call your attention to is that they are
image bearers of God's glory Image bearers of God's glory.
Do you see point number two? I won't be here long, but it's
important this is true not only in the prophetic sense of what
God has ordained by way of his his prognosticating the creation
of men and women, men and women, and thus telling them that they
are very much to be image bearers of God. But as you see the analogy,
my secretary who pulls up these images and PowerPoints, aren't
they great? Aren't these PowerPoints illustrative?
They do a great job. She's a mother too. So when I
give her PowerPoints relative to her calling, she can go straight
to work. But I want you to mark, My secretary got the point even
before I actually told her how I was developing this proposition.
What do I mean? Image bearers of God's glory
are not only what you look like, ladies. You are beautiful in
your own right, and you are glorious in terms of your existential
beauty. God made you that way. That's
the only way you can get a brother. You hear me? And it was meant
that way. Y'all know that. Y'all know that.
You know. We'll talk about all of the internal
benefits and all that, but it all started from the outside.
You know that, right? That's why when God made Adam,
he brought, I mean, made Eve, he brought Eve to Adam. And when
the brother woke up, he was glad at what he saw. Because God knows
man, right? And the relationship part is
where you penetrate past the flesh and get into the person
and find connectivity there. And then you see the true beauty
of the character and the complementarian relationship that we have to
develop and build among ourselves. Is that true? But it definitely
starts with the eyesight. And so God made you women to
be naturally attractive. And we are so thankful for that. But what we mean by image bearers,
ladies, is you see that big old fat belly that that girl got? You guys are image bearers of
the glory of God, by God's right, by God's right. And that thing
that comes through the whole process is filled with trouble. It's filled with trouble. I'll
talk about that in a second. It's important for you to know
that you are image bearers of God's glory and therefore you
are equal in dignity, in standing and in destiny with any and every
man on planet earth. You need to know that. You are
equal in dignity, standing, and destiny. You guys got that? Now,
our daughters need to know that. Because in our present culture,
they struggle with maintaining their identity. Are you hearing
me? Right now, we're developing a
young women's class, as we have developed a young men's class.
And we're working on foundational principles for that, so that
we can help our daughters maintain a biblical identity. Because
without a biblical identity, you struggle enormously with
your value. But God has already decreed that
you are equal, equal in your dignity, in your standing, and
in your destiny. It's simply a matter of you acknowledging
it and walking in all of the blessings that are yours in Christ. But the conception part and the
bringing forth part is that part which is always amazing to me
because it brings us to our third point. Now watch how parallel
point number two is to point number three, and you'll see
it. Are you ready? Women are a conduit of the what? Yes, yes
they are. You see that? They're a conduit
of the mystery. It's almost like what I said in point two, right?
Image bearers of God's glory, but now more so conduits of the
mystery. Conduits of what mystery? The mystery of what I started
earlier about the seed and how God made you for trouble. And
I want you to get this. I think about the post dynamics
of my raising children frequently now because I'm in grandpapa
stage and I love it. I love grandpapa stage. I wouldn't
want to go back to having children stage for nothing. Not at this
age. Because the energy level is not
that high. It's just hard enough to hug
them, play with them, send them home. You understand what I'm
saying, right? And I mean, I love playing with
my grandkids. I mean, I love them to death.
I will mess around and spoil them if you don't back me up
off of them, because grandchildren are precious, as are grandparents
to grandchildren. This is the one thing I knew
about my grandparents as I spent time with them growing up. In
my own eyes, my grandparents were uniquely a blessing to me. Every second I got with my grandparents
was like just rich with me. Because you know children are
little computers with programs that are empty. They can't wait
to fill it up with data, right? So they're examining everything
about grandma and grandpa. How you look, how you act, how
you talk, what you do. We steal it all and put it in
our files, don't we? Because you're precious to us. Because we have a sense that
we're not going to have you as long as we're going to have mama.
And so those times with grandparents are absolutely phenomenal. And
for some of you in the house, when I talk about grandparents,
I'm talking about your mother. Your mother. And so sometimes
the direct relationship between daughters and mothers or sons
and mothers don't have that level of appreciation that the grandchildren
do. Y'all know what I'm talking about.
And yet we're supposed to appreciate the totality of motherhood because
ladies, it is filled with challenges. But that's the way God is glorified.
So watch the promises of God around this, a conduit of his
mystery. In Genesis 3.15, God had told
the first woman, Eve, that her seed was going to crush the head
of the serpent, and the serpent was going to bruise the heel
of her seed, and that seed would be that thing in her womb that
she would carry, and bring to fruition, and nurture, and raise
up, and have to watch him die. Now watch this. Let alone the
difficulties that women go through just being in the world. Ladies,
can you bear record? Having babies, I'm talking about
conceiving them, there might be about five minutes of pleasure
in conceiving them. After that, it's trouble. The
hormones change and then life takes on a whole new metamorphosis,
right? For some of y'all, you really
don't like it because you get ugly in your own eyes. You gain
weight, and things start happening in your body, and you really
don't like this metamorphosis. But that's what God has designed
to bring forth the glory of the child. That whole inter-experience
that you go through is designed to teach you that God made you
for trouble. He made your physical anatomy
for the trouble of burying a child for nine months, and then pushing
that big old head You know, some of us got big watermelon heads.
We were born with big old heads. It was just a miracle to get
that big old head through that little hole. With my first child,
she's here, I ain't gonna point at her, I almost fainted. I was in the hospital, I almost
fainted. Lord, how do you do that? And
here we are, room full of people, 600 people. Something like that
happened to you. Women, and you know what's crazy
about that? Just the deliverance. Just the
deliverance. See, you couldn't persuade me
to have a baby for nothing in the world. Nothing. And then what's the mystery about
a woman? It should turn around six months later and say, let's
do it again. Let's do it again. Let's do it
again. The hormones will do that. Let's get in trouble again. Let's
go through the misery again. Let's go through morning sickness
again. And don't let's talk about what's going on between when
she started dilating and going to the hospital. They different. You know that, right? So when
I say trouble, you were made for it because there's a dynamic
of suffering and blessing, trouble and triumph. That's the cycle
of life. And therefore, women are amazing
creatures because they are image bearers of God's glory. God had
called Eve to that. He had called his daughters to
that all through the scriptures. 1 Timothy 2, verse 11 and 12,
what God promises, and this is not a means of your salvation,
it is a An emblem and symbol of the salvation of women when
the scripture says and the woman shall be saved in childbearing
Look look at verse 12. She shall be saved in childbearing.
I'm sorry. Well, oh, I'm sorry Deb verse
14 and 15 verse 14 and 15 Adam was not deceived but the woman
being deceived was in a transgression verse 15. Here it is. Here it
is. Oh notwithstanding she shall be what saved in childbearing
stop right there now that does not mean mean to be saved in
the sense of redemption from your sins or walk with God it
means to be preserved that God decreed in the beginning that
he would preserve women preserve you for the purpose of proliferation
and specifically the godly woman there's a there's a a an appointment
for all women to be mothers in that God has mandated proliferation
of the seed and in that he protects them that's an amazing experience
all alone but it's exponentially increased when you know God when
you know God he anoints it when you know God he consecrates it
when you know God he can take the life of that woman and that
child and use it in ways that are absolutely remarkable am
I making some sense and so you see the legacy of it in the scriptures
right so God had promised Eve And then God protected Sarah. And then God prepared Mary. And
God perfected the whole of His plan through the church. All
of those are women. All of those are women. He promised
Eve. He protected Sarah. You remember
Sarah, Abraham's wife? Remember when Abraham went crazy
to sell off to the king? And the king was about to take
her to be his wife. And God said to the king, boy, I'll kill you
and the whole tribe if you touch that woman. You guys remember
that? I will wipe your whole tribe out. In fact, right now,
do a census through the kingdom. I have already shut the womb
of every woman in the kingdom. Your whole nation will be dead
in 10 years. How important was Sarah to God?
The seed. The seed. The seed, are you hearing
me? The seed. God would destroy a
whole nation for Sarah. He protected her, didn't he?
And then he prepared that little virgin girl named Mary. He prepared
that little virgin girl named Mary to have to endure trouble. Are you hearing me? Mary signed
up for trouble the day the angel told her, girl, you're pregnant.
Didn't she? See, at that point, Mary had
to ask the question, am I on God's team or on the world's
team? Because what's happening to me
is going to require me to believe God. Listen, conception is a
great analogy of God working salvation in the world. The bringing
forth of children honors the Lord. All the fruit of the womb
is the Lord. All of it. All the souls are
God's. I want you to hear this. Every
soul is God's soul. And so this process of bringing
forth children, ladies, we are to never, ever, ever play it
down. If they continue in faith, charity,
and holiness, and sobriety, they become a marked, marked symbol
of God's tool to bring forth his glory in the life of his
children. This, again, ought to raise your level of respect
for your mothers because they got to go through trouble. Did
Mary go through trouble? Nobody believed she was a child of the
Holy Ghost. She had to go around listening
to all the slander. Joseph had to put up with it,
but Mary really had to put up with it. What did she do to offset
the slander? She believed God. This is why
we honor mothers today, because they've gone through so much
trouble. You and I, men, are sitting here happy in our male
status of security and comfort and autonomy, are we not? I'm
glad to be a man. And I don't say that in any negative
way. I got six daughters. Most of them are here right now.
So they would jack me up at the house today if I came off the
wrong way with them. They know how to corner a brother.
They've been cornering me for a long time. And they'll let
me have it with all canons. So I'm simply saying I'm glad
to be a brother. I'm glad to be a brother, but
I wouldn't be a brother without a mother. I wouldn't be a brother
without a mother. That's all I'm saying. That's
all we're saying. We wouldn't be free to be the
fools we are if it wasn't for our mothers. And therefore, not
only are mothers amazing creatures, not only are they image bearers
of God's glory, not only are they conduits of the mystery,
Christ in you, the hope of glory. See that mystery? Christ in you,
the hope of glory. Many of our daughters right now
who are married and walking with the Lord and have been engaged
in the challenges of matrimony. Some of you, you may not know
it, you and your husband have labored and you thought you wanted
to have babies and nothing happened. Some of you may be pregnant right
now. If that's the case, Christ in you, the hope of glory is
an emblem there. Are you hearing me? It's an emblem.
And it requires you as a woman to embrace all of biblical truth,
all of redemptive truth, to affirm your dignity as a woman in that
thing called being pregnant. Because the world actually does
not care for you being pregnant in the traditional sense. It
doesn't care for you being pregnant because you have said I do to
a man. It doesn't care for you being pregnant because you have
said I do to traditional marriage. The world doesn't mind you going
out and getting a Petri dish or getting a sperm donor and
having as many babies as you want, like the rebellious women
do. I'm going to have children, but I'm not going to be married,
right? Now, God knows how to work with that, but that doesn't
honor God. You do understand that, right? Because it violates
the larger redemptive picture that God is teaching. And so
what I am stating is that you guys are the conduits of mystery
and you are a vessel of life and happiness. Is that true?
Women are a vessel of life and happiness. For 37 years, my home
has been largely a happy home. See, I use that word largely,
right? Because we have troubles. But it's been largely a happy
home, and it's been because we have prioritized raising children. I was talking with a couple,
as I often do, I talked with a young man last night. Him and
his wife are raising children, and they're also talking about
both of them acquiring vocations. That's a challenge. It can be
done. I told him it can be done. You can be you can be a person
in the field of work that you do. She can as well. But you
guys are going to have to really work on harmony and unity to
be able to do that and raise children, too, because children
truly is a full time job, is it not? It's a full time job.
And if I were to isolate the mothers from the children, I
mean, from the husband and just talk to the mothers, you have
adopted or called yourself to trouble just raising children.
That right. A lot of the gray hairs in your head ladies is
the consequence of those children Now now if it's in the Lord,
it's all good. God says gray hair is beautiful in the Lord
and ain't nothing like die Ain't nothing like die Y'all can roll
it back if you want to I don't have a problem with it but I'm
just saying gray hair is beautiful when it's found in the way of
the Lord and and and those of us who are children of parents
and we see our parents aging and and growing grayer, but God
has allowed them to still stay in our life and hasn't changed
the pattern since our youth. We need to be thanking God every
day for that. We need to be thanking God every day for the normalcy
because a lot of our friends don't have their parents. Is
that true? Their parents are gone. So we need to be thanking
God for that and remembering what they went through. Let me
see if I can talk about that now a little bit. Point number
four. What are mothers? Not only are they amazing creatures,
image bearers of God's glory, conduits of the mystery, but
they are tough, tender, torn, troubled, and tried. That's a
sermon all in itself. Tough, tough. Young men and women who are the
products of mothers, By the time you're 12, 13 years old, young
man, you're gonna discover that your mama is tough. She tough. Do you understand that? Your
mama not a wimp. You know how your head get twisted
on backwards about 11, 12 years old. And just cause your testosterone
levels are rising a little bit, you just started thinking, cause
you looked at you a little taller than your mama now at 13, a little
taller than your mama. And you started thinking she
was a wimp. Brothers, nothing could be further
from the truth. Now, in a minute, I'm going to
prove that by an example here in a second. But what I tell
mothers all the time is don't let your boys intimidate you
because they haven't been what you've been through. They couldn't
handle your troubles if they wanted to. The challenges that
you had to engage in and endure as a utility knife for their
sake. keeping a roof over their head
and food in their belly and clothes on their back in a comfortable
home and all of the amenities of life that you have to negotiate
for them. That's called being tough. They
don't know nothing about that. They go out and work three or
four days and if their boss looks at them sideways, they quit.
Am I telling the truth? They quit. If we would talk to you about
what our mothers have had to endure to keep the job, to keep
food on the table, for you guys, you would know that they are
as tough as forged steel. Forged steel. I mean that with
every bit of me, they're tough, but they're also tender. That's
where they'll fool you at, because they're tender. That's the attention
between what a mother is and is not. She's tender, but she's
not a wimp. And she is especially tender
to her children. They're tender to us. You know,
maybe every now and then a mother may be rough. Fathers are generally
more guilty of being rough with the kids than mothers. Mothers
can be so tender that they can fool us. But remember now, tender
does not mean tepid. are timid, are weak. You can
be tender and tough at the same time. Is that true? And so our
mothers are tender, they're tough, they're tender, but they're torn. They're torn. Yes, they are. Because mothers have to live
with things not being right all the time. They're torn. And they have to
wear it well. They still have to put their
makeup on. still have to go get their high heels, and still have
to dress right, and still have to smile. But torn. Mothers are
always torn. Men are torn, but nowhere near
like mama. Mama's torn because everybody's
doing it wrong. In the house, everybody's doing
it wrong, from the husband on down to the children. We all
doing it wrong, and mama's smiling and trying to work with it. Torn. That's true. That's true. You
better get it. Torn. See, that's, you know,
that's why they can endure those jobs because the job is nothing
compared to home. When they have to come in and
deal with their slow boys and silly daughters. Slow boys. I know y'all don't see it, but
I know you think your boys are retarded sometimes. I know that. I know that. I know. Because
boys are slow. Boys are slow and you go, Lord,
I wonder if he got a problem. I'm just talking out loud a little
bit. I'm just talking. I'm just talking out loud a little
bit. Cause I, you know, I, I, I watched my wife and censorship,
censorship on the part of a woman. means that they have reflected
upon it, cogitated on it, and thought it through at length,
and they have concluded it's best not to say anything. It's
best not to say anything. And I mean, they'll hold their
tongue forever, watching to see how we turn out. Because they
love you. But they know you got problems.
The man. So young men are slow, and daughters
are often silly, and that tears them apart too. because they
really want their daughters to be prudent and discerning and
making right choices. And they frequently don't. And
that's where the gray hairs come in. And therefore they are troubled. But there's some insights into
that torn and troubled because privately, especially when they're
godly women, they spend a lot of time with God because of those
two T's, torn and troubled. Privately, they spend a lot of
time talking to God. Is that true? Praying to God,
because you know, the woman was deceived into having him. And
once they got here, she didn't know that she had signed up for
all this. And then as they started growing, she realizes that she
really does need God. And there comes a time in raising
children. I sound like I'm a woman, like
I know, huh? I don't know. I don't know, I'm vicariously
working through what my wife went through, what my mama went
through, okay? I'm just putting together, I'm like the person
that helped you write the book, but I didn't go through your
story, okay? So all my job is putting the pieces together.
I have observed, okay, that women go through this. And I have discovered
that what they do is go to God constantly about the needs of
their family because they realize that personally it's too big
for them. It's too big for them. And so it forces them into communion
with their maker. They are tough, tender, torn,
troubled, and they are what? Tried. But give her a chance
and she will show you. She will show you she can handle
all that God puts in front of her. The woman can handle all
that God puts in front of her. It's amazing if you just do history,
if you just do history. I'm talking about secular history.
And you think about what women have had to endure in secular
history. It's amazing what they've gone
through. It's amazing what they've been doing. It's amazing what
they sacrifice. It's amazing what they put up
with and they're still here. They're still standing. They're
still standing. That's our next point. They're
still standing. They are torn. They are troubled. They are tried.
They are tough. Point number five. They are what?
Strong. Now this is going to get us for
a moment into Proverbs 31 which is called the proverb of the
virtuous woman. And I want you to stay at the
PowerPoint for a minute. Now, I would encourage every mother,
every grandmother, every daughter, every aspiring wife to read through
Proverbs 31, particularly starting at verses 10 through 31. A very
good model of what I call a tough woman. tough woman so you know
in Proverbs 31 verse 10 it gives a title over it in my Bible the
virtuous woman right the virtuous woman well what we often do with
the word virtue is we associate virtue with the integrity of
not having sex until marriage right y'all get that very kind
of very narrow interpretation it's good don't get me wrong
there's a kind of mental toughness that's needed there all mamas
and all daddies want their daughters to hold on until the right time
is that true But often we take the word virtue and it can be
a stigma For a woman if you confine it merely to sexual integrity
You got that The word virtue is not to be defined in terms
of that one slender category. The word literally means strong
Virtuous simply means strong it means to be wealthy and with
resources to get the job done. The word is more often translated,
rather than virtuous, valiant. Valiant. A valiant woman. A valiant woman. That's amazing,
huh? How there's a twist on it in
the Hebrew. Because Boaz, which is the hero of the book of Ruth
for us, is a man and his name by interpretation means what,
ladies? Strength. And in that book, there's a parallel
between Boaz and Ruth, where they are both known to be virtuous. Ruth is virtuous, Boaz is virtuous. But Boaz is not virtuous because
he keeps his virginity, he's virtuous because he's strong.
And Ruth is virtuous because she's strong. Virtue then means
strength. I'm going to give you one more
textual application for that. Remember the woman with the issue
of blood, and she was bent over, and how she pressed through the
crowd to get to the master, and when she touched the hem of his
garment, what departed from him? Virtue. And virtue left him,
right? Virtue left him, not virginity.
Virtue. Trying to teach y'all something
here. The word virtue means strength. And what she derived from touching
the hem of his garment was the strength of God to heal her of
her sickness. And what we are describing in
Proverbs 31 is a strong woman, a strong woman. It's an amazing concept. She is strong. Proverbs chapter
31, verse 25. Listen to these words. Here's
what it says. Are you there? Strength and honor are her clothing
and she shall rejoice Not today, but tomorrow. Do you see that? Strength and honor are her clothing. What do you mean? It means that
her garments, that visible attire by which people know her, is
her strength. and the honor that comes from
her strength. So virtue is the ability for a woman to retain
her womanhood, fully execute the calling of womanhood in a
visible fashion where men, women, families, cultures can see that
she has done her job excellently. She is strong. She maintains
her honor because she knows who she is and she knows what she
does now Watch this watch this and her joy is not necessarily
in today Her joy is in tomorrow. Her joy is in the future It's
a promise that the virtuous woman the woman of strength shall receive
her reward. Do you know what that means?
You got to understand delayed gratification You gotta understand
how to sow now and reap later. You gotta understand how to pay
with the pain now in order to receive the prize later. A virtuous
woman, a woman of strength knows how to give in now to get the
dividends later. And so what they do when they
adopt to be family women, mothers, they are willing to do 3, 4,
5, 6, 7, 8, 9 decades. If they have to, before they
receive their reward. See, that's a mindset. You got
to be strong when you don't mind being paid 40 years later. Did you get that? You got to
be strong when you don't mind being paid, not through your
children, but through your grandchildren. Hallelujah. Now watch this, because
sometimes the payoff comes through the next line. Because like you
have the first line and they mess it up. But God in his mercy
does something through the first line, because he's still sovereign.
And he'll have that first line have another line. And that next
line will be more compliant, more subject to you, more influenced
by you. You're going to help that next
line get through college. You're going to help that next
line get that job. And that next line, the grandchildren
going to love you like nobody's business. That's the fruit. That's
what, are you hearing what I'm saying? That's what I'm, okay,
so we messed up the first 20 years. We're going to work this
out with my grandkids. Are you hearing what I'm saying?
Now, our kids don't know this, but me and my wife know this.
We're going to hook our grandkids up so that we can get a second
chance at getting a few of them straightened out here. And we're
going to see the blessing and the reward of delayed gratification.
Are you guys following what I'm saying? Very important. Obviously,
there's redemptive truth. She knows she's in a what? A
battle of purpose, identity, and glory of her God. That's
the battle of every mother. She's in a battle. Ladies, tell
the truth. Isn't that what you discovered
as you were raising your kids? That all hell was breaking loose
against you and against your family to destroy every promise
of hope that you had for them. I mean everyone. I mean everyone. and that because you are called
to a battle, you have to armor up every day. You have to clothe
yourself in the righteousness of Christ every day. You have
to embrace the promises of God every day. You have to believe
God is with you every day. You have to trust God every day
for your kids, every day, especially when you got them in the preteen
stage, in the teen stage, in the young adult stage, because
they start morphing, they get crazy. But there's somebody crazier
than the kids. Let me go back to my point. Women
are strong. That means they can endure. They
outlast you. My wife is into fitness right now. I mean, we
met as athletes. OK, so we met fighting. So from
time to time, we revisit that scenario. That's just how we
do it in the guest staying house. It's all love. That's all love.
But we grew up fighting. We grew up in the hood, okay?
Just the way it is, you know, kind of tracks, right? I tell
everybody the Loma Prieta earthquake that occurred many years ago,
that was a fight between me and Barb. That was a fight between
me and Barb. Y'all don't know. We can get
down. Other day, I mean about a month
ago, because we both started, you know, I've been training
in martial arts for years, been doing it for years. In fact,
I met her in a martial arts tournament, helped to beat up her first person.
That wasn't good for me though. She come asking me now about
500 years after being out of martial arts, you want to start
training with me? I need to start sparring again.
I said, no, no, uh-uh. She said, you ain't going to
get me on the bad side of you. See, I'm smart now, I was dumb
then. We fight, we fight growing up because we are trying to maintain
our identities and we don't know how to do it in a complimentary
fashion. Am I making some sense? Until God gives us wisdom along
those lines. What God has caused me and my wife to survive, do
you know why? Because she's strong. Our women are strong. Brothers,
listen, if your wife's still with you, that's the point. Please
understand that. Strong. The next word is what? Simple. Now, it takes a long
time to learn this. Usually, you have to be out of
the house before you figure this out about women, particularly
when they're mothers. They operate out of basically
two principles when they have come into seasoned motherhood.
Are you ready? The first one is this, I'm only
telling you once. I'm only telling you once. Really,
watch this now, watch this. You are tempting your moms when
you go to acting like they weren't clear the first time. Especially
some of our mothers. They really want you to, if you
want to win points with your mama, get it the first time.
Because they're not into telling you three and four and five times.
They'll do that with you when you're five, not 15. Five, not
15. And definitely not 25. They want
you to get it, and then they want you to get out the way,
because they're busy. That's how simple women are. I've learned
that. Barbara will tell me something. I will catch it out of there,
and I'll go work with it and decipher it, T, because I got
to get it right before I respond. I'm not going to respond until
I get it right. And if I don't think I got it right, I'm not
responding. Because she ain't playing no
more. She's simple. We call that simple. Simple I told you now
get out of my way cuz I'm busy And that's a great relationship
because sometimes we can beat around the bush with stuff older
Women don't really want you beating around the bush Really, I'm not
telling the truth. We really don't want you beating
around it You can do that at 19 when you're petting and cute
and in the hormones is kicking in you can beat around the bush
but out of certain days stop I told you once Now they're going
back to their files and wondering, is he still slow? Is he still
slow? I'm sure now, I'm sure now, I'm sure now some
of his behavior traits he got from his daddy. That's why he's
slow like that. It's really frustrating because they're simple. They're
simple. Really good relationships between
men and women, especially husbands and wives, is when the husband
understands their wives are simple and don't really want all of
that old, that mess that go on. Simple, simple. But they're also
sophisticated. I know that seems like an oxymoron,
but you would be wrong if you didn't think women were sophisticated. So what do I mean by sophisticated? I mean they are, Coy? Do y'all know what coy is? In the hood, it's like slick,
but it's not. I don't want to use that word for our sisters,
but they're coy. It takes some work to get coy.
Because women think faster than men. As a general rule, they
think. And so they're a few feet ahead
of you, a few yards ahead of you. And they are calculated
because they're coy. You guys are. You're calculated.
You calculate it. So to be sophisticated is to
be quite calculated. And therefore, for men, you guys
are complex. Now, you better mark this because
if you're at the point of trouble in your relationship, that's
where the man is stuck. Because of the complexity of
the woman. The woman is complex. That means that we don't understand
them effectively enough for them to know that we know what they
know the moment that they say it. I don't know if that made
any sense. Do you understand what I'm saying? But I always
get this funny feeling when I'm with my wife, and I think this
is true. I go, I think Barb thinks that I didn't get it. That's
what I say. I'm talking to myself. I ain't
saying it to her. I'm talking to myself now. Just
work with me. I think Barb thinks I didn't get it. I probably didn't,
but I'm not going to let her know I didn't get it. Stay with
me for a second, stay with me, because I only want you for a
few more minutes. Is it true? So what we're trying to do is
we're trying to solve the puzzle in our head before we respond,
because we want to at least appear to be smart as you guys are.
But because you guys are coy and complex and complicated,
they say, somebody said fast. I'll go with that. There's another
C here that I wanna add. This is not gonna be politically
correct, but it's true. Mothers are crazy. Right, right, right, crazy. That's
the hood term, crazy. Crazy. Crazy. No, it's true. You guys are crazy
because there's no way we try to figure out why you do what
you do. And the only conclusion we can draw, we won't tell you.
She crazy. She crazy. It's just crazy. We won't tell you that. Now,
because I've been married long enough, I know that you already
know we drew that conclusion about you. Because frequently
my wife will say, now I know you think I'm crazy. Barbara,
I didn't say that. I did not say that. I didn't
say that. I didn't say it. I did not say
it. I was thinking it all along.
I did not say it. Crazy. But see, the crazy element
is rooted in a sophistication of complexity and coyness that
God made them in order for them to survive. This is what makes
them strong. Woman of the month for me, the
mother of the month. You know who the mother of the
month is for me? Mother Baltimore. Anybody know Mother Baltimore
with the yellow jacket on? Mother Baltimore. I was so glad when I saw that
on public TV. I was so glad when I saw Mother Baltimore handle
her business on public TV. I was so glad. I said to myself,
I said to myself, now me and my brothers would be in jail
for that, right? Our brothers would be in jail
for that, but our sisters can get away with it. That mother
would not allow her chimpanzee You got it? She would not allow
her chimpanzee to go out there and be part of the multitude
and act a fool and get a camera on him and mess up his chances
at an education. Now, now, she handled her business
in the public unmitigated. Do you got, did y'all see it?
Unmitigated. She handled her business. She
told him once or twice, remember? She really only meant to tell
him once. He messed up by acting like he didn't get it. So all
he did was let the army out. He let the army out. And she
went after that boy like nothing. Did she well on him? Did she
well on him? Well on him. I went to worshiping at that
time. Now that's the word fearful back at Psalm 139, that's the
word fearful. You're wonderfully made and you're
fearfully made. See, and she called him while
he was a chimpanzee because we have them and they're little
bitty monkeys, cute. The boys are little monkeys,
cute. But I told you they gonna grow up to be gorillas, right?
And once they're a gorilla, you can't do nothing with them, but
go get your Smith and Wesson. Right? That's all you can do.
That's all you can do. Because either they're going
to obey you or they're going to die. You have that right,
mama. Honor your mother and your father.
See, long ago, long ago, parents had an opportunity to let them
know, I'll put you down. I'll put you down. See, so there
were lines drawn, boundaries drawn. Respect was established. The idea of hitting your mama See, that was one of the thoughts
where you, if you thinking like that, get an Amtrak ticket, take
a ride to another country for a while and go see a doctor.
Because if she actually even get a hint of that thought, see
the sophistication going into crazy mode, right? I want you
to follow me. She handled that brother so well. I was so happy. I said, Lord,
there's a God in heaven. Hallelujah. This is how we handle
the kids. I said, this is how you do it.
And she wasn't ashamed when they put the cameras on her and asked
her, what is all that about? It's about her loving her boy
and telling him she's still his mama. What authority did he have
to go out there and act a fool? None. If his mama didn't give
him permission to do it, he doesn't have permission to do it. She
clothing him, feeding him, providing for his school and education.
He has no authority, but that which is permitted to him by
his parents. I know this is blowing synapses in the room right now
by you young college students. I know you think you can do what
you want to, but you can't do what you want to, watch this
now, you can't do what you want to until you can pay for what
you want to do. When you can pay for what you
want to do, then you can do what you want to. But as long as you
rolling up in your mama house, she run the show. And the daddy
will always keep the pistol oil clean. Arm. Do you understand that? Mothers
are crazy. But see, she was smart enough,
coy enough, sophisticated enough to know I better beat him while
he's a chimpanzee. Because when he's a gorilla,
can't do nothing with him. But shoot him or give him over
to the system. Give him over to the system. Are you guys following
what I'm saying? mother of the month and watch
this after all of the hell that our mothers go through, they're
still standing. We thank god for our mothers don't we they're
still standing after all the hell they go through still standing
still standing. We leave home go do all the mess
we do and we finally think about going back home to mama. We finally think about when we
give her a call because she's a point of stability for us,
a point of reference for us. This is true when that relationship
is healthy. It's true because God made her
that way. Are you guys understanding what
I'm saying? We are to value them therefore in the depths of our
hearts because they are a reflection of the wisdom of God, a combination
of strength and tenderness. that the whole world needs. Do
you hear me? The whole world needs a combination
of strength and tenderness. And so we thank God for our mothers
today. Amen. Amen.