As For Me And My House Part VI, The Heart of the Home

Would you be seated everyone? Thank you. Why don't you go ahead and get your outline out of your notes, please. If you're new to us, what we try to do each and every Sunday is to provide you with an outline where you can take some notes and have something to discuss when you leave here today beyond just a faint recollection of a message. And today particularly, moms, this is your day and what a great day it is. Few things are more important in this culture. I guess I'd have to say, is there anything more important than moms? Just listen to a few of history's greatest contributors. George Washington said this, my mother was the most beautiful woman I ever saw. All I am I owe to my mother. I attribute all my success in life to the moral intellectual and physical education I received from her. Abraham Lincoln, all that I am or ever hope to be I owe to my mom, my angel. Oliver Wendell Holmes, youth fades, love droops, the leaves of friendship fall, but a mother's secret hope outlives them all. Mothers have a profound impact. Now, there's the other side of reality here as well. One person wrote, motherhood is full of frustrations and challenges, but eventually they move out. Another one said, I don't know who said it, but it's true. If it was going to be easy to raise kids, it never would have started with something called labor. And if you ever have an experience like this, the burst of thunder sent a three-year-old flying into her parents' bedroom. Mommy, I'm scared, she said. The mother, half awake and half unconscious, replied, go back to your bed. God will be there with you. A small figure stood in the unlit doorway for a moment and then said softly, mommy, I'll sleep here with daddy and you go in there and sleep with God. Our focus this morning is on honoring our moms as the heart of our homes. This is the last in our four-part series as for me in my house. You see, if dads are the foundation and the strength in which a solid family is built, then moms represent the heart, the spirit, the fabric of the homes. Motherhood is, as always in these last couple of decades, taking some lumps in the media. The media would portray the ideal mom as one who launches their professional career and builds a great reputation and then, with some measure of anxiety, lays that on the shelf for a bit and has one child or the max two and then quickly shuttles them into quality daycare where then she begins to manage her home, her career, her marriage, and her personal life in fantastic fashion. I looked through the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette this morning, pretty much front to back. I found one article on motherhood and it was about a professional mom whose name I won't mention in the Parade magazine who fit that description. That's the ideal mom in today's media. Sadly, devoted moms, moms who want to get with their kids and invest in the early years of their lives, those moms won't make it on magazine covers. They won't end up heading corporate boards or making big-time decisions necessarily that will find their way to the media. They won't get big bonuses at the end of the year. They just simply hold the fate of the world in their hands. I want to quote Barbara Bush, the president, former president's wife, when she was speaking at a graduating ceremony at Wellesley College. She said this, listen to this quote, At the end of your life, you will never regret not having passed one more test, not winning one more verdict, or not closing one more deal. You will regret time not spent with a husband, a friend, a child, or a parent. We're in a transitional period right now, fascinating and exhilarating times, learning to adjust to the changes and the choices that we men and women are facing. Maybe we should adjust faster, maybe slower, but whatever the era, whatever the times, one thing will never change. Fathers and mothers, if you have children, they must come first. You must read to your children, you must hug your children, and you must love your children. Your success as a family, our success as a society, depends not on what happens at the White House, but on what happens inside your house. And I firmly believe that. And friends, contrast that with some of the things that we read this Thursday in USA Today. In a rather actually inspiring article by a man named William Maddox was this one little excerpt I wanted to read to you. He quotes a person who wrote a new book on the importance of moms in the early developmental years, a person named Brenda Hunter, and he says this, The time mothers spend caring for their babies is far more important than many of us realize. While the first three years of life may be a time that escapes a child's memory, it's nevertheless a time of extraordinary developmental importance. In fact, the first three years of life are now considered to be so developmentally important that some daycare advocates are openly questioning whether mothers and fathers are up to the task. At a number of recent conferences, including two White House gatherings sponsored by First Lady Hillary Rodham Clinton, these advocates have suggested that quality daycare should not be seen as a last resort for families with special needs, but as a first and best option for all families who want to do right by their children. Think about that. Well, if you really want to do right, you really should put your kids in daycare. You as a parent, I'm not sure you know what to do is what that's saying. So even though statistics, friends, show that stay-at-home moms are on the rise in the last four or five years, these remain oblivious to the media. And there's a subtle sense that continues to be perpetrated that if you're called to be a stay-at-home mom, you're not really counting all that much. It's not as significant as something professional. Tony Campolo is someone you've heard of probably. He's a writer, an author, a speaker that is. He says this, I love the way my wife expresses it. I love it at a party when someone comes up to her like some lawyer and says in a real condescending voice, What do you do, my dear? Kind of a disguised put-down of homemakers by those who think the only significant work in our society is done by some professional vocation. And then Campolo says this is what his wife usually says in return. She says, well, I'm socializing two homo sapiens, the dominant values of the Judeo-Christian tradition, so they can become agents of the transformation of the social order and the kind of eschatological utopia that God had in mind from the beginning of creation. What do you do? The answer comes back pretty lame. Well, I'm a lawyer. You see, there is no higher calling, friends, than motherhood. And so we're going to reverse that mentality just a bit today. I want to see what Scripture says about honoring our mothers. I'm aware of a couple of things right now. First of all, that some of you here will find the next few moments uncomfortable, difficult, because you're in a relationship with your mom that isn't going very well. Maybe you're not communicating at all. That will make what I'm going to say today more difficult for you. I know there's some of you here today who would very much want to be a mother. I even know some folks who didn't come today because they were afraid they couldn't bear the pain of talking about mothers when they themselves have not been able to bear children. There are some of you likely that are here that maybe things are okay now with your mom, but some of the history, the memories aren't all that good. And today, it's just going to make it hard for you to remember those things. Friends, listen, please be encouraged about something. God's truth can transform all of those situations. Don't dial me out right now. Tune me up. God wants to speak to your heart. Note the definition of honor on your outline, would you please? Note the definition. It's very important. Honor is a decision that we make to place high value, worth, and importance on another person by viewing him or her as a priceless gift and granting him or her a position in our lives worthy of great respect. And love involves putting that decision into action. Honor is a what? It's a decision. The first blank in your outline is, note that honor is not a reward that is deserved, but a decision that is made. Write that down. It's a decision that you make. To honor someone isn't something that you kind of calculate and sort of figure, well, I guess they aren't, no. You make the decision to honor. The Bible never says, honor your father and mother if, in fact, if you look at the top of your outline, it says, honor your father and your mother so that you may live long in the land the Lord your God has given you. And look at Ephesians 6, 2, and 3. Children, honor your father and mother, which is the first commandment with a promise. What's the promise? The promise is this, that it may go well with you and that you may enjoy long life on the earth. The Bible seems to correlate a long life with your willingness to obey the commandment to honor your father, and particularly today we're focusing on mothers. So let me give you three ways today, three suggestions as to how you, dear one, might honor your mom on this day. First one is pretty straightforward. The first one is to integrate her into your life. Pay attention to her. It's interesting that the opposite of honor is to dishonor. To dishonor, if you look it up, means to perceive something as a vapor or mist or something that seems to be disappearing or of little substance. To dishonor your mother means you basically kind of marginalize her as a part of your life. You kind of see her as not all that important anymore. And you know why that is? It's because we forget just how much our moms have done for us. We forget this sheer effort involved in raising us. How many of you know you weren't that easy to bring up? Don't take it personally, but how many of you know you were a full-time case? Huh? From the beginning, it's interesting. Moms, they pay a big price right out of the gate. And sometimes they're kind of led to believe that, well, maybe it won't be all that bad. I remember 20-some years ago, Carol and I went to what's called Lamaze classes, huh? How many of you have been to a Lamaze class? Well, if you have, you know that they tend to be sort of an optimistic bunch, don't they? They're not allowed to use the word pain. What is it called when, what do moms experience during those times of labor? It's, discomfort is the word they use. My, what discomfort. And my role was called, I was called the coach. Not the pain management specialist, the coach. And that really didn't, that painted a strange picture in my mind. Coaching, I mean coach. Well, I think coach is the first figure that pops into my brain is a guy named Bobby Knight. He's coaches in the Indiana basketball team. You ever see Bobby Knight? He kind of paces around and screams and throws chairs. And if I recall, in my first experience in Lamaze, in the room where I was, and the baby was being born, I wasn't the one screaming and throwing chairs. And that just begins the process. And from that day on, moms are carrying in them all of those huge decisions, all of those important things that no one ever told her how to do. There's no school for being a mom, no formal preparation, no idea what to do next. I remember when Amy first came home, we had this wonderful day when Amy came home from the hospital, and friends came over, and family was there, and we were just celebrating this little bundle, and we ate, and cooed, and everyone, you know, tickled, and all that stuff. And then they all left. And Carol looked at me, and I looked at Carol and said, well, there you are. And Amy started crying, and if I recall, she cried most of that night. And I said, is there a book somewhere I can get? What should we do? How many of you remember that feeling? Moms, when all of a sudden, there's that baby, and you have to know what to do, and you don't know what to do. Moms are the ones who have to determine when to comfort, when to challenge, when to draw boundaries, when to give permission, when to say yes, when to say no, what friends seem to be okay, and what friends, well, you know, I hope they don't come back, when to give advice, and when to be quiet. Moms aren't perfect, as were not her mom, or the mom before her, but she did her best with what she's been given, and now she desires to be included in the life that she was so integrally involved in bringing into the world. And you know what happens in our fast-paced, high-demand society? We get real busy, don't we, friends? We get real busy with our activities, with our careers, our jobs, our home upkeep, our soccer games, our little league, our gymnastics, our dance, our this, our that. And we kind of find it pretty easy not to spend all that much time with my mom. Mom will understand. Mom knows how busy I am. Mom's always been the one who just kind of would say, well, I miss you, but I understand. Friends, when your life is that full, and you don't have time for mom, the Bible would say you're dishonoring her. You're not giving her the substance. You're not giving her the attention she deserves. I want to answer this one question before I leave this point. Have your parents, in particular today, your mom, for whatever reason, slipped to the back burner of your attention? Because everything else has become so important. You know, I found it fascinating. Turn your outline over. Jesus Christ, at age 30, entered his ministry, and it's the first public record in the book of John, and his first miracle, turning water into wine. Who was present at that miracle? John chapter 2. Jesus' mother. See, at age 30, Jesus just wasn't too busy to have his mom around. And isn't it more fascinating? Look in your outline. The very last moments of Jesus' life. And friends, I want to submit to you that when Jesus Christ hung on the cross, every word that came from his lips had huge significance. Everything he said. And he took time specifically, just before he died on the cross, to say, as he looked at John the disciple, to say to him, here is your mother. And John knew what he meant. From that time on, John took Mary into his home. How many of you understand how important that is? Jesus said, made it very clear that he cared so much about his mother, that he made sure that someone would take care of her, even after he gave up his life for us. Integrate your mom into your life. Number two, celebrate her life as a person. Celebrate her life as a person. To dishonor is to devalue. To honor is to recognize something of substance. And literally, let's just put those several definitions up. Something that's heavy or valuable. Something that's costly or priceless. The Greek word literally means, the word for honor is the word for price. I noted that. Look on your outline. The scripture that we often quote, you are bought with a price. That's the same word for honor. First Corinthians 6 20. Therefore, glorify God in your body. And so, to honor someone is to attach high value, high worth, a high price to their life. And we need to learn how to express that to our moms in a way that gives weight to their opinions and their insights. And that's never been difficult for me. To this day, I still consider my mom's appraisal of people and social dynamics as some of the wisest I've ever heard. I'll often ask her, what do you think about what's going on in the Middle East? And she will tell me some things I haven't even read about or seen before about what's going on in terms of those dynamics. Last fall, when we had that vote on the on the stadium tax proposal, I, you know, all the articulate young entrepreneurial leaders of Pittsburgh were saying, hey, vote for this tax and do this. And I said, well, mom, what do you think about that? And she said, don't be stupid. She said that. I said, we're not dumb. Don't vote to tax yourself. Well, son of a gun. Eighty percent of the people in the county agreed with her. See, what the Bible is teaching us in this powerful way is to learn how to value and put a price on who our moms are. Oftentimes, it's just being able to say, you know, you're special. The word, wow. Do you ever use that word? What has to happen to you to really elicit a strong response? When you see a beautiful sunrise, like this morning, if you got up early today, most of you in this service don't even know what a sunrise is on Sunday. But this morning, there was a little cloud cover just above the horizon. So when the sun came up, it just did a beautiful sunrise, at least where I was. And, you know, in my heart, wow. Do you ever have that? What does it take in you to bring out a wow, you know? Maybe it's like when you're driving along on the Orange Belt 910 over here, and you see a pen dot sign that says, you know, men at work, and you look, and there really are. Wow, I mean, you know, it's incredible. A man, a miracle. Well, moms need to hear that every once in a while from us. Like, wow, are you special? Let's try that. Ready? Wow. You're going to have to do better than that. Just imagine you're looking right at your mom, and you're going to say, wow. You are terrific. I want to encourage you, when you leave here today, if you're going to go be with your mom, take a minute, you know, come alongside of her. Just look right at her. Don't be real weird about it, but just, you know, don't let her get nervous. Just say, wow. Mom, you, you're awesome. Other moms need a touch of some kind. They need a hug. They need to be, they need to just feel that you care for them. They need to know, in some tangible way, that what they've given the prime years of their lives to many times is worth it. No one else may have noticed it, but you have, and you appreciate it, and you bless them, and you celebrate that with them. You're saying to mom, you haven't been crazy. We're worth it, even if the world doesn't necessarily agree with him, and sometimes we honor our moms just by listening to them, just by sort of valuing what they have to say to us, savoring their perspectives on life. You know, recently with my dad's going home to be with the Lord, I spent some time with my mom, and we traveled just this past week, and some of the neighborhoods where she and dad spent a lot of time together, and I would just listen. She said, well, over here, we used to go out to eat, and oh, and oh, and there's that real steep hill where we pulled up the hill one day, and the car broke down, and we were backing up traffic, and the guy behind was just honking his horn, and your dad got out of the car and said, tell you what, you go fix my car, and I'll sit here and honk the horn, and you know, all those kind of moments when, you know, life was full, and you just kind of savor those, and share them together. And friends, we also honor our moms, and celebrate their lives by just giving to them certain things that show that we understand them, and we appreciate them, and we value them. Carol's mom just turned 87 years old, and Carol used to always send her clothes or different things that she could appreciate, books to read, and so on. Well, this year, Carol, Carol's mom has begun to lose her eyesight, and it's been very hard. She can no longer drive, and so this year, Carol chose a number of things that she could listen to. We've sent her some cassette tapes, and some audio books, and those kind of things, and some fragrances that she could enjoy, and just things that didn't require her eyesight. Ways to say to her mom, we care about you, we know what you're going through, and more phone calls to encourage her. Just honor your mom, and celebrate her life for who he is, or who she is to you. Number three, we honor our moms by appreciating their great sacrifices for us. You see, we dishonor moms, and we forget what they've done. When I looked up the word to honor in the Greek, it means to respect as a person by looking back and seeing what they've accomplished. That's why I quoted the scripture Psalm 66 to sing the honor of the Lord's name, make his praise glorious, say to God how awesome are your deeds. You see, we look back, and we say with gratitude, Mom, I see how much you've sacrificed for me, and I appreciate you. I heard a country-western song a while back, one of those sort of narrative songs, kind of like Butterfly Kisses, you know, that tells a story that's sort of progressing, and in the song, it's a song about a boy who gets tired of doing his chores, and he sits down to write his mom a bill for all the work he's done around the house. I almost feel like I want to sing it, but I'm not going to, and you know, for mowing the yard, how much she's going to charge, and for cleaning the basement, what that's going to cost, and for making his beds, and doing the dishes, and for taking out the trash, and dressing himself, and on and on he goes, and all these little things, and then the song goes on, and Mom gets the letter from the little boy, and then Mom sits down, and she responds by writing a bill of her own, and starts to itemize her charges, and she says in the song, for bringing you into the world, no charge, for rocking you all night long when you wouldn't be comforted, no charge, for all the times I cleaned your nose, and patched your knees, no charges, for all the time I kissed your hurts, and squeezed you tight, no charge, for all the times I wait, I laid awake at night, waiting for you to come home, not one, not knowing what happened, no charge, for all the times I prayed, and believed, and asked God for the best for you, no charge, for all the times I sacrificed, and dreamed for you, no charge, I mean, I felt so guilty after hearing that song, I called my mom, and said, whoo, mom, mom, you know, how can I say thanks, she said, just send me the money, you know, but you know, the whole point of this story, friends, is simple, a child has a debt to his or her mom, that he or she can never repay, that article in USA Today, the focus of it was, thanking mom for all the things you never knew that she did, and I'm amazed as I go on how true that is, recently I was at a luncheon, maybe it was a dinner with a couple here and there, and we were talking about one of my kids, and I was, I had remembered one sort of thing about a portion of their growing up years, and Carol looked at me and said, that wasn't the way it was, I was doing this while you were off doing that thing, speaking about church, and she was reminding me of all the things she had done, you see, friends, moms do it willingly, because they know that if they do this parenting thing the way God has designed it, with no charge, and no strings, and no obligations, if they just give it as a gift, because it's a gift they've received, then their highest hope is that that gift then will be passed on down to the next generation, and that circle of life will continue on, and the love of God will be passed on down through, and you see, that's what God intended, and that's what blesses the heart of a mom, that's how we show appreciation. There are going to be times, friends, let's be honest, when moms mess up, when because of their own hurts, or abuse, or something in their past, they pass it on down the line, or they somehow put in some impossible standard before you of constant attention, or whatever, or worse yet, a controlling spirit that won't let you just be the adult that God wants you to be, but there's grace even in those circumstances for you to give them honor. To make a decision, to honor them just for being human. Just a final word, you know, I don't know where you are today in your relationship with your mom. I don't know where you are in this whole process. You know, maybe you've done great in all these things, maybe you didn't need to hear this today, but I need to tell you that I did, and there are many times that I wish I had done a better job at this. I just want to say to my mom today that I really love you. I think you're here somewhere, mom. Are you? Would you stand up if you're here? Would you just help me in church today to honor my mom? Go ahead and stand. There she is. And I want to pray for you, and with you today, that somehow God would give you the grace to integrate your mom into your life, to celebrate with your mom her life, and to appreciate all that she's done for you. Show her today. She's been a vessel of God's grace to you. Now you be a vessel of honor, a vessel of honor to her. Would you stand with me, please? Lord, move right now by your spirit in this congregation. Give us the grace to be vessels of honor to our moms today, to express to them the love that we have, how much we value and appreciate them. Lord, we thank you for them in Jesus' name. And friends, we learned a chorus a few weeks ago. I think the worship team sang it for us. Let's learn it together. Lord, I want to be a vessel of honor. I want to be a vessel of honor.