Mother’s Day, Everyday
Of all the big titles and responsibilities a person can hold, mother is the most important.
I didn’t grow up with money or much material comfort. I was born and raised in a mobile home on a dirt road. But it sure was a beautiful, welcoming one. My mother made it so.
My parents didn’t spoil us with substitutes of what is actually valuable. They gave us what money can’t buy: their undivided attention and love, in both word and deed. That example taught me more about what hospitality and beauty really are—and what success should look like—than any book, career coach, or college degree could.
My mom brought ten of us into the world, all born at home. Alongside my dad, she schooled, disciplined, and loved us into happy, healthy, mature humans.
Mommy, I don’t know how you all did it, but I sure am thankful. All the nights I kept you awake as a grumpy little baby (you don’t ever have to stop teasing me, cause I know you never will). The messes I made before I could clean up my own. The lessons you taught me in the living room each morning in how to pray, write, and speak up; at the kitchen table, how to diagram sentences; in the garden, how to pull weeds. Wherever we were, it was always from your heart. We were loved by both of you, deeply and totally, and that’s the greatest gift I could ever receive.
And right now I can just see you shaking your head and pursing your lips a little as you read, but don’t worry, you won’t change my mind. I know you made mistakes and I know you aren’t perfect—but you are.
There wasn’t much glory in the ordinary work of mothering ten kids, but you did a glorious job.
I believe we all have callings on our lives: people we were born to be and to become. For the past thirty-six years of motherhood, my mom has fulfilled her calling with grace, grit, wit, and wholehearted devotion. And when the time came, that example taught me what to look for in a woman who would mother my future kids, and gave me the faith to believe I might find her.
Helen, I’ve known you my whole life. Since long before we fell in love or I asked you to marry me, I’ve watched the way you love God and others. The way you care about people, young and old, deserving and undeserving. About making little things look beautiful. About giving God glory in everything.
Your mom taught you well. That would be clear enough to anyone who doesn’t know her just by seeing you, but knowing her completes the picture perfectly. Your mom has my highest respect.
Helen, I’ll never have your tenderness, your beautiful voice, the perfect touch of your handwriting, your cooking, or a long list of other cherished attributes. But I promise to use every gift I do have to return that love. My dad never failed to show his love to my mom, and that is a big reason I feel the way I do about her today.
I pray our kids see that, too.
God gave us a beautiful gift when He made mothers and grandmothers. And they make us.
I want every mother reading this to know that what you’re doing matters; what you’re struggling with, what you’re succeeding at. Keep up the good work, one tiny, mundane act of care at a time. Keep putting your whole heart into it. Keep planting little seeds of love and care and connection. I promise they will grow into trees whose fruit you’ll one day reap, whose branches you’ll one day find shade under.
We love and value you. Today, this Sunday, and every day.
P.S. I wanted to let you all know something: Helen and I are expecting our third in July! We are so excited to meet him or her (gender is a surprise), and for Lucas & Ezra to meet their new playmate and fellow trouble maker :)
