i was approached by a bishopric member a few months ago and asked to speak about motherhood. i spent so much time thinking about what it is and what it isn't, but this was my final talk - i just missed one thing, which came to me the minute i sat down afterwards.
jill churchill once said: "there is no one way to be a perfect mother,
but a million ways to be a good one." ♥
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Today I’ve been asked to speak about motherhood.
This is probably the fourth talk I’ve been asked to give on motherhood, my
first when I was pregnant with Madeline, so I’m pretty sure it’s one of two
things. I’ve either got this on lock and am about to tell you all just how it’s
done, so listen up! Or the more
likely possibility, I’m doing a rubbish job and need to keep researching… which
I have done over the past few weeks to put this talk together.
One of my friends asked
me a few months ago if being a Christian made it easier to love your children
when they are misbehaving, I told her heck no, you just spend a lot more time
praying to Heavenly Father for the strength to not kill them. So far he’s given
me just enough of that. I did a lot of that this week, when a child who will
remain unnamed unplugged my computer not once, but twice in a five minute
period and I lost half of my almost finished talk. Gretchen Rubin once said, "The days are long, but the years are short."
So. Motherhood… Motherhood
is a partnership with the Lord. We, as women have been given this amazing opportunity to raise the spirit
children of our Heavenly Father. It is up to us to guide them in the right
pathways and help them to reach their heavenly home. Just personally, I think
our most important job as a mother is to prepare our children and have them
ready to make decisions that they don’t yet know are coming.
There is a primary song entitled “The
Family is of God”, which states: “A mother’s purpose is to care, prepare, to nurture
and to strengthen all her children, she teaches children to obey, to pray, to
love and serve in the family.” It is so true. Most children learn their first
lessons in life from their mothers.
I was blessed with amazing, strong and
faithful women in my life. Both my grandmothers had lost a child and felt a
pull to the gospel and the promise of eternal families. My mother’s mother had
married a severely less-active member of the church, only to have the
missionaries knock on her door in the 1960’s when
my mother was a child. My grandmother felt something and asked the missionaries
to come back... my grandfather was not as keen and said "you do whatever
you want to do, but I'm already a member and clearly if I haven't been going
for all these years I won’t be rushing off to church..." she persisted in
her learning, joined the church and he eventually became active again.
My father’s mother had the missionaries
knock on her door and asked them to come in, much to my grandfather’s annoyance.
He supported her in her decision to learn more, whilst showing zero interest,
but as the missionaries taught her, he moved from the kitchen, to the dining
room, to the lounge room doorway, eventually to the lounge and after a few
months more he joined them in the gospel. How grateful I am every single day
for these two courageous women who stood up and made their choice, regardless
of what their husbands thought, teaching their children to love the Lord, and enabling
me to have what I have.
Both of my grandmothers died when I was
very young so the very few memories I had of them have almost gone... I look
forward to the day that I can actually get to know them too. I simply know that
they set a fine example for our family with their dedication to attending
church, serving within the gospel and their unwavering faith and testimonies.
My own mother benefited from their ways and has been a true example of faith
and serving others, raising my brothers and I in a strong, gospel centred home.
I was lucky enough to choose a husband who had also been raised by another one
of these strong women who helped him remain close to the Lord, serve a mission
and be ready and waiting for me to arrive.
I have determined to be one of these
women too; I am often heard telling my children (much to my own mother’s
amusement) that I do not negotiate with terrorists, when they try to get their
own way.
As mothers in the gospel, we have to be strong, often defying the
ways of the world. In her 2001 BYU address entitled “Knowing Who You Are—and
Who You Have Always Been,” Sheri Dew said, “Satan, of course, knows how
spiritually potent the knowledge of our divine identity is. He hates women of the noble birthright. He
hates us because he is almost out of time, while we are en route to everlasting
glory. He hates us because of the influence we have on husbands and children,
family and friends, the Church and even the world. It is no secret to him that
we are the Lord's secret weapon.”
Elaine S Dalton once
said, “If you desire to make a difference in the world, you must be different
from the world.” As mothers in the gospel we have the responsibility of
teaching our children the right path to walk. In Proverbs22:6 it says, “train
up a child in the way he should go: and when he is old, he will not depart from
it.” I was taught things in my home that I now teach my children, simple things
such as having personal and family prayer, reading scriptures, going to church,
attending the temple, paying tithing, having regular family home evening, all the
basic things that help us learn and keep the commandments. As a whole, we need
to fill our homes and the lives of our children, with the light of the gospel,
while remembering that when the time comes, it will be their choice which path they follow. For this reason, we need to
make sure their feet are firmly planted on the right path! Our examples and testimonies can only take them so far,
so we as mothers need to make sure we teach the gospel in our homes, ensuring
they gain their own testimony, so
they will remain faithful in the years to come.
President Monson spoke
specifically of this in his final conference address when he said: “If you do
not have a firm testimony of these things, do that which is necessary to obtain
one. It is essential for you to have
your own testimony in these difficult times, for the testimonies of others will
carry you only so far. Once obtained, a testimony needs to be kept vital and
alive through continued obedience to the commandments of God and through daily
prayer and scripture study.”
The things he mentioned
can be taught in the home. If we are doing the right things, our children will
see and copy us. As Sister Joy D. Jones said, “Children are great imitators, so
give them something great to imitate!”
Mothers who
know of gospel truths stand strong and immovable. In her 2007 general
conference talk “Mothers who know”, Julie B Beck said: “Who will prepare
this righteous generation of sons and daughters? Latter-day Saint women will do
this—women who know and love the Lord and bear testimony of Him, women who are
strong and immovable and who do not give up during difficult and discouraging
times. We are led by an inspired prophet of God who has called upon the women
of the Church to “stand strong and immovable for that which is correct and
proper under the plan of the Lord.” He has asked us to “begin in our own
homes” to teach children the ways of truth. Latter-day Saint women should
be the very best in the world at upholding, nurturing, and protecting
families.
In equal partnership
with their husbands, mothers lead a great and eternal organization. These
mothers plan for the future. They plan for missions, temple marriages, and
education. They plan for prayer, scripture study, and family home evening. They
build children into future leaders within the gospel and the world. They do not
abandon their plans by allowing social pressure or worldly examples of
“parenting” to get to them. Mothers in the gospel are selective about their own
activities and involvements, and sometimes even their friendships!, in order to maximize their influence where it matters
most, within the walls of their own home. As President Harold B. Lee said, “The most important of the
Lord's work that you will ever do will be
the work you do within the walls of your
own home.”
There are many faithful
women who by no choice of their own, will not be given the chance in this life
to become mothers. In fact, I think I could safely say that Sheri Dew, who
actually has no children of her own, has given some of the most amazing talks about motherhood. In her
talk, “Are we not all mothers?” she stated: “We tend
to equate motherhood solely with maternity, but in the Lord’s language, the
word mother has layers of meaning. Of all the words
they could have chosen to define her role and her essence, both our Heavenly
Father and Adam called Eve “the mother of all living” and they did so before she had
even borne a child.”
Like Eve, we sisters began our
motherhood before we were born. Just as worthy men were foreordained to hold
the priesthood in this life, righteous women were endowed premortally with
the privilege of motherhood. Motherhood is more than bearing children, though it
is of course certainly that. It is the essence of who we are as women. It
defines our very identity, our divine stature and nature, and the unique traits
our Father gave us.
My children have been blessed with many
“aunties” (some related and others who are friends that have become family) and even a bonus nanna.
Some have children of their own, some do not – and may not. However, their shining example and ability to love them as
we do has taught me so much, helping me in turn, to become a better mother. For reasons known only to the
Lord, some women are required to wait to have children, perhaps even until the
next life. This delay is not easy for any righteous woman. Some of us, then,
must simply find other ways to mother. All around us are those who need to be
loved and led. We have some amazing examples even right here in our ward, of
women who have stepped up and stood in place when there has been someone in
need of a mother. Motherhood
is brought about not only by being able to carry and birth a child, but also by
being an example and helping to raise others to walk the strait and narrow
path.
Eve set a pattern for us to follow. In addition to
bearing children, she mothered all of mankind when she made the most courageous
decision any woman has ever made and with Adam opened the way for us to
progress. She set an example of womanhood for men to respect and women to
follow, modelling beautiful characteristics which we as women should possess:
strong faith, a keen sensitivity to the Spirit, a hatred of evil and complete
selflessness. She loved us enough to help lead us. As daughters of our Heavenly
Father, and as daughters of Eve, we are all mothers and we have always been
mothers. And we each have the responsibility to love and help lead the rising
generation. Our young women will learn to live as women of God when they see
what women of God look like. What we wear, watch, and read; how we fill our
time and our thoughts; how we face trials and temptation, where we find true
joy and how we act righteously. We
are all mothers in Israel, and our calling is to love and
help lead the rising generation through this dangerous life ahead.
Never in the history of the world has there been a
greater need for righteous mothers—mothers who bless their children with a
sense of safety, security, and confidence about the future, mothers who teach
their children where to find peace and truth and that the power of Jesus
Christ is always stronger than the power of the adversary. If we do not
teach our children to follow Christ, the world will teach them otherwise. No
woman who understands the gospel would ever think that any other work is more
important or would ever say, “I am just a mother.”
If we really want to make a difference in this life, it will happen as we
mother those we have borne and those we are willing to bear with. As it happens, one of the greatest blessings of motherhood is, in fact, the other mothers. I am so lucky to have amazing mum friends and so many good examples right here to learn from.
As mothers in Israel, we are the Lord’s secret
weapon. Our influence comes from a divine endowment that has been in place from
the beginning. We just cannot let the Lord down. And if the day comes when we
are the only women on earth who find nobility and divinity in motherhood, so be
it. For there is no such thing as just a
mother.
The most amazing blessings in my life, are the
three children I have been given the opportunity to raise with my husband, in
the safety of the gospel. I know of its truth and I want nothing more than for
my children to come to learn and know that for themselves. How grateful I am to
be a mother in Zion. In the name of Jesus Christ, Amen.
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