To Every Mother Who Has Ever Prayed in the Dark

There is a kind of love that doesn't make the headlines. It doesn't ask for recognition, it doesn't clock out at the end of the day, and it certainly doesn't take weekends off. It is the love of a mother. Quiet but strong. Bottomless and absolutely irreplaceable. This Mother's Day, we want to take a moment to honor every mother who has poured herself for her child.

The Bible doesn't shy away from the power of a mother's influence. In Proverbs 31, we are given a portrait of a woman whose children rise up and call her blessed. Not because she was perfect, but because she was present. She was strong in the morning and still standing at midnight. Sound familiar? That's the mother most of us know.

"Her children arise and call her blessed; her husband also, and he praises her: Many women do noble things, but you surpass them all."
— Proverbs 31:28-29

We think of the mothers who worked double shifts and still made it to the school play. The mothers who held it together in public and fell apart privately so their children never had to see them break. We think of the mothers who prayed over their children's beds long after those children stopped believing their prayers were needed. God heard every single one of those prayers.

We also honor the women who mother without the title. Aunts who stepped in, the grandmothers who raised a second family, the women in the church who mentored children in the body of Christ. Motherhood is not always biology. Sometimes it is simply a woman who decided that a child needed love and she was going to be the one to give it.

"Can a mother forget the baby at her breast and have no compassion on the child she has borne? Though she may forget, I will not forget you!"
— Isaiah 49:15

What a comfort to know that even on the days a mother feels like she has nothing left to give, God's love for her children surpasses even her own. She is not alone in this.

To every mother reading this: Thank you! Thank you for the sacrifices nobody saw. Thank you for the love you gave on the days you didn't feel loving. Thank you for staying. The community is better, families are stronger, and children are safer because of you.

Happy Mother's Day from all of us at Jacksonville Church of God (Seventh Day).

— Pastor Anderson
Jacksonville Church of God (Seventh Day)