What is it to be a mother?

The day of celebration is coming near, and today I hear a friend say that it’s always the week leading up to this day that she feels just exactly like the worst mother.

Tonight I rock my little baby and place him in a crib that is not right next to my bed for the first time and tears stream down my face as I hold his sleeping little body, not wanting to let go.

Yet this is the same little baby boy who’s endless cries to be picked up and held can also send me to tears as I try to flounder through my day and somehow get something done.

I hear a disappointed sigh from oldest as he finds the world once again to be unjust and I search myself with questions - “Am I doing this right?” “What would other moms do?” “Maybe I have this all wrong?”

“Will he still like me when he’s grown?”

And we wonder why we often collapse into bed in exhaustion so often.

This all comes at the end of a week when I’ve stood outside rooms where judges settle disputes between mothers and fill-in-mothers —I’m forced for nearly an hour to listen to their complaints in the hall.

I ask myself this question —what is it to be a mother?

Surely it must be more than giving birth.

Anyone can hold the title —but who is it that fills the role?

Perhaps the one who stays through tantrums, trials and all temperaments.

Perhaps the one who loves enough to give a no.

Perhaps the one who surrenders her wants for the needs of another.

Could there be a greater opportunity to take up our crosses daily than to be a mother?

Could there be a better way to flesh out love every moment than to be a mother?

Could there be a higher calling than to train up small lives and little souls for the Kingdom and to be their mother?

We often look at the calling of motherhood and tremble at the enormity of it all, but truly, what better opportunity to throw ourselves in total surrender on the One who has given us the call?

Perhaps a mother is not what you have done, but what you have given.

Perhaps it is more than a single physical act - albeit a great and sacrificial one!

A mother is one who runs out every day —one who is spent in the happiest and holiest way. One who has answered the call to engage in the battle and to train up a great army we call the next generation.

We fail, we question, we falter - but a true mother is marked by heart bowed low with willingness, a swelling passion to instil greatness, an all-consuming love demonstrated in Jesus.

To be a mother is to live inside the Gospel —and oh, what greater privilege is there than that?

Our master does not call us to perfection - He calls us into daily faithfulness. May that be our theme —regardless the results we see today.