The Power of Motherhood

Welcome to Leading the Way with Dr. Michael Yousaf. I hope you're going to be blessed and encouraged by this message. It is from my heart to yours.

God bless. All of us owe a debt of gratitude to our mothers. Children at a very early age are nurtured and loved and nourished by their mother's love. Children feel such depth of love and gratitude for their mothers that they feel so linked to mom in a very special way.

Just think about these big, powerful athletes. And when the camera is pointed at them, what do they say? Hi mom. Always mom.

Which reminds me of the story of a young boy who felt so indebted for his mother's love and he wanted to do something special on Mother's Day. And so he went to the store and there the lady behind the counter and he sat there and he said, I brought my pig bank here and I want to spend all this money to buy my mother a dress. And so the lady said, fine, now what is your mother's size?

I don't know. She said, well is she tall? Is she short? Is she big?

Is she small? The boy said, she is perfect. She's perfect.

Indeed she is. She is perfect. To him, her love is perfect. Her tender heart is perfect. Her loving heart is perfect.

Her nurturing is perfect. And it is not a surprise therefore, when God Almighty himself honored motherhood, that God blessed motherhood, that God even compares his love with the love of a mother, as we will see in a few minutes from the text. While motherhood has been under attack for many years, the truth is this. Motherhood is one of humanity's highest calling. Motherhood is one of humanity's greatest responsibility. Motherhood is one of the most powerful and influential instrument in any society. Motherhood has the power to impact societies, to impact nations, and yes to impact even the world. Motherhood has a greater impact for the future of our world than all of the emperors with all of their power.

Amen belongs here. In fact, the apostle Timothy, he was the hand picked disciple and successor of the apostle Paul, whom Paul personally discipled. Timothy, that great man of God, was great because of his mother and grandmother. According to the apostle Paul, it is the godliness of both his mother and grandmother that really made Timothy who he was.

Listen to 2 Timothy 1-5, Paul said, I have been reminded of your sincere faith, which first lived in your grandmother Lois, and in your mother Eunice, and now lives in you also. Saint Augustine, who probably impacted the history of Christianity like very few people, was a renegade, and the reason he came to Christ, and the reason he was used by Christ is because Monica, his mother, prayed for him every single day. This is to say nothing of the mother of John and Charles Wesley. Susanna Wesley has to be one of the top heroes on my list. Susanna Wesley spent one hour every day praying for every one of her children. In fact, Susanna Wesley lived just long enough, she was 73 when she died, to see the fruit of her labor. And you talk about a mother who was a powerhouse for God, who influenced the world for generations all across the globe.

She is it. Let me tell you about her. At 19 years of age, she got married, and in a period of 19 years, she gave birth to 19 children. Nine of them died in infancy, including two sets of twins. And when she was 19, on November 11, 1688, she was married to the Reverend Samuel Wesley. Her husband was not only a very poorly paid Church of England rector, but he was a terrible money manager. And literally, they lived in utter poverty, dependent on people's charity to help them along the way.

And to add insult to injury, he had a foul temper, and for a period of time, he left home, and left his children and his wife to fend for themselves. But in spite of this painful and crushing circumstances in which Susanna Wesley found herself in, she was determined to bring every one of her children in the fear and nurture of the Lord. And she succeeded beyond her wildest imagination. She would say that her highest calling, and I quote, the saving of their souls. You talk about walk of faith, impact of a mother. Before she died, at the age of 73, Susanna Wesley wrote her son Charles.

Now, Charles Wesley wrote more than a thousand hymns, and so many of his hymns are taught and sung throughout the world in many languages. And she wrote the following words, I want to read them to you. Just before she died, she said, when I had forgotten God, yet I then found He had not forgotten me.

Even then, He did by His Spirit apply the merits of the great atonement to my soul by telling me that Christ died for me. Susanna Wesley, although she has never preached a sermon, never wrote a book, and never founded a church, and yet without her, and without her powerful godly motherhood, we would not have had one of the great revivals in 2,000 years of Christian history. It was Abraham Lincoln who said, no man is poor who has a godly mother. And I say amen belongs here.

Why am I telling you this? And the virtue of waiting upon the Lord in the tough times is because that is the context of this verse. That is the context of this passage, Isaiah 49 and 15.

When the Lord wanted to assure His people of the depth of His love for them, He chose the image of a loving mother caring for her infant. And when you look in that verse in context, you're going to discover that the people of God at that time were in despair. They were disappointed with God. They were upset with God. They were facing a crisis, and they were facing uncertainty.

They were facing tough times. They were in a state of waiting upon the Lord, and they didn't like it. And their hearts began to question the love of God for them. And you see this clearly in verses 13 and 14. Here you see that distrust of God's love. You see the doubt about God's faithfulness which they have experienced throughout history. And their disappointment and doubt and distrust, they even trusted the Assyrians more than they trusted Jehovah. And God promised them again and again, all you need to do if you just trust Me, if you just wait upon Me, if you just place your confidence in Me, if you just wait and watch My hand to deliver you. But alas, they found waiting to be hard, and so does you, and so do I.

We can identify with them. We find it hard to wait too. We find it difficult to trust in His timing. We find it impossible at times to keep holding on to Him, and we take matters into our own hands.

We try to do our own thing, and we place our confidence in ourselves, in our ingenuity, in our resources, in other people. Do you know that Isaiah prophesied about waiting for the Lord and for the coming of the Messiah more than any other prophet in the Old Testament? He did. And history tells us that of all of God's people, a tiny remnant, a tiny remnant who trusted, who believed the promises of God through His prophet, Isaiah. And they believed that God will send His Messiah. And they trusted, and they waited, and they waited, and they waited for 700 years.

You say, how can that be? Did they live that long? No, I want to tell you about it, because that's the challenge I want to bring you from the Word of God today. You see, those people in the time of Isaiah waited upon the Lord. In fact, there was a whole group of them, that remnant, they were called the people of the way, sometimes referred to them as the Essians. And if you've been to Israel, you can go and visit near the Dead Sea, that whole area where the Essians have lived. John the Baptist came from the Essians. They're the ones who waited for the coming of the Messiah.

You say, how did that happen? Well, that first generation of Isaiah waited for the Messiah to be born. But then they got old and they're about to die.

And what do they do? They told the next generation, you wait for the Messiah to come. And when that generation did not experience the coming of the Messiah, they told the next generation, you wait for the Messiah to come. And when the Messiah did not come for that generation, that they told the next generation, now you wait for the Messiah to come. And they waited for the Messiah to come generation after generation until the time Jesus was born and two of the representative of that whole remnant faithful remnant group were Anna and Simeon You read about them in the Gospel of Luke chapter 2. They were waiting but they've been Inheriting this virtue of waiting for the Lord from generations go back 700 years Anna and Simeon and many others. They're just representative They recognize even then That God fulfilled that same prophecy that he gave us.

I a 700 years earlier They were the last of a long chain of faithful generations waiting for the Messiah. I I often wonder today if we are telling the subsequent generation. Are we telling our children?

Are we telling our grandchildren? About the Lord's return. Are we encouraging them to wait for the Lord to return? Whether we are teaching them to have confidence about the Lord's return whether we are instructing them about the vital Importance of waiting confidently upon the Lord for his return now beloved. Please listen to me We must teach future generation the virtue of waiting We must never never never get tired of teaching ourselves and the next generation the blessings of waiting upon the Lord in The midst of this generation and I know it's a generation of instant messaging Instant food and instant results. I know that but we must be committed afresh to teaching our children the value of waiting Upon the Lord we must teach them that instant gratification Brings a disaster by waiting upon the Lord brings a blessing that instant fulfillment Can bring about depression and discontentment, but waiting upon the Lord will bring true fulfillment and joy to life we must teach them that instant anything is a mere band-aid and it never builds a character and That is why the Lord said to his disciples He said you must wait in Jerusalem until the Spirit come upon you only then will you have the power to preach?

I Want you to hear me, right? Giving up on waiting and trusting in God's timing and God's faithfulness is so dangerous It is so dangerous so much so that the Lord Jesus Christ himself in Luke chapter 18 verse 8 asked the Question when the Son of Man returns will he find faith on the earth? What is Jesus saying he is saying that immediately before his return? There are going to be too many Christians who have given up waiting on him There will be too many Christians who have begun to live for self There will be too many Christians who lose their fervor and lose their passion in Anticipating the return of the Lord and lose the desire to order the life in the light of his coming too many Christians will have ceased to Expectantly wait for the Lord too many Christians will make this life with all of its Distractions to be the total focus too many Christians will be so earthly minded that they'll become of no heavenly good And that's why Jesus talks about the foolish women who had the lamps they had the lamps But there were no oil in it. They got busy with the world. They got busy with the life They got busy with thing.

They're no oil. So the bridegroom comes in and they got caught without oil Back to Isaiah This is all by ground Those folks in Isaiah's time that you read about here in 49 they lost hope Which led them to questioning God's love? But when they lose hope They begin to question the love of God Some thought that God was not fair. He did not treat them. Well Others looked around and said if God loved us so much Why are we in a mess and then there were those who like some modern Christians today? Whose attitude was so what?

so what What's the point? What difference does it make? God can say he loves us all he wants.

It won't do us any good Today I hear people Say if God really loves me Why was I born in this abusive family if God really loves me? Why am I trapped in this bad marriage if God really loves me? Why is this illness? Why is this accident?

Why is this business partner whom I trusted stole me blind? Why why why why? And so God wanted to communicate to them here in verse 15 chapter 49 of Isaiah He wants to communicate to them the depth of his undying love for them That his longing for them to comprehend the depths of his commitment to them His longing for them to trust in his love His longing for them to realize that God cannot cannot cannot cannot not love them and so in Isaiah 49 15 he says I Can no more forget you than a mother Forget her suckling child But then he said something else so hold on hold on. He said that's not all he said that even for some reason for some impossibility for some crazy reason a Mother may forget her baby. I Will never forget you you don't want to say amen Amen Then in verse 16, he goes on to say we're engraved on the palms of his hands When you think of the palms of the hands of Jesus, what do you think of?

the scars of the nails and Listen to me if those hands were nailed for you How can he forget you? Even when we sin and disappoint his heart He waits for us We don't wait for him But he waits for us to repent to confess and to turn so that he might graciously Out of love for us to forgive us again and again and again He's saying can a mother can I a normal mother can a sane mother can I caring mother? Can a godly mother forget her suckling child and the answer is what? Even they May forget but I Will never never never never how many nevers of this never never never forget you John Newton who wrote amazing grace and blessed millions upon millions upon millions He lost his mother when he was seven years old seven And the man grew up To be a terrible guy involved in the worst thing any human being can do to another human being he was involved in slave trading The most horrible thing a human being could do But even in his most vile days He could not forget his mother at whose knees He learned to pray And whenever he got into trouble Even though he did not know the Lord at the time when he got in danger in the high seas. He would cry out My mother's God The God of mercy Have mercy on me and God would answer him again and again such the impact of John Newton's mother on her son though. He only had her for seven years first seven years of his life and Finally when God took hold of John Newton thoroughly converted him to himself He taught the world to sing about God's amazing grace Listen to me. This is not the cheap grace that is being preached today That is nothing but a license Spurgeon said the grace that does not change a person is not the grace of God Amazing grace how sweet the sound that saved the wretch like me Can a mother forget the baby at her breast and have no compassion on the child She has born Though they may forget I'll not forget you Dr. Michael Yousaf with a reminder of the incredible influence that moms have over the children in their lives This is leading the way and we encourage you to learn more about the worldwide ministry and impact when you go to ltw.org Well, as you heard moms have incredible influence over their children and children They encounter during day-to-day life and the challenges that kids and families face in today's culture is mind-numbing We're facing decisions that many previous generations never even considered So to equip you and others to tackle life and culture through a biblical lens leading the way and dr Yousaf would like to challenge you to listen to a life-changing podcast candid conversations with Jonathan Yousaf Hello and welcome to candid where we never settle for less than the truth. I'm your host Jonathan Yousaf each week We'll tackle present progressive Christianity. They don't view the Bible as the Word of God They say we're gonna be all-star game and I got a phone call from Rhonda And she said Kayla's not breathing The phone call no parent. Yeah, I mean it's like what are you talking about? A lot of people try to heal the pain that they've lived through So accolades and success and credentials and there's no accolade.

There's no credential. There's no success That's ever gonna give you what Jesus Christ will give you if God is not sovereign then it depends on our works alone For the salvation of people which would be impossible the Lord asked me a question He said if he stood before me tonight, what name would I call? I said, oh god, that is not fair. I told you I've repented of this I'm sorry.

I ran back to the car and dropped the bomb I had I've gotten close to the house of the carport with the bomb and Dropped it. That was a miracle right there that it didn't explode Can a Christian engage in that political process without selling their soul? I think it's possible I think eyes in politics always happens. The question is are you compromising your principles?

Or are you compromising your policy? Jonathan is dr. Yusef's youngest son and has served in ministry both domestically and internationally for many years Each candid goes after life issues and offers biblical tools to face these unique challenges Jonathan provides biblical perspectives on such things as suffering heaven and hell forgiveness parenting suicide and more so look for candid Conversations with Jonathan Yusef where you get your podcast or you know what? you can always find more information about candid and stream online when you go to LT W dot org, that's LT W dot org Oh, that's our broadcast for now, please If you have any questions reach out to a leading the way ministry representative, we would love to talk to you at eight six six six two six four three five six that's eight six six six two six four three five six or Write to us. We love getting your notes in the mail. Just send them to leading the way post office box two zero one zero zero Atlanta, Georgia three zero three two five Again, that's post office box two zero one zero zero Atlanta, Georgia three zero three two five This program is furnished by leading the way with dr. Michael Yusef Connect with us through our YouTube channel Facebook Twitter and all of our social media networks You can learn more at LT W dot org