What My Mother Taught Me

The Godly Mother teaches more lessons on character than she ever will on fashion. The Godly Mother relates the activities of a child's life to the Word of God more than the latest magazine or talk show hostess. The Godly Mother will challenge you to pursue the approval and pleasure of God over and above the approval of man and the pleasures of life. She is more interested in teaching you that the greatest treasures are not treasures of earth, but treasures of eternity.

I wonder what your mom taught you. What's the most important lesson your mother ever taught you? And if you're a mom, what lasting truths are you hoping to pass on to your children? Welcome to Wisdom for the Heart with Pastor Stephen Davey. Whether you're laughing over childhood memories or walking through some of motherhood's hardest moments, this message will resonate deeply. The Bible gives us a surprising picture of how God uses even imperfect families to raise Godly kids.

So if you're part of an imperfect family and we all are, Stephen will encourage you today. This message is called What My Mother Taught Me. People have emailed me this list of rather humorous lessons learned from our mothers. I thought I'd share them with you. I sort of tucked it into my file. I'll give it to you now. My mother taught me the value of a clean home when she taught my brother and I, listen, if you're going to kill each other, do it outside.

I just finished cleaning up. My mother taught me the value of passionate prayer when she said, you better pray that we'll come out of the carpet. My mother taught me logic when she said, if you fall out of that swing and break your neck, you're not going to go to the store with me later. My mother encouraged me to learn contortionism when she said to me, will you look at all that dirt on the back of your neck? My mother taught me that love has boundaries. That lawnmower cuts off your toes. Don't come running to me. My mother taught me about the value of stamina.

You will sit there until that spinach is gone. How many of you can identify with that? Well, this day is especially for you, moms, for having to put up with us all.

You are underpaid, undervalued, and taken for granted. Amen. Hey, go ahead. Amen. Don't hold back.

This is your one day, okay? You can never call in sick. You don't get to choose your shift. You don't ask for the weekends off. When your child is sick or hurt or throwing up, they never call for dad, do they?

They know we're just going to throw up with him if we see it. They call for mom. Once you are a mom, you will never, ever not be a mom.

It is for life. I've heard this phrase, and maybe you can identify with it. It's true. Moms know it best. The days are long, but the years are short. The days are long, aren't they?

Especially those of you with little kids. You've learned how to take a nap standing up. It's amazing. You've learned to wear baby lotion and baby powder as if they are your newest perfumes. In fact, you don't wear perfume anymore because those other smells just sort of overpower everything else. You put off buying new clothes for that car seat that morphs into a stroller, that morphs into a high chair, that morphs into a bunk bed.

It's amazing what they can do now. We didn't have that when our kids were little. You've learned how to awaken, not by an alarm clock. You haven't used that now for some time, but you are awakened by that monitor, and you hear every little whimper. You have learned to never leave home without Cheerios. Isn't that a great invention?

Worth its weight in gold. The days are long, and the nights are too at times, but the years are short. Before you know it, you're standing at an ironing board, not over a pile of little jeans and ruffled dresses and tiny flannel shirts, but a graduation gown, a tuxedo shirt for a wedding.

The days were long, but the years were short. I wonder what your mom taught you. If you have or had a godly mom, or maybe you're fortunate to be married to one, you can understand the truth of these attributes, as I thought about it this week. A godly mother teaches more lessons on character than she ever will on fashion. A godly mother relates the activities of a child's life to the Word of God more than the latest magazine or talk show hostess. A godly mother will challenge you to pursue the approval and pleasure of God over and above the approval of man and the pleasures of life. She is more interested in teaching you that the greatest treasures are not treasures of earth, but treasures of eternity.

I have wondered, what did your mom teach you? In a book by Eugene Peterson, subtitled Growing Up With Your Teenager, he writes these rather interesting words, and I quote him, a search of scripture turns up one rather surprising truth. There are no exemplary families in the Bible. Not one single nuclear family is provided or portrayed in scripture in such a way so as to evoke admiration in us. There are many family stories.

There is considerable reference to family life, and there is sound counsel to guide the growth of families, but not one single model family for any of us to look up to in either awe or envy. Maybe that's why God left it out. Adam and Eve, he goes on to write, are no sooner out of the garden than their children get in a fight. The sons of Noah are forced to devise a strategy to hide their father's drunken shame.

Jacob and Esau are bitter rivals and sow seeds of discord that have borne centuries of bitter harvest. David is a man after God's own heart and Israel's greatest king, but he cannot manage his own household. As I thought about it, it struck me, and it is, I think, fascinating to consider that one of the clearest examples of a New Testament godly heritage actually takes you into a mixed and broken home with a single mom where one of the church's greatest leaders is reared. This godly young man raised in a rather unlikely setting is introduced to us in several of Paul's letters, but he first appears in the book of Acts.

Would you turn there? His name is Timothy and his family background is sketchy, but we have been given words, a few of them that speak volumes. Turn to Acts chapter 16. As you're turning, Paul is on his second missionary journey. He's headed to this Galatian region, cities like Derbe and Lystra, Thyatira, Troas.

He has had great fruit in his first missionary journey, and now he's going back to dig even further into the lives of people and see their roots take hold even further. Look at verse 1 in Acts 16, and he came also to Derbe and to Lystra, and behold, a certain disciple was there named Timothy, the son of a Jewish woman who was a believer, but his father was a Greek, and he was well spoken of by all the brethren. Now, most believe that Timothy, when this text is written of him, was somewhere between the ages of 18 and 22. We're not told when Timothy became a believer, but if you piece together the clues, it seems that Timothy's grandmother, Lois, and Timothy's mother, Eunice, became believers during Paul's earlier visit during his first missionary journey. During that first visit, Paul had performed some amazing miracles by the power of God to validate the message of the apostles, but the mob, who at one point wanted to worship him, but when he refused, they eventually turned angry and took he and Barnabas, who would refuse the worship they wanted to give him, naming him Zeus, took them out of the city and stoned Paul. They believe they stoned him to death. The disciples gathered around Paul, who lay on that road outside the city, beaten, bruised, bleeding, they all believed dead, but he arose, an interesting term which has led many scholars to believe he was literally raised from the dead, but he rose up and he went back into the city and preached. Now, if I were Paul and that city had just taken me outside and stoned me to death, I would not get up and go back.

I would say, God wants me to minister somewhere else, but he went back and preached, and the text tells us earlier in the book of Acts that many people were brought to faith in Jesus Christ. Two of those converts were two Jewish women, Lois and Eunice. Now, before we go any further, I want to make some observations.

In fact, fairly quickly, I want to give you six of them that we can glean from this story of Lois and Eunice and Timothy. Number one, an earlier failure as a wife and mother does not eradicate the potential for future success. Eunice had no doubt earlier broken her mother's heart by marrying outside the law, marrying a Gentile, a Gentile unbeliever. Timothy was the son of a mixed marriage. Now, in this culture, a strict Jew would refuse to accept their marriage. If a Jewish man's daughter married a Gentile, they would treat her as if she had died to the family. In fact, the Orthodox Jews in Paul's day would actually carry out a funeral, symbolizing the loss and grief they felt, the loss of their daughter to the family and the loss of their daughter to their world.

We have no idea of the grief that Lois had endured, but I'm sure it was deep. We have no record of their detailed story but twice Luke writes in this text of their home. He says in verse one that Timothy's father was a Greek, a clear indication that he was not only a Gentile but a Gentile unbeliever. Everyone knew, verse three tells us that Timothy's father was a Greek as if to again emphasize the fact that everybody knew Eunice was a believer and a follower of Jesus Christ and everybody knew that his father was a Greek, an unbeliever. Now, we're not told when and why but if you put the clues together further, we know that Eunice heard the gospel message brought by Paul. But even before that, what's insightful to understand is that Eunice had returned to the Old Testament scriptures and had begun devouring them and obeying them and teaching them from what Paul will write in 2 Timothy.

We'll turn there in a moment. Eunice had returned to the faith of her forefathers before or around the same time she bore this little boy, Timothy. Paul will write to Timothy that he was taught the scriptures from his earliest childhood days. He came to faith when he was 18 or 19 but before then, he was taught to revere the scriptures. Evidently, the woman who had walked away from the Word of God came back and it became a part of her life. An earlier failure as a wife and mother does not eradicate the potential for future success. I think it is illuminating, ladies and gentlemen, that when she had her son, she named him Timothy, which means honoring God.

As if to say, I didn't honor him when I became a bride but I want to honor God now that I'm a mother. And this was sort of her testimony. Certainly, she hoped that this boy would grow up to honor God but this was her testimony to her world that I am now honoring God with my life. I wish we were given more about those early years. There's nothing though quite like the cry of a newborn that sends many a man and a woman back to God.

Is there? Eunice said, in effect, this son will be named to reflect the condition of my heart. I want to honor God. To this day, we name our children. Many times, we give them names that bear meanings that we hope they will grow into, don't we?

Beyond the fact that it might rhyme with our last name or it might sound good or it's named after grandpa or our favorite uncle or whatever, we know the meanings of those names and often wish and hope and pray they grow up to reflect them. Observation number two, the absence of a godly father does not forfeit the potential of godly children. Paul would write to the wives of unbelieving husbands in Corinth not to abandon their husbands and start over now that they've come to faith in Christ.

But to provide in that home a sanctifying influence, a holy influence, a high calling for those women in difficult arenas. Here in Acts 16, young Timothy is 18 years of age, perhaps that young, has distinguished himself already as a pure and godly young man dedicated to the truth of Scripture. While his father was a Greek, that meant his father would have stayed home on Sunday reading the newspaper, right? While Eunice and Timothy went to the synagogue, later the church, his father would never have any advice for Timothy that would have any kind of spiritual encouragement.

They could talk about the weather, they could talk about the coming Olympic Games, they could talk about the race in the Roman Senate, but that would be about it. But the absence of a godly father did not forfeit the potential of a godly son. The text in Acts implies that Timothy's father was no longer around.

The use of the verb was, some believe it was a divorce, others believe it was death, we're not told. But either way, Timothy grew up without a father to help him develop his faith in God. Ladies and gentlemen, the lack of a father's spiritual influence in the home does not automatically forfeit spiritual insight in the children.

Timothy would grow up in many ways to take the mantle of Paul in leading the church. Which leads me to my third observation and it is this, the dedication of a godly mother can overcome enormous disadvantages in raising her children. Now, don't misunderstand what a blessing it is in the home where there is spiritual leadership from a father. In fact, on Father's Day, I hope to bring a message on a man that's often overlooked in the Old Testament who provided a good example and we're only told just a phrase of his life.

It is the model that God intended for a man to be a shepherd and husband who's following after God. But I speak today to mothers. Many of you may be single, many of you divorced, perhaps some who are now grandmothers, some empty nesters, some widowed.

I read again this week that one out of every three children, in fact it's nearly two out of three now, will be born in the United States who will not be raised by both of their biological parents, their mother and their father. Some of you, moms, walked away from the God of Abraham, didn't you? And you have a testimony of rebellion and now that you're a mother, you've repented and you've returned to walk with God and you're wondering, did that somehow forfeit the future? Did that void the potential? Take it from a woman named Eunice. It did not.

It did not. Yes, you will have great challenges but the potential is there. What you have here in this text is the dedication of a woman who battled back, a woman who overcame enormous disadvantages to raise her son to follow after God. I hesitate to tell personal stories and I won't mention any names but I have had the privilege of welcoming into our fellowship many who've come from broken homes and who are now raising a godly lineage, those who are beginning the heritage.

It's always exciting to me to see those who begin it. I welcomed one young mother into our fellowship whose life has been totally upended. The mother of young children not long ago, her husband admitted his homosexual lifestyle to her and then walked away. What compounded her grief was that he had been involved with none other than her own father, which was a surprise to everyone. In one conversation, she was robbed of both her husband and her father.

To make it even worse, both were involved in ministry. She came here. She slipped into a seat, perhaps near you, finding sense for her life and hope for her heart. I'm so glad that God led her here to sing next to you, to put her children into the classroom where your children are, to walk past you in the hallway.

I wonder if you said hello. She wrote me a letter not too long ago that said, I'm grateful to have found Colonial. I believe that I can trust you. I am praying for you to stay true to Christ. I immediately set that letter down and prayed that God would enable all of us to keep that woman's trust. Like Eunice, by the grace of God, she is overcoming great challenges by raising children who will walk after her example, her testimony, her commitment to her Lord and her savior, Jesus Christ. And for all of you who are doing the same, take hope in a woman named Eunice who did the same.

Another observation from this text is this, the benefit of an older believer in supporting parents cannot be underestimated. Turn over quickly to 2 Timothy chapter one, 2 Timothy chapter one. Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus, by the will of God, according to the promise of life in Christ Jesus, to Timothy, my beloved son.

I love that. Imagine what that choice of words meant to Timothy. Paul could have easily called him my fellow worker, my Christian comrade, my disciple, even my beloved brother. No, he said, my beloved son.

How that marked him. Imagine if Paul called your son, my beloved son, in a way he has. Imagine if your son didn't have a Christian father. What a joy to the heart of Eunice to see her son and Lois, her grandson, adopted by the apostle Paul. Imagine the value of that godly Christian pouring his time and energy into that boy. What a wonderful benefit it is to godly parents who understand that raising a child to walk after God is going to require not just a mom or a dad or a mom and a dad or a grandfather or a grandmother, but other godly people who care, who pour like Paul into the life of that boy. It is a prayer that should be yours.

It has been my wife's and mine. In chapter three, Paul writes, you continue in the things you've learned, verse 14, and become convinced of knowing from whom you've learned them. Obviously, Paul would be part of that picture, but he's speaking also to his mother and his grandmother because of what he says. How that from childhood you've known the sacred writings, which are able to give you the wisdom that leads to salvation through faith, which is in Christ Jesus. You put it all together and discover that Timothy was a godly young man impacted and shaped by a godly mother and grandmother and a man twice his age who poured his life, who poured his letters into Timothy's heart.

Let me give you another one quickly. Number five, even if an unbelieving father might seize every opportunity to deride Christianity, the godly mother must seize every opportunity to defend and define and declare the truths of Christianity. I know that's a long one.

Let me say it again. Even if an unbelieving father might seize every opportunity to deride Christianity, the godly mother must seize every opportunity to defend and define and declare the truths of Christianity. Carefully? Absolutely. Respectfully?

Yes. But let your children know as you tuck them into bed at night, maybe after praying with them or reading a little Bible story, you whisper in their ear, Jesus loves you. We sang it earlier.

None of us ever forgot it. More than likely our mothers taught us how to sing it. When you bow your head at the table and lead them in the prayer of thanksgiving, or when you answer your child's questions about why doesn't daddy come to church with us, or why doesn't daddy love God?

Your answer is filled with deference and as much respect as possible, but then you lead your children to pray for their dad, to pray for the condition of his soul. Timothy's father was an unbelieving Greek, but carefully, it seems rather openly, perhaps with his own permission, Timothy was taught the scriptures. A Greek scholar named Lenski believed that this phrase in 2 Timothy 3.15, from childhood you have known the sacred writings, that he believed that that was an idiomatic way of saying that Timothy was taught the letters of the alphabet by reading the scriptures. Like Spurgeon, the great British pastor of the 19th century, was sent to live with his grandparents at age two.

We're not sure it was probably some sort of economic hardship. He had godly parents, but he was sent to live with his grandparents. And when he returned at age six to begin his education, he could already read because his grandfather and grandmother taught him to read by exposing him to the scriptures. He spoke of his godly father's influence, but he actually spoke of his mother's awesome influence in his life. Evidently, she would gather the children on Sunday evening around the table for scripture reading and prayer. Spurgeon said she would pray this, and he quotes, now Lord, his mother would pray, if my children go on in their sins, it will not be from ignorance that they perish. My soul will bear witness against them at the day of judgment if they lay not hold of Christ.

Imagine that. It was his mother that helped in many ways to define and deliver, declare the truth of the gospel. And this was the testimony of Eunice. Paul says, I know of your mother's faith, and he uses the word sincere. The Greek word means the opposite of hypocrisy. I know she's a genuine follower of God, Timothy.

Follow her example and the faith of your grandmother. Which leads me to say, the sixth observation is this, when it comes to teaching your children the truth of scripture, it is never too early to start. Maybe you're tempted to say, but I am inadequate. You'd be right. Maybe you're sitting there and you would say, Stephen, you don't know my background.

I don't. But God did. When he allowed you to bring into this world an immortal soul, he did. And he gave you that gift.

Eunice, for one, would never imagine 2,000 years later we'd be sitting around talking about her. She probably would never have imagined that her son would take the mantle of Paul, but that's how God displays his amazing grace. He uses clay pots like you and me to pour into the lives of others his grace. The fact that you are the one pouring is a testimony of the grace of God, and you know it better than anybody else. I'm here to say, pour away.

Pour away with everything you have. Lisa Morgan is the president of Mops International. She writes, I am probably the least likely person to head a mothering organization that impacts thousands of mothers' lives for the gospel. I grew up in a broken home. My parents were divorced when I was five. My older sister, younger brother, and I were raised by my alcoholic mother. While my mother meant well, most of my memories are of my mothering her rather than her mothering me. Alcohol altered her love. I remember her weaving down the hall of our ranch home in Houston, Texas, a glass of scotch in hand.

I would wake her at seven each morning to try to get her off to work. Lisa writes, 10 years ago, when I was asked to consider leading Mops International, a vital ministry that nurtures mothers, I went straight to my knees. How could God use me who had never been mothered to nurture other mothers? The answer came, my grace is sufficient for you, for my power is perfected in your weakness. God took my deficits, she wrote, and made them my offering to Him.

Can I ask you a question? What did your mother teach you? What are you teaching your children? That would be a lesson that I think would summarize them all best, that God's grace is sufficient. Let your children learn to respond if they are asked, what did their mother teach them?

This is what my mother taught me. The grace of God is sufficient. He poured it into my life, and I am pouring it into yours. This lesson would serve Timothy well. He would live by it.

He would lean heavily upon it. The grace of God was sufficient, and it would be that lesson that would take him through his ministry and the challenges of his life, one day at a time. This lesson serves as a powerful reminder of the important and significant influence a godly mother has. If you're a mom, I hope this time in God's Word has encouraged and challenged you. If you'd like to share this lesson with others and give them an opportunity to hear it, we've posted it to our website, wisdomonline.org, and you can call us for information. Our number is 866-48-BIBLE. Well, to all of you mothers, I wish you a very happy Mother's Day and I hope that you'll join us again next time for more Wisdom for the Heart. You