Mothers Who Make A Difference

MOTHERS WHO MAKE A DIFFERENCE

Genesis 3:20 & Other Passages

INTRODUCTION … You Know You are A Mom When (humormatters.com/holidays/mothersday.htm#)

Your feet stick to the kitchen floor.....and you don’t care.

When the kids are fighting, you threaten to lock them in a room together and not let them out until someone’s bleeding.

You can’t find your cordless phone, so you ask a friend to call you, and you run around the house madly, following the sound until you locate the phone downstairs in the laundry basket.

Your idea of a good day is making it through without a child leaking bodily fluids on you.

Your baby’s pacifier falls on the floor and you give it back to her, after you suck the dirt off of it because you’re too busy to wash it off.

Your kids make jokes about farting, burping, pooping, etc. and you think it’s funny.

You’re so desperate for adult conversation that you spill your guts to the telemarketer that calls and HE hangs up on YOU!

Spit is your number one cleaning agent.

In your bathroom there is toothpaste on the light fixtures, water all over the floor, a dog drinking out of the toilet

You automatically double-knot everything you tie.

You can never go to the bathroom alone without someone screaming outside the door.

You actually start to like the smell of strained carrots mixed with applesauce.

You weep through the scene in Dumbo when his mom is taken away, not to mention what Bambi does to you.

You spend a half hour searching for your sunglasses only to have your teenager say, "Mom, why don’t you wear the ones you pushed up on your head?"

You are out for a nice romantic meal with your husband, enjoying some real adult conversation, when suddenly you realize that you’ve reached over and started to cut up his steak!

Today is of course Mother’s Day and it is a day to honor those women in our lives who have made an eternal difference. Maybe it was the woman who gave birth to you, but it also may be an aunt, a sister, or another dear woman who has changed your life for the better.

INTRODUCTION #2… Genesis 3:20

Eve was the mother of all living people who have been and who will be. Her name, “Eve,” means “living.” She was the first mother and the first woman to ever give birth to a child.

I wonder if she knew what to expect when it came time for Cain to be born?

I wonder if she was afraid of motherhood… no one had ever done it before?!

I wonder if she knew what an important and influential job being a mother is?

I wonder if laundry day or Adam’s forgetfulness of their anniversary or other issues bothered her?

Eve had three sons mentioned by name in Scripture: Cain, Abel and Seth. Genesis 5:4 tells us that they had many sons and daughters in their life together, but we focus on these three boys. Cain murdered Abel. Eve is not only the first mother, but also the first mother to lose a child in death. Really, Adam and Eve lost two sons because the other left and wandered the lands. It was through the line of Seth that people began to “call upon the name of the Lord” (Genesis 4:25-26).

Since the time of Eve, it has fallen to mothers to raise their children for the Lord. Our mothers bring us into the world. They nurture us. They provide for us. They raised us up. They teach us. They discipline us. Mother’s have a remarkable ability to change the world through their children. There are other mothers in the Bible that teach us about the influence that mothers have on all of us.

I. THE PROTECTIVE MOTHER: JOCHEBED in EXODUS 2:1-4

READ EXODUS 2:1-4

Now a man of the house of Levi married a Levite woman, 2 and she became pregnant and gave birth to a son. When she saw that he was a fine child, she hid him for three months. 3 But when she could hide him no longer, she got a papyrus basket for him and coated it with tar and pitch. Then she placed the child in it and put it among the reeds along the bank of the Nile. 4 His sister stood at a distance to see what would happen to him.

Moses’ mother, who we find out later is named Jochebed, took great risks to protect her son. Unfortunately, this woman was a slave among a very brutal people. The plan set in place in Exodus 1 was to control the Hebrew people though controlling the male population. The Hebrew people would soon be a stagnate race and Egypt would have total absolute control over them. The problem for the Pharaoh (Exodus 1: 17-22) is that the midwives did not obey his command and allowed boys to live and the nation of Israel grew strong in spirit and in number… which was the fear of Egypt. Egyptian cruelty did not end, but only continued.