Written by Pastor Jack Wellman“I don’t believe there are devils enough in hell to pull a boy out of the arms of a godly mother.”
– Billy Sunday
Billy Sunday Mother Quote Commentary
As Christians, we are very familiar with the characterization of God as a loving Father. From Genesis to Revelation, we are told that God is a loving Father. However, in certain parts of the Bible God describes his love in terms of the love of a mother. God’s love is all encompassing. Just as the love of a mother for her child knows no bounds, God’s love for us know no bounds. Just as there have been many cases in our time and throughout history where mothers would lay down their lives just so their children can survive, God laid down his own life-in the person of God the Son-so we can get a chance to live again in reconciliation with Him. That’s how much God loves us.
The sustenance of a mother
Just as a child gets its sustenance from its mother, we should get our daily sustenance from God. By reading his Word and communing with him daily through prayer, we can let his grace form the source of our power. When we put him in the center of our lives, God’s sustenance, like that of a mother, not only gives us the energy to move forward in life, it also gives us the nutrition we need to grow.
The gentle love of a mother
Mothers are known to be the ‘gentle’ parent when compared to the stern and often hard and easy-to-misunderstand discipline of our fathers. God actually shows both sides. While we are all familiar with the Old Testament face of God the Father, we also know that God gives us so many chances and is so patient. In many cases, he gives us so many chances before we reap the fruit of what we’ve sown. Put it this way, if God wasn’t so patient, faithful, and ever waiting for us to repent, He has every right to repay us for our mistakes almost instantly. Instead, it often takes a long time for us to get what we deserve. Instead, he patiently waits as his grace works on us to call us to lives of repentance and obedience. These aspects are very much like that of the ever gentle and kind mother who gently reminds us to do what’s right and get on the right road.
God’s commandments are rooted in a parent’s love
We might think that God’s law is harsh and hard. However, if we look at the bedrock of the law, we realize that it is rooted in love. God commands us to live a proper life because He knows this is the way to a fulfilling, peaceful, and satisfying life. We only need to break his commands to see the pain, disappointment, emptiness, and other evils he is trying to shield us through his law.
