Pack the Lunchbox

Let all that you do be done in love. 1 Corinthians 16:14

This week in honor of mother’s Day, we have been talking about the legacy mothers leave their children.  Leaving a legacy is a little like packing their lunch – for life!

Pack the Lunchbox Faithfully

Mothering is not a part-time job.  It is an on-going, long term responsibility that changes as the child changes, but never ends.  We never know when a child is really learning.  We have to go on faithfully.

• Our lives are instructional... whether we intend for them to be or not.
• Our lives are influential... Our actions and words even when it seems they are not hearing one word we are saying.
• Our lives are inspirational... The example of faithfulness we leave will inspire the practice of faithfulness in their lives.  Character is caught, not taught! 

We must, as mothers, keep consistency in our attitude and countenance.  We are the ones who set the tone of the home, the ones who become infectious with our attitudes and actions.

Pack the Lunchbox Discerningly

Just as a mother bears a child during pregnancy, and just as a mother feeds and cares for a child during infancy, so mothers also play an ongoing role in the lives of their children, whether they are adolescents, teenagers, young adults, or even adults with children of their own.  

While the role of mothers may change and develop as the child ages, the love, care, nurture, and encouragement a mother gives should never cease.  A mother sees not only what her children are becoming, but what she wants them to become.  Be perceptive to the changes as they grow.  What they need from you changes as they grow.  Don’t keep the child a baby.  Let the child grow up even though it is bittersweet – joy mixed with sorrow.

Pack the Lunchbox Lovingly

How does love strengthen a mother’s body when she is weary from work? How does love create patience and kindness when her nerves are frayed to splitting?  How does love keep her from becoming selfish, rude, temperamental, bitter, or critical?  How does love not focus on the wrong but celebrate the smallest victories? How does a mother handle all of the emotions and duties of her task without losing her cool or her mind?  It is by bathing everything she does in love.  The key is that 

Love Understands.

Elisa Morgan and Carol Kuykendall in their book What Every Child Needs a child has and how they can be met in the language of love provides us with Nine Basic Love Needs:

1.             Security: a hold-me-close love

2.             Affirmation: a crazy-about-me love

3.             Belonging: a fit-me-into-the-family love

4.             Discipline: a give-me-limits love

5.             Guidance: a show-me and tell-me love

6.             Respect: a let-me-be love

7.             Play: a play-with-me love

8.             Independence: a let-me-grow-up love

9.             Hope: a give-me-tomorrow-today love

A mother’s love for her child is tenacious.  It can be rejected, but it cannot be stopped.  Don't you know that a mother's love does not stop loving just because her love is not returned? Her love is not conditioned by response. Her love just is! Period.  It is the most powerful thing on earth next to the love of God.  You see, in this image of a loving mother, we have a mirror for our relationship with God.  On the one hand, there are God’s passionate efforts to protect and save us. And on the other, there is our persistent rebellion to that power, and opposition to that grace, as we seek to go our own ways in life.  Like a mother, Jesus' love is so great that his all-consuming passion is to sweep us up into his protective arms.  Love your children with the love of Jesus so they will know this all-encompassing grace, compassion, and love.

Scripture to Claim:
…with all humility and gentleness, with patience, bearing with one another in love… Ephesians 4:2