When You don’t Feel Like being a Mother

The birthrate in our church is rising and that means I get asked to speak at baby showers a lot more often.  In the past week and a half I spoke at two!  Below are a few pictures from our latest baby shower.  This is Alona’s second and this time it’s a girl!

I encouraged the women to love their children regardless of how they may feel or what their child may do.  In my experience as a mother of five I know this is not always the easiest thing to do.

Babies are cute and it’s easy to love that little pudgy slobbering face. In fact almost everything they do in the first 4 months of life evokes smiles and “oohs” and “aahs”.  Unfortunately the cute phase is temporary but mothering is for a life time!  It didn’t take me long after my first child to realize that sometimes I need to make a conscious choice to love and mother my child.

The truth is it takes less than a year for those innocent darlings to learn to defy their parents and  throw tantrums that turn every head in the mall our direction!  So what do we do when our child no longer evokes tender feelings of love and  joy?   It is vital that we remember God’s love for us.  He didn’t love us because we were cute or cuddly rather he loved us in our sin and rebellion!  (Romans 5:8)

Our relationship with our children is a picture of our relationship with God.  The wonderful thing is that God never stops loving us despite repeated mistakes on our part. As a result we grow and we also learn to love God.  There are many examples in the Old and New Testament of how God patiently loved His children.  At times He gently warned them and at times He punished them but He never stopped loving them.

Question: What helps you get through when you don’t feel like being a mother?