Kimm Crandall » Family Children Home Heart Gospel

Striving to be the “Best Mom Ever” will leave you feeling exhausted and unworthy. Thankfully, that’s not your calling as a mom.

Mother’s Day is the day my kids will smother me with the cards and crafts they have made that read “#1 MOM” or “Mom of the Year.” And while they do this, I will want to sit them down and talk to them about how we should be honest and how we shouldn’t lead others to believe they are something they are not.

That sounds ridiculous as I write this, and while I obviously don’t do that, I can’t help but think it while I smile and enjoy the extra hugs and attention.

Not the #1 Mom

Now, I know that I am a “good” mom. I mean, my kids are clothed, schooled, and fed; I really could be doing much worse. In fact, my eldest told me yesterday that she has never experienced hunger the way that people in books describe it, and she came to the conclusion that she has never actually been hungry. You can be sure that I gave myself a big, self-righteous pat on the back for that one. But “Best Mom Ever?” I think not.

I’m not the “Best Mom Ever” when my harsh words and anger cut through the morning air announcing, “Nobody ever listens to me!” loud enough to scare the chickens in their coop. I’m not the “#1 Mom” when I tell my kids to use their words to build one another up only to tear them down with my own words when they start fighting.

“Best Mom Ever?” I think not.

I’m not the “Mom of the Year” when I care more about how my daughter’s bangs are hanging in her face while she is talking to me than about what she’s trying to tell me from her heart.

I even fail to be the “Best Mom Ever” when I spend all morning making special Star Wars-shaped pancakes, snuggling with my kids on the couch instead of being on Facebook, or driving them and their classmates on field trips with my purse locked and loaded with healthy snacks for everyone to share.

You’re not the “Best Mom Ever”

Not one of us is the mom we need to be to our children. You and I both know that we have failed miserably. All you have to do is browse Pinterest, Facebook or mommy blogs and you will soon feel that anxiety of needing to do more for your kids rising up within you.

It doesn’t take much more than looking at someone else’s family picture, with nicely dressed children sitting and smiling all at the same time, for us to feel as if we are doing something wrong.

Not one of us is the mom we need to be to our children.

You see, this thing called Motherhood is not about us. It’s not about being the “Best Mom Ever.”

Motherhood is not about loving our children perfectly; it’s about needing a Savior, because we fail to do just that.

Jesus died for moms

Now that I’ve given you the bad news and made the (burnt) toast from your Mother’s Day breakfast in bed drier than dirt, let me give you the good news.

Romans 3:23–24 gives mothers the good news that we so desperately need to hear: “For all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God, and are justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus.”

Motherhood is not about loving our children perfectly; it’s about needing a Savior.

We have all failed, but because of his great love for us, God has given us the gift of his righteousness.

In other words, Christ died for moms!

My friends, let’s stop living as if this truth were not a reality. If anyone needs to know that their calling is not about perfection, it is mothers. Motherhood is messy. It is a beautiful, gnarly, exciting, and exhausting calling. And if we make it about us, condemnation or pride will be hiding around every corner.

Love for the messy

Jesus knew what it was to care for others. He knew the patience needed to deal with the immaturity of those who didn’t understand. His very ministry was to the messy, the broken, and the demon-possessed maniacs our children all-too-often emulate.

He did this all for us. Yes, for you and for me. Every act of kindness that wasn’t deserved, every extension of grace, and every patient tone in his voice was done in our place. Every single one! With you and me in mind he perfectly and flawlessly cared for those around him when he could have so easily thrown in the towel. Never did he show a twinge of bitterness, knowing that this was the Father’s will for him and exactly what we needed as mothers. Do you see the love there?

If anyone needs to know that their calling is not about perfection, it is mothers.

We needed this love. We needed the blood of Christ to wipe our “bad mom” slate clean. But a clean slate would not be good enough, would it? If we simply had a clean slate set before us every day, our lives would consist of trying to rewrite it with the words “Best Mom Ever.”

You don’t have a clean slate

But thank God that he didn’t leave the slate clean for moms. No, he wrote across it with permanent marker the title that was meant for him: “My beloved, with whom I am well pleased.” Our record today remains as perfect, beloved God pleasers—on the good days as well as the bad.

Do you believe this, my friends? Do you believe that God has pursued you with a furious longing since the beginning of time? Do you believe that he loved you so much that he chose to die for you? Do you believe that his pursuit of you, his beloved, continues every minute of the day, and that he won’t ever give up on you?

Thank God that he didn’t leave the slate clean for moms.

No matter how much you make a mess of motherhood, no matter how much you fall into the sin of thinking you are a better mom than others, God loves you just as much in your good moments as well as your bad.

This is our God. This is motherhood. We are his beloved! Let’s do the hard work of believing that we are just that.

And if I can leave you with one thought on this Mother’s Day let it be this: Christ loves mothers as the messes that they are, not as the cleaned up mothers that they think they should be. Not one of us is as she should be. This is great news!

 

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