Maternal instinct is something that mothers naturally listen to. That voice inside a mother that warns her when something is wrong despite when others tell her otherwise, the gut feeling she needs to protect; this is God’s gift to mothers. It is something that is so profound and amazing and should never, ever be ignored.
God does care for His children and does not just fathers us but also mothers us. One of the common images of God is Him as a mother bird sheltering her children under her wings. The bible says in Ruth 2:12 “May you be richly rewarded by the LORD, the God of Israel, under whose wings you have come to take refuge.” In the book of Psalms 17:8, the bible says…“Keep me as the apple of your eye; hide me in the shadow of your wings.” Also Psalms 57:1 says “I will take refuge in the shadow of your wings until the disaster has passed.” And Psalms 91:4 says “He will cover you with his feathers, and under his wings you will find refuge”. Mothers are designed by God to keep their children safe, nurture and care for them within their human power and to be spiritually alert concerning their children. As a mother (both Biological and spiritual), God has given you the grace to nurture and care for your children, you need to tap into that grace.
As mothers, God expect us to teach our children, God does not expect us to be selfish; thinking of ourselves alone, we have responsibility and we are engraced to carry out this assignment. In Hosea 11:3-4, we see an example of God as a mother, “Yet it was I who taught Ephraim to walk, I who took them up in my arms; but they did not know that I healed them. I led them with cords of human kindness, with bands of love. I was to them like those who lift infants to their cheeks. I bent down to them and fed them.”
Once mothers bring children into the world, they work to preserve and save their children from harm and death. Israel’s cry to God, possibly recorded while in its Babylonian exile, offers imagery of how God as a mother preserves God’s child, Israel. In Isaiah 49:13-15, God responds to the people’s cry by reassuring them with the question, “Can a woman forget her nursing child, or show no compassion for the child of her womb?”
Mothers have a unique and crucial role in the lives of their children, Motherhood is not chore or unpleasant task. Mothers play an ongoing role in the lives of their children, whether they are adolescents, teenagers, young adults or adults with children of their own. While the role of motherhood must change and develop, the love, nurture, care and encouragement a mother gives should never cease.
If you are a mother and you are struggling on how to mother your children, I want to encourage you to change your focus to God, tap into the grace that He has given unto you as a mother and He will surely help you.
This is a call to mothers to awake and let’s use our maternal instinct and the grace that God has given to us as mothers, let’s raise a greater generation of children who will stand for God.