Good Monday morning, all of you! I had the privilege of serving my church yesterday on Mother’s Day and, after delivering the message, read this silly thing at the end on behalf of moms who resonated. This is not artwork here, folks. I jotted it down in a few minutes while getting my message ready. A mom who came to our church yesterday just asked me if I’d share it with her so I thought I might as well go ahead and share it with any of you who want it. By the way, we applied mothering pretty broadly yesterday in the message I gave. If you have travailed in some fairly serious pain and personal sacrifice to help bring forth some life in somebody, Girlfriend, you have mothered. Listen, if the Apostle Paul could see himself as having labored with the anguish of childbearing (Galatians 4:19) and say he and Timothy and Silvanus had cared for the Thessalonians with the gentleness of a nursing mother caring for her children (1 Thess 2:7), I think you are pretty safe to do the same, particularly if you have labored to see Christ made obvious in someone you care deeply about.
I love you guys. Be encouraged in Jesus today.
Okay. Here’s what I read at the end before prayer:
I once was young when so were you
A newborn then so quick turned two.
You toddled, cackled, climbed and cried
You threw some tantrums. So did I.
You went to school and I was glad.
By half past noon I’d gotten sad
You’d walk in the door, hey what’s to eat?
I fought your phone till time to sleep
You yelled hey mom! a trillion times
Till I would nearly lose my mind
I drove you fifty billion miles
You and every neighbor’s child.
Then one day you had outgrown me
Had your own car and your own key.
And off you went, you’re all grown up
Not my snuggly baby long enough
And now when I could take a nap
I want you back, right in my lap
Did you know I loved you so
Would have given you my life and soul?
Got it wrong too many times
But I was yours and you were mine
So proud of you, you’re doing well
Life here on earth is hard as…hades
Strollers, trikes and bikes, all past
The days went slow, the years went fast
With you all grown this might seem strange
But some things time just cannot change
When life seems mean, not worth the bother
I’ll feed you, hug you, fight for you.
I’m still your mother.
I appreciate your sharing this. I am a mom of four, now grown, and having babies of their own. I sent it to the two who are mommies….and the one is hanving her second. I felt all of this. Now, being a Grammie, I can hold ones in my lap again, and gave the same silly wishes of keeping them little…full well it’s fun the Grace of God that they grow up. Prayerfully in Him. I have new strange duties. I love these new duties of spiiling, listening ..be the.. Spending more time…at times it seems than I had with their parents. Sadness wants to flood me, and I have to cling to God, say I’m sorry,,,and do what I feel is being a better grammie, than I was a mommy. My kids would say I was super good at being their mom, but we all know where we seemed to have failed. I’m grateful to you for sharing. It puts new sparks in my heart, for my new job. Keeps me hunble, and now able to share these things only we as having gone through it can really know. Their journies have just begun…and I’m thanful that I’m getting to go through it with them for as long as the good Lord sees fit.
Bless you Beth. I know you know all about it. You bring me strength.
In Christ love,
Rebecca
Crying at work!!! Thanks, Ms. Beth. You have a way with words.
Thank u for that ,very true.
Oh Beth .. what fun and yet so true words you have penned .. while we are similar in age .. I’m currently in week 8 of Believing God .. and feel you have been a spiritual mother/sister/mentor .. I”m so excited at the idea of a Trainers conference for those who do your new bible study … trainer/leader/mentor/mother .. your love for “your daughters” the Lord has entrusted to you … I consider myself counted
oh, tears!! so very true. the bitter and the sweet!
Oh Beth, so very true. It all goes so fast. Especially loved your line “You threw some tantrums. So did I.” 🙂
Beautiful words and oh so true, both for my handsome 36 year old son and my sweet daughter, forever 14 in heaven.
May God bless you my sweet Sister.
No tears in Heaven. Only love.
Hugs & love,
His daughter, Jodee
So very true … always a mom.
Not silly at all. All us Mother’s feel this way!
Dear Beth,
Thank you for this lovely poem. I read it at work and am holding back tears! My one & only son will be turning 30 this Saturday. My grandson will be graduating from kindergarten in a two weeks.
Oh I love it. Trying not to tear up. You are the best. You speak for us when we cannot find the words to express our thoughts and feelings.
Love you deary Ms. Beth.
Thank you for sharing this and a BIG Happy Mother’s Day! This brought tears to my eyes. I have three kids, ages 10, 7, and 5. It is not lost on me that these days of bedtime stories and prayers, snuggling up to watch movies, and arguments over who gets to sit next to me at the restaurant won’t last forever. I treasure these days. I am so blessed to be a mom.
Beth, thank you for sharing these heart-felt words here. The days go slow, but the years fly by…so true. My boys are now 13 ½ & 12-both almost taller than me. And more protective of me at this stage than I could have imagined! Seeing your love for Jesus makes me want to love Him fervently, too. And seeing your love for your daughters makes me want to invest in my boys passionately. I know it’s imperfect, but somehow, in Jesus, it’s enough!
love,
Audrey
Oh that is so beautiful and touching just give me the want to cry chills. Love it Beth Moore keep doing all you do for our God its so motivating to watch you speak the word. and how you bring to life is awesome.Love Juliet Loza
And you do Miss Beth, Our Spiritual Mama –
You Feed Us, Hug Us, Fight For Us …
We feel it, and We love you and pray for you – for it <3 xoxox
OK, I’m crying. My first born son graduates high school next week & I feel as though I could have written this myself. Thank you for putting down on paper what I feel. I am going to share this with Tyler. I am teary eyed as I am typing this. I am so grateful that God chose me to be a mom to 2 amazing boys. It has not been easy, but I would not change a thing. I am looking forward to witness the plans God has for both my boys. One is graduating & one will be taking driver’s education this summer. Pray for me!
Dear Beth,
Your poem resonated with me on multiple levels.
While motherhood is challenging like nothing else, it is also uniquely, richly rewarding. My three are 7, 9 and 11 and I am already somewhat dreadfully anticipating the time when they will fly from my nest. I try to soak in the moments.
I want you to know that, while my own mother has not been an encouragement or mentor to me during my adult years, you have been. When you speak to women through the camera during your video sessions, you speak to me. You tell me I’m dear like no one else does. You have taught me and encouraged me. Though you don’t know me, I feel I know you. I hope you will be honored to know that I chose my 9 year old daughter’s name, Anne Elizabeth (Annie Beth), in part because of the role you have played in my life.
Love and blessings to you.
So simple and so profound….that’s what I love about you Beth….my sojourner to Heaven just three years ago so I am still very tender..Mothers Day was hard but God is so good…thank you for sharing..
I love you…
So simple and so profound….that’s what I love about you Beth….my mom sojourned to Heaven just three years ago so I am still very tender..Mothers Day was hard but God is so good…thank you for sharing..
I love you…
Beth – This was so sweet! Made me cry a happy tear. I am blessed to be a mom….
Love and hugs,
Adrienne
Love the line “the days went slow, the years went fast”. Wow! So true
Thanks, Beth! So very true!
Just watched your Motherhood TBN program! It was great!
Am loving to watch all of your series and thank you for all that you do to keep us focused on Him and His Word!
Love you and your team so much!!!
Thank you so much for sharing this poem. I’m a new mom with a 9 month old baby girl. As I have all this to look forward to, I’m trying to enjoy every moment even the sleepless ones. May God bless you and yours today!
❤️ This. My sentiments exactly, although I’m still very much in the stage of …”hey mom! A trillion times…”
Love reading this. I have one daughter she lives in LEXINGTON Ky. and I live in Alabama. I don’t get to talk with her often she tells me she don’t like to talk on the phone. I told her I wish she was a baby again I would love to have her back living with me. I get to see her twice a year sometimes 3 times. I rd her just call and I would talk she could listen. God Bless Beth You are a Blessing.
Hi Debbie,
I completely understand how you feel. I have two grown sons, but it’s rare that I ever hear from either of them much less see them. In fact, it’s pretty much down to major holidays… Thanksgiving and Christmas that I get see them, and my oldest son usually comes by on Mother’s Day also.
I really miss them – not hearing their voices or seeing their faces; but I don’t obsess over their safety and security like I used to. I was really bad when they first graduated from High School and left home. They were both so far away with my oldest in the Navy in Washington, D.C., and my youngest in Seminary School in New Orleans. I had a really difficult time adjusting to that empty nest. That nest is real, it’s not imaginary!
I know it’s the evil one trying to get inside my head with his lies so as long as I keep feeding the Spirit in me spending time with God, he’s got no chance. But the minute I get lax, it’s like Beth put it — all hades breaks loose!
Who knows why they are how they are? God does. With that being the case, I knew I was helpless to do anything about it, so I went to the altar at church one Sunday morning and cried out to the LORD. I asked Him to take my sons — take them out of my hands and into His own. I prayed for Him to protect them, to guide them down the path that leads them to be the men He wants them to be. I made a promise that day, right there at that altar, that I was relinquishing my worries over my kids by turning them over into the hands of our Almighty, Loving, Father God.
I pray that God pricks your daughter’s heart tendering it to your love for her. May He be revealed in You as you speak with her, as she sees you and in all your ways so that she will be drawn to you by the love of Christ alive within you. In Jesus’ name, Amen.
Much love to you my Sister!
In Christ – His daughter,
Jodee
Beth of fresh air! how do i keep telling you about your great skills
and thanking you for your poetry.
I tell anyone who will listen!!
from
Su Su ( grandma name) Caldwell
by the way I asked Abeth 2 give you a hug from me. grin
on Sunday.
Posting this poem on our women’s ministry FB page! Love it and you!!!! Thanks for sharing! Happy Mother’s Day Week!!!
Thank you so much for sharing this, Beth! I shared it with my two grown daughters. Hope you all had a blessed Mother’s Day!
Hey Ms. Beth/LP Crew, I pray this finds ya’ll well!! I have a question (random). As an eager beaver aspiring Bible teacher, I’m looking for advice / wisdom on “balancing” Bible studying and family. Because if it was for me, this sista’ will be knee deep (for hours) studying the Word and just hanging with Jesus – BUT, my family doesn’t understand that at times. Would love to hear your feedback.
Sweet poem! Beth, for weeks I have been feeling led to encourage you in your ministry. You have been in my prayers and thoughts and I just want to thank you for being such an influence in my life to stand firm. I cannot imagine how much you get hit with (ie. criticism, grace-less emails and the like), yet you have displayed such faithfulness and tenacity that most of us would only hope to emulate to a small degree and we’d feel successful! Ha! Bless you Sister in Christ, may you experience going from glory to glory in what the Spirit calls you to each day and continue with boldness in the ministry that God has given you. You are a blessing and you just need to hear that a lot so the weariness ministry can sometimes bring will not cast a shadow for longer than a minute! 🙂 Thank you for being faithful.
Thanks Beth. Might be nothing to you but it speaks volumes to many of us. Sharing for sure.
Absolutely wonderful!!!! So so true!!!!
Love this! Love you sweet Mama!
Dear Beth you jotted down such beautiful
Thoughts, but what’s amazing is that you spoke
directly to each of us Mothers, & God Bless those
who are like a Mother to us & have mentored
Children & loved them. Thank you for sharing
Your heart with us. I know you enjoyed celebrating
Mothers~
Beth, speaking of “mothering,” would so love to hear your thoughts on how to navigate vulnerability and truth with consideration for the comfort and expectations of one’s mother.
Sometimes, perhaps shame induced, I feel I have to be who she wants me to be rather than who I have evolved over time to become (authenticity). And the worst part is I feel it is one of the largest obstacles to giving my whole self to the world- this simple, people pleasing of my mother, longing somehow and in some way for her acceptance. I hold back because of it. I’m hoping something along these lines will come up in your 2 Tim study. Love and tenderness toward you!
I love you so! Awesome and true.
Love this Beth! I sent this to all my 3 kids. So fitting! One daughter told me she would never outgrow me. Melt my heart! ❤️ I love your momma’s heart! God bless you!
I wish this were a handwritten letter, but since I can’t seem to find an address, this’ll have to do. My 3rd daughter is going into high school next year, so I dusted off my copy of So Long Insecurities (that I read when daughters number 1 and 2 were in high school) and am re-reading it. She saw me reading it and said she’d like to read it too, so I ordered her the “teen edition.” And since she’s in a growth group with a bunch of girls also going into high school, I thought I’d get the group guide and read the teen version to lead the group come fall.
Now, I’m not trying to brag or anything, but our church has worked very hard and with extreme intentionality to be diverse. And we have made it work in a powerful way, truly. Culturally, physically, educationally, economically, age-ically (can’t think of the correct word at the moment, but you know what I mean…) I can’t tell you how wonderful it feels to worship and grow along side these women who have such varied stories, abilities, disabilities, gifts and styles, etc. So, when I looked through the SLI Teen Edition, I was, to be honest, MAD at the lack of diversity! There were no heavy girls, no abnormally tall girls, no girls with any sort of visible disability (that would certainly give Satan a heyday while he whispers to them that they are not good enough) and a SEVERE lack of ethnic difference. No, Middle Eastern ladies, no Hispanics, no Asians, (well, maybe 1…) so FEW girls of color. ANY color besides white. Granted, this particular topic is something that brought me MAJOR insecurity as a teen so I’m a tad bit sensitive to it, but there was not one girl who didn’t have beautifully aligned teeth! NOT ONE! If their teeth weren’t already perfect, they had braces on (and even then,C’mon! They have GOT to be nearing the orthodontic end of their treatment) to make those smiles perfect. After the first chapter, all I could think of was how I will have to re-write the book for our growth group. As my son’s friend reminds us. All.The.Time. They’re from the ‘hood! Not all, but a good majority of their friend’s parents are working second jobs to get their kids into safer schools, not putting braces on teeth. I guess I am blessed because I was raised in a trailer park, now live in a cozy (that’s my fancy word for tiny) house in the ‘burbs and go to church smack dab in the middle of an area that is, “a sketchy part of town that they just can’t let their daughter go to for church,” or so I’ve heard… I fellowship with a whole bunch of different girls and although the insecurities (and thus the Biblical principles to combat insecurities) are very much the same, I am so disappointed in a Bible study book that filled it’s pages with images of such unattainable bodies, when that’s exactly what the words in the book are fighting against. And even though the words in the book are condemning the practice, I’d bet my boots that there was a whole bunch of photoshopping going on…just saying.
Perhaps this was just an oversight. Maybe once Beth Moore pens a book, the authority to veto photos goes out the window. Potentially this photo shoot took place in a big old, back woods county where they just couldn’t truck in some girls that looked different. I don’t know what happened, but I know it’s not because Beth doesn’t minister to a diverse group of women, because I’ve done her studies with women who are as varied as the colors in a good old quilt. I just wonder why in world I’m going to have to do so much work “doctoring it” so that it doesn’t feed into exactly what it’s trying to help teen girls overcome.
Or is it just me? Could be…
I can’t even begin to explain how much I needed this tonight. God truly does speak through you. You have such a gift. Thank you & God bless!!!
This is so good, Beth. So good, so sweet; taking that trip down memory lane, slipping back into time when my young men were boys. A time when I had a great purpose that I was naturally born for — having and raising my family, two sons. I was over the top apprehensive though about my mothering skills since I didn’t have a Mom for an example — our mother abandoned us Christmas Eve when I was 4 years old.
Without a lot of details, suffice it to say I had a hellish life, for lack of a better description, for much of my young life leaving me pretty bent up both mentally and physically. Even so, in Oct. 1991, I saw love — face to face, pure, unadulterated love staring up at me in the face of my firstborn son. I knew at that moment that I could never do any harm to him and I’d certainly never leave him. We were connected. Connected then, and connected now.
How many of you guys have ever said this to your child(ren), “You may _X_ years old but you’ll always be my baby.” Perhaps only me, but I’ve said it plenty to both of mine!
And they are.
I just love you so much, Beth. My prayer partner introduced me to you many years ago. Though not in person, you still had a profound effect on my spirit. We had your Believing God study at our church back in the early 2000’s, I can’t recall the time frame. I was hooked. That was all it took for me — I’d found a new favorite author, speaker, Sister in Christ… but this time, a kindred spirit. God has ministered to me through you in so many ways so many times over the years and I just want to say “Thank You,” with everything I have in me. You’ve been a lifesaver — I love you.
“Oh that my words were written! Oh that they were inscribed in a book! That with an iron stylus and lead they were engraved in the rock forever! As for me, I know that my Redeemer lives, and at the last He will take His stand on the earth.” Job 19:23-25
May God bless you and make His face to shine upon you. I pray His favor rests upon you and that many are reached through the ministry He works through you. Be strong beloved Sister, strong in the LORD.
Much love – in Christ,
His daughter, Jodee
Thanks a lot !
Beth, as a mommy to three in my mid thirties with the call and giftings clear (humbly) this is the exact encouragement I needed. I feel like you wrote this with my name on it. This is the exact thing I’ve been asking God about, literally in the last few weeks. I love Jesus so much, and living His call is the most wild joy I’ve ever known. Rising tall into who and how He’s made me, unattached to the world, for the seen and unseen, is exhilarating. But seriously satan is wrecking havoc. Thank you for your transparency and truth. God continues to use you in mighty ways and I’m personally eating it up! Yes Lord!! -Melissa
This is it..what I haven’t been able to put my finger on. I’m 43. All I can say is thank you. You don’t know how much your encouragement means.
There is definately a lot to find out about this topic.
I love all the points you’ve made.
Oh my goodness how these words hit home. Right in the smack dab middle of learning how to live as an empty nester! The youngest is not quite “out”, but a college student, nearly 20 years old and doing her own thing….without my help most of the time. It’s a bittersweet time, learning how to now give more time and attention to my marriage than ever before, learning how to balance love and attention between grandchildren, learning how to be the family matriarch. Some days it’s overwhelming, other days what a blessing… over all a very strange stage of life I find myself in. So thankful for words from others that have been through it, or in the midst of it now.