When Mothers Pray
John 17:1-11
Mother’s Day, May 8, 2005
6^th Sunday of Easter
First Baptist Church, Wilson, NC

As I read this scripture to you, I want you to listen very carefully and count the number of times the word "mother" appears. (Read John 17:1-11)

How many times did you hear the word "mother?" Zero? You are exactly right. This passage does not mention the word once. It does mention the Father, and the Son, and the ones the Father has given the Son (his disciples). But though the passage does not mention mothers, if you were to hold this passage up next to a mother, the scripture would shine light on the mother, and the mother would shine light on the scripture. They illuminate each other.

If you look at this scripture, you see Jesus getting his disciples ready for a separation. They are about to be separated from Jesus. Therefore Jesus prays to the Father that, after that separation, the disciples will stay connected: connected to the Father and connected to each other. It is so important to Jesus that his followers be emotionally and spiritually prepared for this separation that the Gospel of John devotes all of chapters 14-17 to Jesus preparing his disciples. Psychologists understand how important this passage is. Murray Bowen once said that there are two critical tasks in life: becoming separated, and becoming connected. Jesus is preparing those he called "his little children" for separation and for connection.

Is this not what mothers do too? Is not their life work totally devoted to helping their children to become separated and to become connected? What is the act of childbirth but the hard labor of separating the child from the mother? And what is the first thing that usually happens after childbirth? The baby is placed in the mother’s embrace so that after the separation of birth they can immediately begin the bonding of mother and child -- the connecting. Separation, and connection. And that is the story of mothers and children from then on. During the preschool years, mother and child connect in an inseparable bond. But then comes the first day of kindergarten, separation. Time passes, and the mother keeps teaching the child how to stay connected with her and with others, how to show love and care for one another. But then comes the day the child goes off to work or off to college. But that separation makes possible a different kind of continuing connection as the mother and child reconnect in the friendship of two adults. But then a wedding may come, which is itself a ritual of separation and reconnection as the children separate from their families in order to form a new family, and then they return to their families as that new family. Separation and connection: it was the basic task of Jesus as he prepared his little children for their future, it is the basic task of mothers as they prepare their children for the future.

Look back at this scripture passage and you will see other parallels between the work of Jesus and the work of mothers:

• In this scripture, Jesus is praying for the disciples in his care. What do mothers do? They pray for those in their care.

• In this scripture, Jesus tells the Father that (v. 8) everything Jesus has received he has given to those in his care. What do mothers do? They give everything God has given them to their children.

• Jesus prays that his disciples (his children) will know God and have eternal life. Mothers pray that their children will know God and have eternal life.

My point? Mothers who follow Jesus will pray like Jesus. Mothers continue Jesus’ work of prayer. When Jesus prayed, things happened. When mothers pray, things happen. Look at what happened in the Bible when mothers prayed:

WHEN HANNAH PRAYED

In the first Book of Samuel is the story of a woman named Hannah who could not get pregnant. I have a couple of dear cousins, Rita and Beth, who have not been able to become pregnant. They have tried everything and it has been very difficult for them. Some of you can sympathize … with them, and with Hannah. And in Hannah’s time it was worse, for there was a stigma attached on women who were barren. So she went to a holy place in Israel called Shiloh and prayed to God that she might have a child. A prophet named Eli happened to see her. She was praying silently. Eli watched her moving her lips, but misunderstood, and thought she was drunk: "How long will you make a drunken spectacle of yourself? Put away your wine." But Hannah explained she wasn’t drunk, she was just "pouring out my soul before the Lord." When Eli understood, he told her to go in peace, for God would answer her prayer. (1 Samuel 1:14-17) And "in due time" Hannah bore a son whom she named Samuel.

But that’s not all that happened when Hannah prayed. A few years later she brought the toddler back to the holy place called Shiloh, back to the prophet Eli, and she said, "Remember me?" You can read this in 1 Samuel 1:26-28:

She left him there for the Lord?! Imagine the look on old Eli’s face when she left him holding that toddler and went home! Things happen when mothers pray. When Hannah prayed, she gave her child to the Lord.

When mothers pray today, they give their children to the Lord. When mothers pray today, they let go the temptation to live their lives vicariously through their children, but give their children to the Lord. There’s a British Baptist litany for the dedication of children that poses a tough question to the parents:

And then the congregation prays to God, "Work out thy plan for their lives; use them in thy service."

When Will Willimon was University Chaplain at Duke, he got an irate phone call from the father of a senior just about to graduate: "What have you people done to my daughter?" "Sir, what do you mean?" "She was all set on a track for her M.B.A., and now she wants to go off and work for the Peace Corps somewhere in West Africa! What have you done to my daughter!!" Chaplain Willimon was not intimidated. He replied,

"May I ask sir, when you had her at home, did you take her to church?"

"Yes, but what’s that got to do with anything?"

"And when you took her to church, and taught her the stories of the Bible, did you teach her to follow God’s call, and in worship did you sing the old hymns like, ‘Wherever he leads, I’ll go?’"

"Yes, yes, yes, but what is your point?"

"My point sir, is that you have raised a Christian. Congratulations."

And my point here is that when mothers and fathers pray, they give their children to the Lord.

WHEN MARY PRAYED

In the Book of Luke is the story of another woman who gave her child to the Lord: Mary the mother of Jesus. Let’s look and see what happened when Mary prayed. Take a Bible and turn to the prayer of Mary in Luke 1:46-55 (read).

What happened when Mary prayed? When Mary prayed, she reached back to the prayers of Hannah in the Book of Samuel and made them her own (1 Samuel 2:1-10). Mary declared that God has done great things for her. God has brought down the powerful and lifted up the lowly, God has filled the hungry with good things, and God has sent the rich away empty. When Mary prayed, she declared that God was turning the world upside down. God takes the old order of things: the violence, the hunger, and the greed, and reverses it all into a completely new order.

I’ve told you the story of a mother in Northern Ireland who was on a street when there was a bombing or a shooting and a young man lay dying on the sidewalk. She held the young stranger as his life ebbed away. That night she couldn’t sleep for the horror of it all, and all of a sudden she jumped up and went outside and she and another mother started banging on the doors of the homes yelling, "We are not going to take this anymore! We are not going to let this cycle of revenge keep on killing our sons and daughters!" That night began a new movement for peace in Northern Ireland, and I believe those women were awarded the Nobel Prize for Peace. If the hands that rock the cradle are praying hands, then the hands of mothers will work with the hand of God and turn the world upside down. That’s what happens when mothers pray.

WHEN EUNICE AND LOIS PRAYED

One more story of what happened when women in the Bible prayed. Turn to 2 Timothy 1:5. In a fragment of a personal letter, the apostle Paul writes to his apprentice Timothy:

Don’t you know that Lois and Eunice prayed for their boy Timothy. And as they prayed, the faith that was so lively in them came to life also in him.

If you are just going through the motions in church, your child will see it, and your child will get just enough religion to be inoculated against the real thing. Or if your life in the church is just one more extracurricular activity to you, just a membership you have to keep up occasionally like your membership at the club, then your child will learn exactly what you have been teaching.

But if you want Christ to be the center of your child’s life, then Christ has to be the center of your life first. If you want sincere faith to live in your child, then that faith has to live sincerely in you first. When Eunice and Lois prayed, a sincere faith lived in them first. Only then as they continued to pray did that faith come to life also in their boy. That is what happens when mothers and fathers pray.

Now I know that some of you parents do have a lively faith and have been praying fervently for your children but nothing has happened. Do not berate yourselves. Between your child and God is sacred space into which not even you can intrude. It is, after all, your child’s decision. That decision is not in the end your responsibility. But keep on cultivating your own relationship with God, and keep on praying, and keep on trusting in the slow work of God.

When George Truett was a young man in western North Carolina, he was walking home late at night. He came over the last ridge before his house and descended into the hollow through the orchard. And then he stopped, because he heard something. He crept forward slowly, and saw his mother kneeling down in the orchard. He crept forward closer, and heard her praying, praying for him to come to faith in Christ. And then he knew that her faith was very much alive, and then that faith began to move in him.

When mothers pray, they give their children to the Lord.

When mothers pray, the Lord turns the world upside down.

When mothers pray, the faith that lives in them can come to life in their children.

-- Douglas E. Murray