The Session: More Mother's Day Thoughts

The Session with Tom Russell

"Mom"...."Stepmom" Such important names, such important people. On this episode, Tom & Scott share thoughts on honoring mom.

The Session: Helps For Honoring Your Mother On Mothers Day

Exodus 20:12, “Honor your father and your mother,” and Leviticus 19:3, “Every one of you shall revere his mother and his father.”

By Amy Bost Henegar. She has been a pastor for the Manhattan Church of Christ in New York City since 2001. She has a Doctor of Ministry degree from New York Theological Seminary and is a Board Certified Chaplain.

Mothering Can Be Painful

The relationship between a mother and her child has as much potential to be filled with pain and grief as any other human relationship. In fact, disappointments in the mother-child relationship may be exacerbated by the fact that motherhood is glorified, and mothers are expected to easily love, care and devote themselves to their children in a superhuman way.( Christianity Today)

Isaiah 66:13 "As a mother comforts her child, so I will comfort you." Proverbs 31:25-27 "Strength and honor are her clothing; she is confident about the future. Her mouth is full of wisdom; kindly teaching is on her tongue. She is vigilant over the activities of her household; she doesn't eat the food of laziness."

We have the opportunity, on Mother’s Day especially, to be honest with our congregations about the pain and disappointment that is inevitable in the sinful human relationships of a broken world. We can then proclaim the good news about God’s commonwealth of love, where every person is invited to have a second, third and fourth (or seventy times seventh) chance at building healthy, life-giving relationships. Those who have experienced the deepest disappointments in human relationships are invited over and over again to be mothers and daughters, fathers and sons, brothers and sisters, to each other within the body of Christ.

Mothers Day / Stepmoms

Laura Petherbridge serves couples and single adults with topics on spiritual growth, relationships, marriage enhancement and divorce recovery. As someone in a second marriage herself, she is also a stepmother. Several years ago, she released The Smart Stepmom, co-written with step-family expert Ron Deal.

“I do want to add that it is perfectly acceptable to honor a stepmother on Mother’s Day if the idea of acknowledgment comes from the child.”

She also suggests dads should be the one to make their wives feel special, as the stepmother of his children:

“Stepmothers need to know that their husbands see the little things that his kids don’t appreciate her for, and that he wants to honor her for what she does for their family.”

Petherbridge knows this from personal experience. After two years of sad Mother’s Days, she took the initiative to communicate to her husband about how this day made her feel.

“I had to go to my husband, and let him know that it would make me feel appreciated if he did something special for me,” she said. “There is a misconception that husbands cannot honor their wives on Mother’s Day for what they do, because they are not their mothers. It’s just simply a way of validating his wife in her role.”

For Petherbridge and other stepmoms, this can do more than lessen the sting of rejection by the stepchildren: “It strengthens the marriage, which is the primary relationship in any home. Besides, women don’t need a big hoopla. They just want to be appreciated.”

From Family Life Blended: Ways to celebrate Mother’s Day as a stepmom

To reach Tom Russell, go to https://www.heritagechristiancounselingofmansfield.com.