October 8, 2025 • 40 mins
In this special Mother’s Day message, Pastor Rains explores the divine design of motherhood from Genesis 2 and 1 Samuel 1. From the creation of woman as man’s perfect companion to Hannah’s heartfelt prayer for a child, this episode reveals how God placed within every woman a sacred desire — not just to receive life, but to give it back to Him in worship. Through the stories of Hannah and Mary, we see that motherhood is not merely about emotional fulfillment, but about becoming a vessel of God’s grace and love.
Whether you are a mother, child, or simply someone seeking to understand God’s heart for family, this episode will inspire you to see motherhood as a reflection of God’s giving nature and His glory in creation.
📝 Show Notes:
- Scripture Focus: Genesis 2:18–24; 1 Samuel 1–2; Luke 1
- Theme: God’s design for motherhood and the heart of giving back to Him
- Key Points:
- God’s Perfect Design: Woman was created as man’s complement, partner, and helper — reflecting divine harmony.
- The Gift of Relationship: Family relationships—parent and child, husband and wife—flow from God’s original plan.
- Hannah’s Desire: A godly mother’s longing is not only to receive a child but to dedicate that child back to God.
- Mary’s Praise: The heart of motherhood rejoices in God’s glory more than personal gain.
- Eternal Gratitude: Even imperfect mothers are vessels of God’s grace—reminding us to give thanks for His faithfulness.
All messages are taught by the Rev. Chuck Rains of the Fellowship Bible Church of Joliet IL
Thanks for listening and please subscribe. if you have any comments or questions please send them to legacybiblepodcast@gmail.com you can check out the website at www.legacybiblepodcast.com Fellowship Bible Church website is at wwwfbcjoliet.com please come back every week for another legacy lesson from the bible by the Re. Chuck Rains.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
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This is the Legacy Bible Podcast, the place for legacy audio from the tape archives of the Fellowship Bible Church of Joliet, Illinois.
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Now here's your host Marcus O'Nate.
All right. Thank you, Miss AI voice. This is the Legacy Bible podcast. She is right now Marcus on eight.
So I'm bringing to you another one from our archive.
This one is from, uh, see, May 12th, 1991, which was a Mother's Day episode in 1991.
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And it is titled, The Desire for Motherhood. So it's God's Design and Hannah's Prayer.
Okay. That was a long time ago, Mother. Mother's Day, 1991. So let's get right into it and we'll listen to it.
And I'll talk to you on the other side of it.
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Open your Bibles to Genesis chapter two, if you would.
The book of Genesis in its early chapters tells us the story of creation.
And the crowning act in God's creation was the creation of mankind.
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God created a man. And then after having created a man, he took a rib from the man
and from the rib, he created a woman and brought that woman to the man,
presented her to him and he recognized her as bone of his bone, flesh of his flesh,
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his other part, woman, woman, out of man. She was called woman because she was taken from man.
She came out of man and she became for man. God's gift. God's blessing for man's life.
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When you read that story, you may think that all there is to be found there is what a woman is to a man.
What a wife is to a husband and that somehow that is the capstone and the total of all that's to be found there,
that the teaching about that kind of is summed up and what these two share together.
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I'm glad to have the opportunity on a Mother's Day to tell you that's not true.
That isn't the end of the story. There's more to it than that. In Genesis 2, 18,
it says, and the Lord God said, it is not good that the man should be alone. I will make him
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and help meet for him not to be alone, not to wander through the earth without companionship.
He could have a pet in an animal. He could enjoy his work with the plants. He could praise God for
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all the blessings of his life through the day and all the things he had to eat, the wonderful taste,
the smells, the sights, the beauty, but God wanted him to have more. He wanted him to have very,
very personal, very specific, intimate provision. God knew that there was more.
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God knew what man needed. God made a help-meet for him. Now, you could translate that this way.
A helper corresponding to him or corresponding to the man. Meat could be translated. One corresponding
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to the other. God made a helper for him that corresponded with him what he needed, what he was,
what his potential had in it. God knew all those things. God was the designer.
God designed the perfect helper. First, she corresponded to him and designed.
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The woman was his compliment. Secondly, in life activity, the woman was his partner.
And thirdly, in love's expression, because you see, man was created not just as the animals are.
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Man was created with a spirit, an eternal part of him, once created, that was going to go on
forever and ever. But it was going to have that special capacity that God has, the capacity to
worship, the capacity to love, to give oneself for the good of the other, to delight in doing that.
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And God put that in the man. He had put it in the angels. But in this creation, he put it in the man.
He gave him a spirit to be able to love. So in love's expression, the man's helper was going to enter into
that. He was going to be his greatest, his most intimate, his most fulfilling relationship.
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That's what God had intended and has designed in giving woman to man and man to woman.
In Galatians 2.24, it says, therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother and shall
cleave unto his wife, and they shall be one flesh. I love to use that in wedding ceremonies.
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It's right from the Scriptures. A lot of people think that much of the verbiage in a wedding ceremony
doesn't come from Scripture. I love to stay with the phrases of Scripture, to teach in the
wedding worship service what God has designed, what God's will is in this, what God wants people
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to believe him to do in their lives and in their marriages. It says here that the man is to leave
his father and mother and be and cleave unto his wife, and they are to be one flesh.
Well, in other words, they became one flesh when they were brought together. But that wasn't all
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that God put into heart of man, in designing man to enter into relationships. It wasn't all
summed up in the fact that man and that woman would come together as one flesh. That verse is true,
and those two do have that intimate relationship. But there's more. As we read on in the Word of God,
we learn about other relationships that mankind can enter into. We learn about friendship.
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Friendship is a God-designed-love relationship. Man can enter into that. We learn about
lordship and servanthood, and a man can enter into that. We can commit ourselves to one as our Lord,
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in the days of slavery that was better understood, that one could commit themselves to somebody as
their master with all of their life and serve faithfully. Of course, I'm sure that most slaves
might have, as the human nature has been to do, might have only been self-serving,
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might have hated having to serve a master. But nonetheless, the scriptures teach that it is in
the design of God that we have the capacity to give ourselves as a servant.
And God wants that really to be given to him, that he might be our Lord, our master, by our choice,
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and with joy, not with sorrow. He made that possible. That relationship was in the first
of God's design when he created Adam and Eve. And one relationship that's part of the basic
structure of humanity, he also put in that design, and that's the relationship of family.
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Now it didn't look like it was there when God made Eve for Adam, and she came to him, and
he was immediately aware that she was especially for him, and he could see how she would enter
into his life and be a compliment to him and partner with him. But family was also a part of
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God's design, and that took some time. The two came together as man and wife, and out of that
union came children, sons and daughters. Daughters aren't named for us, but they came.
We don't know how many they had. They may have had many. We're not told all the details.
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But we are told enough in the Scripture to know this. The design for family, not just the physical
design, but the design for the relationship of family came from God. He made it.
What is involved in those relationships? Why I think there are two classes of relationship in
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family that are primary. There are others that go beyond these two, but this is the beginning place.
There is the relationship, we call it the parent-child relationship, and then there's a second one.
The compliment to that is called the child-parent relationship. That's the beginning place of family.
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Beyond the man and wife relationship as husband and wife. You step beyond that, what do you have?
Parent-child-child-parent relationships. Now it's true that in family, these relationships keep going
because after that generation comes another generation and you have child-grandparent and
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grandparent-child relationships. Some might live long enough to have child-great-grandparent
relationships and grandparent-child relationships. I've even known some who had great-great-grandparent
relationships with a child and a child with them. It goes beyond that. You have the aunts and
the uncle relationship with the nieces and the nephews. We have the cousins that come with those
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relationships. In some families they even know who their second cousins are. I've even met families
and know who their third and fourth cousins are. I don't. But you might. When we get our family
together, I tell you, there's always people there. I haven't the slightest idea why they're there.
Unless they heard there was a free meal being given away or something. Any idea who they are
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or who they belong to? Especially the kids. If you don't have a family reunion for about three
or four or five years, you come together and there's always a new crop running around. Or there was
probably the old crop, but they grew up and you can't recognize them anymore. Susan and our family,
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my wife and our children are going to go to my father's family reunion in June and go down there
and have a little bit of time with them after VBS just a day actually, one day, and we'll come back.
But I'm looking forward to it. Things have changed since our last family reunion. My father
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married another sweet lady after my mother died and the last family reunion was such a sweet time.
She was there and all the family was together, but since then she died. My father lost her also and
since then he's married again. Now I don't know this new mother stepmother, see, and I'm going to go to my
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family reunion with my father and meet my stepmother. So it's a very exciting thing. I understand that
she's a wonderful lady. My father thinks so anyway and I'm glad he does. He had no business marrying her if he didn't think so.
But I haven't and here she is stepmother. I've never had any mothering from her. I don't really know her,
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but at least the blessing of whatever the Lord has in store for me, I'm going to find out something of it when we get together.
And then there'll be all those new children that have been born and then there's some of those second and third cousins that come and some of their cousins that come and I don't even know what to call them.
I have an idea for some of them, but we'll move along.
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Some of them, some of my relatives would not be good examples for righteous living and you might not know it, but I actually think of some of them when I preach about certain subjects in the scripture.
Thieves and robbers and other things.
So we all have some of those in our family tree, I guess, since we all got off the boat with Noah, right?
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We all go back to one another. So don't get too up at the about your family tree.
Somewhere there's some bad fruit.
But the man was made to have these relationships in family and the man was to have his role and the woman was to have her role.
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I want to talk a little bit about the woman's role today, this being Mother's Day.
The thing that the Lord directed my heart to was the idea of that's in a woman's heart.
I'm calling it the desire for motherhood. I want you to turn with me to 1 Samuel and the story of
Hannah and Elkhana in 1 Samuel chapter 1
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because I'd like you to see Hannah's desire for motherhood.
This is a desire that God places in the heart of a woman.
Desire for motherhood.
Now it's true, this is not the primary driving desire.
I would say that in each of us there's a desire for companionship that has to be answered in the Lord's provision.
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Now some are not called to marriage,
but generally we can speak of all of mankind.
Generally speaking God has certainly given us the design of marriage and the design of family.
And so we have this godly design operating in our spirit
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showing itself in a desire for that fulfillment.
There's a desire in the heart of man to be united with a mate.
Now it can be terribly corrupted.
In the days of Sodom and Gomorrah it was corrupted to the place that the driving primary thrust of
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the heart of man was for homosexuality.
God was so nauseated by that that he destroyed those cities.
I used to read that and think how could a society ever sink to that level?
Why those people were brazen. They were right out in the streets with their homosexuality.
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Little did I realize that they would come and I'd turn on the television and here they would
be marching down the main streets of the big cities of the United States.
20 abreast with their signs.
How proud they were or are to be homosexual.
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I don't believe God takes any pride because it violates his design.
They miss out on what God provides for them in his love design.
And here it's operating correctly in Hannah.
Now when we step into the story I want to be quick to say man's ways are in this story.
Man's confusions and sin are here because Elkhina had two wives.
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That's man's way, not God's way.
You see a man doesn't need two women to be complimented, to be made fulfilled.
He certainly doesn't need what Solomon went after.
700 wives and 300 concubines.
I mean that is beyond the wildest imagination of sinners.
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You know in the world that you couldn't sell that on the street corner that a man needs a thousand
women. They might think of it in wrong terms for their lust and their desire but the idea of
taking on the responsibility of providing for one thousand women and all their offspring
and keeping one thousand women happy.
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Man would have to be unglued to think that he could do that.
That's one of my opinion of Solomon's decision is he was given great wisdom from God but
I think in a few days he didn't apply it.
About one thousand of those days he went down a bad road or at least 999 of them.
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He should have made other decisions that would have been more wise.
Well let me get off of that.
Elkhana had two wives.
There was Benina and there was Hannah.
Hannah had no children but she was loved by her husband and I want to read the scripture that
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underscores that so you understand that.
Verse four and when the time was that Elkhana offered,
it means it came yearly to the time of offering given an offering to God.
He gave to Pinaiah, Pinaina, his wife and to all her sons and her daughters portions.
But unto Hannah he gave a worthy portion for he loved Hannah
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but the Lord had shut up her wound.
She had no children but aren't you glad for this clear statement in the Word of God?
He loved her.
So I want you to understand that the motivation behind the story and what happens in Hannah
in her desire for a child is not because her husband did not love her.
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The motivation for motherhood doesn't come out of deprivation or a desire to substitute for
the love that a husband has denied her.
Now that does happen at times but that isn't the design of God.
The right design is this that it can be right in the presence of and it should be in the presence
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of a husband's full love.
Now I grant you this is even soil that's limited because he's brought another woman
into his life as his wife but he did love her
and God goes to lengths to make sure that we understand that.
Yes there's conflict there but the husband's love shines through all of that
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and Hannah long for more down at verse 6 through 8 it says her adversary also provoked her
sore and she's talking of Elkhana's other wife for to make her fret because the Lord had
shut up her womb. Undoubtedly Benina would point to that and ridicule Hannah.
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No doubt the children would take up the ridicule and as he did so, year by year when she went up to
the house of the Lord so she provoked her therefore she wept and did not eat.
Now I think in verse 6 when it says her adversary also provoked her sore you should see in verse 7
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the translation and as he did so year by year, Elkhana going up to make offering.
So she provoked her the she in verse 7 is the adversary of verse 6 and that's the other wife.
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So really we know we could say that behind that whole action is the one that could be called a he
Satan but in this case Satan had his way working through Benina's heart. Therefore she wept and did
not eat. Then said Elkhana her husband to her and here's a quote from Elkhana to Hannah. Hannah
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why weepest thou and why eatest thou not he could see that she was not eating. He could see that
she was weeping it was heavy burden. Why is thy heart grieved? He could see that her heart was
terribly grieved. Notice in seeing that that means he was tender to her he was tuned to her
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he could see what was going on and he said am not I better to thee than ten sons?
He loved her he wanted to be for her all that she needed but listen motherhood and the desire to be
a mother is not fully satisfied by a husband's love. It's not supposed to be satisfied by a
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husband's love in God's perfect design. There's still a desire to have a child and to have what
comes with having a child that is entirely proper entirely God design and is fulfilling
in that design. No Elkhana couldn't be even what ten sons could bring to Hannah and so she prayed
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verse 10 and 11 she was in bitterness of soul and prayed unto the Lord and wept sore and she
vowed to valence at all Lord of hosts. If thou will indeed look on the affliction of thine
handmade and remember me and not forget thine handmade but will give me given thine handmade
a man child then I will give him unto the Lord all the days of his life and there shall no razor
come upon his head. What she did was say Lord if you will give to me a male child a son.
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Notice in the same verse I will give to you that son all of his life. Do you understand that prayer?
She is not just simply saying give me give me give me that isn't really what motherhood craves.
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You can't understand the burden the longing of motherhood unless you understand this verse
and at least what this verse is saying. That motherhood while it desires a child desires also to give
the child. Motherhood doesn't say proper godly motherhood doesn't say give me a child and I'll
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grasp my arms around it and I'll hold that child to myself and I'll never let that child leave me.
Child could be 30, 40, 50 years old but I'll hold on to that child I won't let it go. That isn't
proper motherhood. Proper motherhood can say though give me a child and from the day that child
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is born I will love that child with my soul my life my all but in my heart that child is yours God.
It is yours. Yours to have glory from the life of that child is yours. I'll give myself through all the years that you allow me whatever degree of giving I can have. In those early years it'll be so complete and as the years go along it'll be less and less complete and the time may come when it's not quite so much because they've left they've married they have their own family and you won't have as much occasion to be with them but still the giving will go to the family.
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And you won't have as much occasion to be with them but still the giving will go on and godly motherhood it'll go on and the desire to give it will go on and but never will there be that violation in that all of that love and all that giving never will there be that violation of also giving that child to the Lord.
These two have to be together.
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A desire to receive from God and a desire to give to God that fulfills motherhood and if you twist that if you thwart it it becomes very very ugly.
God gave her her son Samuel was born and she came up and praised him for that child and she gave him into the Lord's house.
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He had no hands even for service from the time he was weaned. He was probably only three years of age when he was in full time service for the Lord.
If there's ever a case in the word of God of a little child leaving his mother to serve the Lord at the earliest age possible here it is.
The Lord Jesus didn't enter into his ministry until he was 30. Samuel entered into his ministry when he was three.
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Amazing and she prayed with praise to God having received that child when I read this I thought this is so clear of what motherhood should really be directed at.
The prayer of Hannah from chapter two verse one through verse 10 if you read it obviously I can't cover it all.
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Times gone but here it is you read it and you know what you see in it.
Line upon line line upon line line upon line of praise to the Lord for what the Lord is and how supreme he is overall things how merciful he is to give.
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In other words the prayer of Hannah in her motherhood is not Lord thank you for giving me this son so that I can have my emotional needs met in my home.
In all through those years through this child thank you for how much I got that is not the emphasis in this prayer.
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By the way a mother has the privilege of receiving that wonderful encouragement emotional support strength joy through the child.
Child becoming a teenager teenager becoming an adult has all of that coming to her but there's a thrust right here.
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That her heart has to be drawn immediately to God her joy should be in the Lord in the Lord as the source of it all.
A mother that understands motherhood as it should be understood is drawn to praise God.
Not for what she got from primarily but for what he is.
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In other words it's like going through a trial.
Why would God send you through a certain trial so that you could cry out to him and see him provide and having him provide you give thanks and praise and say thank you Lord for the trial because you like the trial course not.
But because your heart has learned how to love him more you've seen him provide more.
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And in the case of motherhood motherhood isn't easy.
Don't have to instruct you ladies.
I mean you start out with a helpless thing that needs attention in every kind of conceivable physical way.
And some of them aren't attractive until you deliver them over at a wedding service into the hands of a mate.
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Who's now going to find out some other sides of the issue.
It hasn't all been a picnic.
But motherhood lived in the Lord, in the strength of the Lord and looking to the Lord,
getting in the most unhappy situation, the most difficult situation.
Drawing strength from God constantly in giving and meeting the needs of that child
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give praise to God for the glory.
I mean for the blessing of his grace and provision.
It's a wonderful privilege to be the vessel for God to work through to accomplish something in a life.
That mother has a privilege of teaching, of guiding, of instruction, of correction.
She has the blessing also of honor.
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And that goes on for all of life.
Being honored by that child.
A life relationship that never ends.
And even in the last years to have that child give back.
Even perhaps for the mother after the father may be gone.
The child may have to step in and make provision and care for the mother
in ways that the husband can't because he's gone.
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Might come to that.
Might come even to the physical provision and care daily again.
In other words, in the scripture would teach us this.
We shouldn't shut our hearts as children to doing that for our mothers any more than our
mothers shut their hearts to doing it for us as babies and as young children.
If you will provide for your mother and you see the Lord's hand in doing it,
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you'll be able to give praise to him and you'll pray as Hannah prayed.
And if you as a mother would receive a child and know the grace of God in rearing that child,
you'd be drawn to pray like Hannah prayed.
And one other prayer.
In Luke chapter one, there is another prayer that's parallel with this one.
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And I won't even turn to it because our time is gone.
But it is the great prayer and parallel of this and it's a prayer of Mary.
And when you read what is often called a magnificent of Mary, her prayer of praise to God for being
able to be the one to bear a man child that would become the Savior of the world.
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What does she pray?
Thank you Lord for all those tender moments.
I'm going to have this little child on my knee.
Thank you Lord for all the emotional fulfillment I'm going to get.
Walking down the road holding his little hand.
No, Mary's delight is in the Lord in what he is and his supremeness over all things that he should
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bless her by making her the vessel for doing that thing.
But yet she got all of those blessings.
Above all women, Mary had the privilege of having that little hand in her hand and watching
that one grow up.
And Mary was there the day he was crucified.
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And her heart hurt as any mother's heart would hurt that had her child
brutally, mercilessly murdered in front of her eyes.
But she could still praise God because God is her Savior.
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And God would give her the grace to give herself, to make it possible for her to give herself
and to be fulfilled in that little life's growth and ultimately trust in Christ, worship,
the blessing of seeing the fruit of God come out of that life.
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God would be praised and the prayer of mothers is this, praise the Lord.
Because in motherhood I've learned how to praise the Lord more, seeing him work through me.
That means you might have a child that's not as intelligent as another child.
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You may have a child's not as attractive as another child or you may have a genius child,
but listen, that doesn't in any way limit what you can know as motherhood.
Whatever that child's needs are, whatever can be given through you for that child's sake will
fulfill motherhood.
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For any woman would be the channel of God's grace for another child.
And you can give God praise and glory that he worked because actually the praise has to be
for God for a mother to be a mother. We praise mothers, but listen, the real one to be praised
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today is the Lord God that made them and the Lord God that sustained them and gave them the grace,
the love to be mothers.
I thank God for mothers. I thank God for my mother, but I thank God for God. I thank God for my Savior.
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He's made it all possible. My mother, I've told you this many times, but my mother, to my knowledge,
died without receiving Christ as Savior. I always add to that, I hope I'm wrong.
I hope I see her when I get to heaven, but I have no assurance from anything she said,
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and I was there the moment she died. I have no assurance from anything she ever said to me in my
life that she will be there. Yet I will tell you, I thank God for my mother.
He worked in his grace through her for my blessing beyond my understanding.
She was a vessel of the great grace of God, and I give praise to him
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for her motherhood. And if a woman can do that, she can step into that even right now.
The joy of motherhood will never leave her.
I'd like to close in prayer. I wonder if you're a mother here today, if you just stand,
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we'll just pray and thank God for you in a very special way. Would you?
You have three cats, doesn't qualify.
All right, let's close in prayer. Father, thank you for these vessels that you've
specially given us in this life, or mothers, and even in this church body to have the blessing of
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mothers around us and see their trusting of your grace to be the channel for love and care for
children that you've given. Thank you for the older women that have the testimony for us.
How faithful of God you are and how wonderful you are as they've poured out their life energy
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that you have sustained and they would give glory and praise to you. And we thank you for
them individually. In Jesus name, Lord, bless them today. Amen.
All right, so there we have it. Another one for this week on Mother's for Mother's Day.
So I know it's when this is coming out. It's not on Mother's Day, but well, maybe you could save
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it and come back next year for Mother's Day and listen to it then. But it's good at any time.
It doesn't have to be on Mother's Day. So thank you listeners for listening and thanks to the
pastor for a message. And I want to say that you can listen to the back episodes if you haven't
already on the website or on the various website platforms like Podbean or Apple Podcasts.
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You can listen to the back episodes there or you can listen to them on YouTube. We have there.
And there's a new platform which I'm on and it's on a rumble. Those do not have the back episodes
goes. I started off at episode 70 something 72. I think 73 something like that. But if you're
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unrumbling, you want to hear some of the back episodes, you could go to YouTube or the other
podcast providers of your choice. We should be we should be there so you could check that out.
Okay, and let's see what else. I had a website you could check that out.
www.legacybiblepodcast.com. If you have any questions or comments, you can leave them there
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or if you just want to email me direct. It's legacy Bible podcast at gmail.com. So you could do that.
So until then, I'll see you again next week. And hopefully you'll have a great week.
And also have a great day. All right. See you next week.
This is the Legacy Bible Podcast, the place for legacy audio from the tape archives of the Fellowship Bible Church of Joliet, Illinois.
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Now here's your host Marcus O'Nate.
All right. Thank you, Miss AI voice. This is the Legacy Bible podcast. She is right now Marcus on eight.
So I'm bringing to you another one from our archive.
This one is from, uh, see, May 12th, 1991, which was a Mother's Day episode in 1991.
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And it is titled, The Desire for Motherhood. So it's God's Design and Hannah's Prayer.
Okay. That was a long time ago, Mother. Mother's Day, 1991. So let's get right into it and we'll listen to it.
And I'll talk to you on the other side of it.
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Open your Bibles to Genesis chapter two, if you would.
The book of Genesis in its early chapters tells us the story of creation.
And the crowning act in God's creation was the creation of mankind.
(01:24):
God created a man. And then after having created a man, he took a rib from the man
and from the rib, he created a woman and brought that woman to the man,
presented her to him and he recognized her as bone of his bone, flesh of his flesh,
(01:49):
his other part, woman, woman, out of man. She was called woman because she was taken from man.
She came out of man and she became for man. God's gift. God's blessing for man's life.
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When you read that story, you may think that all there is to be found there is what a woman is to a man.
What a wife is to a husband and that somehow that is the capstone and the total of all that's to be found there,
that the teaching about that kind of is summed up and what these two share together.
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I'm glad to have the opportunity on a Mother's Day to tell you that's not true.
That isn't the end of the story. There's more to it than that. In Genesis 2, 18,
it says, and the Lord God said, it is not good that the man should be alone. I will make him
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and help meet for him not to be alone, not to wander through the earth without companionship.
He could have a pet in an animal. He could enjoy his work with the plants. He could praise God for
(03:28):
all the blessings of his life through the day and all the things he had to eat, the wonderful taste,
the smells, the sights, the beauty, but God wanted him to have more. He wanted him to have very,
very personal, very specific, intimate provision. God knew that there was more.
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God knew what man needed. God made a help-meet for him. Now, you could translate that this way.
A helper corresponding to him or corresponding to the man. Meat could be translated. One corresponding
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to the other. God made a helper for him that corresponded with him what he needed, what he was,
what his potential had in it. God knew all those things. God was the designer.
God designed the perfect helper. First, she corresponded to him and designed.
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The woman was his compliment. Secondly, in life activity, the woman was his partner.
And thirdly, in love's expression, because you see, man was created not just as the animals are.
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Man was created with a spirit, an eternal part of him, once created, that was going to go on
forever and ever. But it was going to have that special capacity that God has, the capacity to
worship, the capacity to love, to give oneself for the good of the other, to delight in doing that.
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And God put that in the man. He had put it in the angels. But in this creation, he put it in the man.
He gave him a spirit to be able to love. So in love's expression, the man's helper was going to enter into
that. He was going to be his greatest, his most intimate, his most fulfilling relationship.
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That's what God had intended and has designed in giving woman to man and man to woman.
In Galatians 2.24, it says, therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother and shall
cleave unto his wife, and they shall be one flesh. I love to use that in wedding ceremonies.
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It's right from the Scriptures. A lot of people think that much of the verbiage in a wedding ceremony
doesn't come from Scripture. I love to stay with the phrases of Scripture, to teach in the
wedding worship service what God has designed, what God's will is in this, what God wants people
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to believe him to do in their lives and in their marriages. It says here that the man is to leave
his father and mother and be and cleave unto his wife, and they are to be one flesh.
Well, in other words, they became one flesh when they were brought together. But that wasn't all
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that God put into heart of man, in designing man to enter into relationships. It wasn't all
summed up in the fact that man and that woman would come together as one flesh. That verse is true,
and those two do have that intimate relationship. But there's more. As we read on in the Word of God,
we learn about other relationships that mankind can enter into. We learn about friendship.
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Friendship is a God-designed-love relationship. Man can enter into that. We learn about
lordship and servanthood, and a man can enter into that. We can commit ourselves to one as our Lord,
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in the days of slavery that was better understood, that one could commit themselves to somebody as
their master with all of their life and serve faithfully. Of course, I'm sure that most slaves
might have, as the human nature has been to do, might have only been self-serving,
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might have hated having to serve a master. But nonetheless, the scriptures teach that it is in
the design of God that we have the capacity to give ourselves as a servant.
And God wants that really to be given to him, that he might be our Lord, our master, by our choice,
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and with joy, not with sorrow. He made that possible. That relationship was in the first
of God's design when he created Adam and Eve. And one relationship that's part of the basic
structure of humanity, he also put in that design, and that's the relationship of family.
(09:16):
Now it didn't look like it was there when God made Eve for Adam, and she came to him, and
he was immediately aware that she was especially for him, and he could see how she would enter
into his life and be a compliment to him and partner with him. But family was also a part of
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God's design, and that took some time. The two came together as man and wife, and out of that
union came children, sons and daughters. Daughters aren't named for us, but they came.
We don't know how many they had. They may have had many. We're not told all the details.
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But we are told enough in the Scripture to know this. The design for family, not just the physical
design, but the design for the relationship of family came from God. He made it.
What is involved in those relationships? Why I think there are two classes of relationship in
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family that are primary. There are others that go beyond these two, but this is the beginning place.
There is the relationship, we call it the parent-child relationship, and then there's a second one.
The compliment to that is called the child-parent relationship. That's the beginning place of family.
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Beyond the man and wife relationship as husband and wife. You step beyond that, what do you have?
Parent-child-child-parent relationships. Now it's true that in family, these relationships keep going
because after that generation comes another generation and you have child-grandparent and
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grandparent-child relationships. Some might live long enough to have child-great-grandparent
relationships and grandparent-child relationships. I've even known some who had great-great-grandparent
relationships with a child and a child with them. It goes beyond that. You have the aunts and
the uncle relationship with the nieces and the nephews. We have the cousins that come with those
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relationships. In some families they even know who their second cousins are. I've even met families
and know who their third and fourth cousins are. I don't. But you might. When we get our family
together, I tell you, there's always people there. I haven't the slightest idea why they're there.
Unless they heard there was a free meal being given away or something. Any idea who they are
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or who they belong to? Especially the kids. If you don't have a family reunion for about three
or four or five years, you come together and there's always a new crop running around. Or there was
probably the old crop, but they grew up and you can't recognize them anymore. Susan and our family,
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my wife and our children are going to go to my father's family reunion in June and go down there
and have a little bit of time with them after VBS just a day actually, one day, and we'll come back.
But I'm looking forward to it. Things have changed since our last family reunion. My father
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married another sweet lady after my mother died and the last family reunion was such a sweet time.
She was there and all the family was together, but since then she died. My father lost her also and
since then he's married again. Now I don't know this new mother stepmother, see, and I'm going to go to my
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family reunion with my father and meet my stepmother. So it's a very exciting thing. I understand that
she's a wonderful lady. My father thinks so anyway and I'm glad he does. He had no business marrying her if he didn't think so.
But I haven't and here she is stepmother. I've never had any mothering from her. I don't really know her,
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but at least the blessing of whatever the Lord has in store for me, I'm going to find out something of it when we get together.
And then there'll be all those new children that have been born and then there's some of those second and third cousins that come and some of their cousins that come and I don't even know what to call them.
I have an idea for some of them, but we'll move along.
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Some of them, some of my relatives would not be good examples for righteous living and you might not know it, but I actually think of some of them when I preach about certain subjects in the scripture.
Thieves and robbers and other things.
So we all have some of those in our family tree, I guess, since we all got off the boat with Noah, right?
(14:25):
We all go back to one another. So don't get too up at the about your family tree.
Somewhere there's some bad fruit.
But the man was made to have these relationships in family and the man was to have his role and the woman was to have her role.
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I want to talk a little bit about the woman's role today, this being Mother's Day.
The thing that the Lord directed my heart to was the idea of that's in a woman's heart.
I'm calling it the desire for motherhood. I want you to turn with me to 1 Samuel and the story of
Hannah and Elkhana in 1 Samuel chapter 1
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because I'd like you to see Hannah's desire for motherhood.
This is a desire that God places in the heart of a woman.
Desire for motherhood.
Now it's true, this is not the primary driving desire.
I would say that in each of us there's a desire for companionship that has to be answered in the Lord's provision.
(15:44):
Now some are not called to marriage,
but generally we can speak of all of mankind.
Generally speaking God has certainly given us the design of marriage and the design of family.
And so we have this godly design operating in our spirit
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showing itself in a desire for that fulfillment.
There's a desire in the heart of man to be united with a mate.
Now it can be terribly corrupted.
In the days of Sodom and Gomorrah it was corrupted to the place that the driving primary thrust of
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the heart of man was for homosexuality.
God was so nauseated by that that he destroyed those cities.
I used to read that and think how could a society ever sink to that level?
Why those people were brazen. They were right out in the streets with their homosexuality.
(16:56):
Little did I realize that they would come and I'd turn on the television and here they would
be marching down the main streets of the big cities of the United States.
20 abreast with their signs.
How proud they were or are to be homosexual.
(17:18):
I don't believe God takes any pride because it violates his design.
They miss out on what God provides for them in his love design.
And here it's operating correctly in Hannah.
Now when we step into the story I want to be quick to say man's ways are in this story.
Man's confusions and sin are here because Elkhina had two wives.
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That's man's way, not God's way.
You see a man doesn't need two women to be complimented, to be made fulfilled.
He certainly doesn't need what Solomon went after.
700 wives and 300 concubines.
I mean that is beyond the wildest imagination of sinners.
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You know in the world that you couldn't sell that on the street corner that a man needs a thousand
women. They might think of it in wrong terms for their lust and their desire but the idea of
taking on the responsibility of providing for one thousand women and all their offspring
and keeping one thousand women happy.
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Man would have to be unglued to think that he could do that.
That's one of my opinion of Solomon's decision is he was given great wisdom from God but
I think in a few days he didn't apply it.
About one thousand of those days he went down a bad road or at least 999 of them.
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He should have made other decisions that would have been more wise.
Well let me get off of that.
Elkhana had two wives.
There was Benina and there was Hannah.
Hannah had no children but she was loved by her husband and I want to read the scripture that
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underscores that so you understand that.
Verse four and when the time was that Elkhana offered,
it means it came yearly to the time of offering given an offering to God.
He gave to Pinaiah, Pinaina, his wife and to all her sons and her daughters portions.
But unto Hannah he gave a worthy portion for he loved Hannah
(20:00):
but the Lord had shut up her wound.
She had no children but aren't you glad for this clear statement in the Word of God?
He loved her.
So I want you to understand that the motivation behind the story and what happens in Hannah
in her desire for a child is not because her husband did not love her.
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The motivation for motherhood doesn't come out of deprivation or a desire to substitute for
the love that a husband has denied her.
Now that does happen at times but that isn't the design of God.
The right design is this that it can be right in the presence of and it should be in the presence
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of a husband's full love.
Now I grant you this is even soil that's limited because he's brought another woman
into his life as his wife but he did love her
and God goes to lengths to make sure that we understand that.
Yes there's conflict there but the husband's love shines through all of that
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and Hannah long for more down at verse 6 through 8 it says her adversary also provoked her
sore and she's talking of Elkhana's other wife for to make her fret because the Lord had
shut up her womb. Undoubtedly Benina would point to that and ridicule Hannah.
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No doubt the children would take up the ridicule and as he did so, year by year when she went up to
the house of the Lord so she provoked her therefore she wept and did not eat.
Now I think in verse 6 when it says her adversary also provoked her sore you should see in verse 7
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the translation and as he did so year by year, Elkhana going up to make offering.
So she provoked her the she in verse 7 is the adversary of verse 6 and that's the other wife.
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So really we know we could say that behind that whole action is the one that could be called a he
Satan but in this case Satan had his way working through Benina's heart. Therefore she wept and did
not eat. Then said Elkhana her husband to her and here's a quote from Elkhana to Hannah. Hannah
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why weepest thou and why eatest thou not he could see that she was not eating. He could see that
she was weeping it was heavy burden. Why is thy heart grieved? He could see that her heart was
terribly grieved. Notice in seeing that that means he was tender to her he was tuned to her
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he could see what was going on and he said am not I better to thee than ten sons?
He loved her he wanted to be for her all that she needed but listen motherhood and the desire to be
a mother is not fully satisfied by a husband's love. It's not supposed to be satisfied by a
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husband's love in God's perfect design. There's still a desire to have a child and to have what
comes with having a child that is entirely proper entirely God design and is fulfilling
in that design. No Elkhana couldn't be even what ten sons could bring to Hannah and so she prayed
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verse 10 and 11 she was in bitterness of soul and prayed unto the Lord and wept sore and she
vowed to valence at all Lord of hosts. If thou will indeed look on the affliction of thine
handmade and remember me and not forget thine handmade but will give me given thine handmade
a man child then I will give him unto the Lord all the days of his life and there shall no razor
come upon his head. What she did was say Lord if you will give to me a male child a son.
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Notice in the same verse I will give to you that son all of his life. Do you understand that prayer?
She is not just simply saying give me give me give me that isn't really what motherhood craves.
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You can't understand the burden the longing of motherhood unless you understand this verse
and at least what this verse is saying. That motherhood while it desires a child desires also to give
the child. Motherhood doesn't say proper godly motherhood doesn't say give me a child and I'll
(25:19):
grasp my arms around it and I'll hold that child to myself and I'll never let that child leave me.
Child could be 30, 40, 50 years old but I'll hold on to that child I won't let it go. That isn't
proper motherhood. Proper motherhood can say though give me a child and from the day that child
(25:41):
is born I will love that child with my soul my life my all but in my heart that child is yours God.
It is yours. Yours to have glory from the life of that child is yours. I'll give myself through all the years that you allow me whatever degree of giving I can have. In those early years it'll be so complete and as the years go along it'll be less and less complete and the time may come when it's not quite so much because they've left they've married they have their own family and you won't have as much occasion to be with them but still the giving will go to the family.
(26:16):
And you won't have as much occasion to be with them but still the giving will go on and godly motherhood it'll go on and the desire to give it will go on and but never will there be that violation in that all of that love and all that giving never will there be that violation of also giving that child to the Lord.
These two have to be together.
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A desire to receive from God and a desire to give to God that fulfills motherhood and if you twist that if you thwart it it becomes very very ugly.
God gave her her son Samuel was born and she came up and praised him for that child and she gave him into the Lord's house.
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He had no hands even for service from the time he was weaned. He was probably only three years of age when he was in full time service for the Lord.
If there's ever a case in the word of God of a little child leaving his mother to serve the Lord at the earliest age possible here it is.
The Lord Jesus didn't enter into his ministry until he was 30. Samuel entered into his ministry when he was three.
(27:39):
Amazing and she prayed with praise to God having received that child when I read this I thought this is so clear of what motherhood should really be directed at.
The prayer of Hannah from chapter two verse one through verse 10 if you read it obviously I can't cover it all.
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Times gone but here it is you read it and you know what you see in it.
Line upon line line upon line line upon line of praise to the Lord for what the Lord is and how supreme he is overall things how merciful he is to give.
(28:25):
In other words the prayer of Hannah in her motherhood is not Lord thank you for giving me this son so that I can have my emotional needs met in my home.
In all through those years through this child thank you for how much I got that is not the emphasis in this prayer.
(28:55):
By the way a mother has the privilege of receiving that wonderful encouragement emotional support strength joy through the child.
Child becoming a teenager teenager becoming an adult has all of that coming to her but there's a thrust right here.
(29:16):
That her heart has to be drawn immediately to God her joy should be in the Lord in the Lord as the source of it all.
A mother that understands motherhood as it should be understood is drawn to praise God.
Not for what she got from primarily but for what he is.
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In other words it's like going through a trial.
Why would God send you through a certain trial so that you could cry out to him and see him provide and having him provide you give thanks and praise and say thank you Lord for the trial because you like the trial course not.
But because your heart has learned how to love him more you've seen him provide more.
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And in the case of motherhood motherhood isn't easy.
Don't have to instruct you ladies.
I mean you start out with a helpless thing that needs attention in every kind of conceivable physical way.
And some of them aren't attractive until you deliver them over at a wedding service into the hands of a mate.
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Who's now going to find out some other sides of the issue.
It hasn't all been a picnic.
But motherhood lived in the Lord, in the strength of the Lord and looking to the Lord,
getting in the most unhappy situation, the most difficult situation.
Drawing strength from God constantly in giving and meeting the needs of that child
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give praise to God for the glory.
I mean for the blessing of his grace and provision.
It's a wonderful privilege to be the vessel for God to work through to accomplish something in a life.
That mother has a privilege of teaching, of guiding, of instruction, of correction.
She has the blessing also of honor.
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And that goes on for all of life.
Being honored by that child.
A life relationship that never ends.
And even in the last years to have that child give back.
Even perhaps for the mother after the father may be gone.
The child may have to step in and make provision and care for the mother
in ways that the husband can't because he's gone.
(31:40):
Might come to that.
Might come even to the physical provision and care daily again.
In other words, in the scripture would teach us this.
We shouldn't shut our hearts as children to doing that for our mothers any more than our
mothers shut their hearts to doing it for us as babies and as young children.
If you will provide for your mother and you see the Lord's hand in doing it,
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you'll be able to give praise to him and you'll pray as Hannah prayed.
And if you as a mother would receive a child and know the grace of God in rearing that child,
you'd be drawn to pray like Hannah prayed.
And one other prayer.
In Luke chapter one, there is another prayer that's parallel with this one.
(32:26):
And I won't even turn to it because our time is gone.
But it is the great prayer and parallel of this and it's a prayer of Mary.
And when you read what is often called a magnificent of Mary, her prayer of praise to God for being
able to be the one to bear a man child that would become the Savior of the world.
(32:48):
What does she pray?
Thank you Lord for all those tender moments.
I'm going to have this little child on my knee.
Thank you Lord for all the emotional fulfillment I'm going to get.
Walking down the road holding his little hand.
No, Mary's delight is in the Lord in what he is and his supremeness over all things that he should
(33:12):
bless her by making her the vessel for doing that thing.
But yet she got all of those blessings.
Above all women, Mary had the privilege of having that little hand in her hand and watching
that one grow up.
And Mary was there the day he was crucified.
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And her heart hurt as any mother's heart would hurt that had her child
brutally, mercilessly murdered in front of her eyes.
But she could still praise God because God is her Savior.
(34:02):
And God would give her the grace to give herself, to make it possible for her to give herself
and to be fulfilled in that little life's growth and ultimately trust in Christ, worship,
the blessing of seeing the fruit of God come out of that life.
(34:23):
God would be praised and the prayer of mothers is this, praise the Lord.
Because in motherhood I've learned how to praise the Lord more, seeing him work through me.
That means you might have a child that's not as intelligent as another child.
(34:44):
You may have a child's not as attractive as another child or you may have a genius child,
but listen, that doesn't in any way limit what you can know as motherhood.
Whatever that child's needs are, whatever can be given through you for that child's sake will
fulfill motherhood.
(35:06):
For any woman would be the channel of God's grace for another child.
And you can give God praise and glory that he worked because actually the praise has to be
for God for a mother to be a mother. We praise mothers, but listen, the real one to be praised
(35:27):
today is the Lord God that made them and the Lord God that sustained them and gave them the grace,
the love to be mothers.
I thank God for mothers. I thank God for my mother, but I thank God for God. I thank God for my Savior.
(35:50):
He's made it all possible. My mother, I've told you this many times, but my mother, to my knowledge,
died without receiving Christ as Savior. I always add to that, I hope I'm wrong.
I hope I see her when I get to heaven, but I have no assurance from anything she said,
(36:14):
and I was there the moment she died. I have no assurance from anything she ever said to me in my
life that she will be there. Yet I will tell you, I thank God for my mother.
He worked in his grace through her for my blessing beyond my understanding.
She was a vessel of the great grace of God, and I give praise to him
(36:43):
for her motherhood. And if a woman can do that, she can step into that even right now.
The joy of motherhood will never leave her.
I'd like to close in prayer. I wonder if you're a mother here today, if you just stand,
(37:06):
we'll just pray and thank God for you in a very special way. Would you?
You have three cats, doesn't qualify.
All right, let's close in prayer. Father, thank you for these vessels that you've
specially given us in this life, or mothers, and even in this church body to have the blessing of
(37:33):
mothers around us and see their trusting of your grace to be the channel for love and care for
children that you've given. Thank you for the older women that have the testimony for us.
How faithful of God you are and how wonderful you are as they've poured out their life energy
(37:54):
that you have sustained and they would give glory and praise to you. And we thank you for
them individually. In Jesus name, Lord, bless them today. Amen.
All right, so there we have it. Another one for this week on Mother's for Mother's Day.
So I know it's when this is coming out. It's not on Mother's Day, but well, maybe you could save
(38:19):
it and come back next year for Mother's Day and listen to it then. But it's good at any time.
It doesn't have to be on Mother's Day. So thank you listeners for listening and thanks to the
pastor for a message. And I want to say that you can listen to the back episodes if you haven't
already on the website or on the various website platforms like Podbean or Apple Podcasts.
(38:49):
You can listen to the back episodes there or you can listen to them on YouTube. We have there.
And there's a new platform which I'm on and it's on a rumble. Those do not have the back episodes
goes. I started off at episode 70 something 72. I think 73 something like that. But if you're
(39:12):
unrumbling, you want to hear some of the back episodes, you could go to YouTube or the other
podcast providers of your choice. We should be we should be there so you could check that out.
Okay, and let's see what else. I had a website you could check that out.
www.legacybiblepodcast.com. If you have any questions or comments, you can leave them there
(39:39):
or if you just want to email me direct. It's legacy Bible podcast at gmail.com. So you could do that.
So until then, I'll see you again next week. And hopefully you'll have a great week.
And also have a great day. All right. See you next week.
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