Priscilla Shirer - Building a Legacy in Motherhood

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
I remember feeling like my mom was superhuman. I mean
when I was little. To me, she was an actual,
literal superhero. I remember this one time that my brother,
Anthony and I we were in the house, probably with
our siblings as well, but I remember my mom had
turned on the stove right before walking into the garage,
which at the time that is where our washer and

(00:20):
dryer was. So she turned the stove on and got
dinner going, and she just walked out to put a
load of laundry in, but Anthony locked the door behind her,
and I remember hearing her from the other side of
the door trying to explain how to unlock the door,
but we couldn't figure it out. That I remember walking
around to the window and looking out of the window
as I watched my mom run in what looked like

(00:40):
to me superhuman strength, leap over the fence line to
run to the neighbor's house to call nine to one
one to get somebody to come unlock the door as
smoke began to come out of the windows and fill
the house. I will never forget that picture. She looked
superhuman to me or that one time, because you know,
all four of us were always getting in trouble. One
time when we were running errands with our mom, and

(01:02):
we were in the car, and she pulled up to
a bookstore and went inside the bookstore. The whole front
of the bookstore was all windows, so she could see
us and we could see her as she stood right
there at the desk to buy what she was buying.
But one of us kids decided that we would shift
the gears on the car, and she saw the car
start slowly rolling backwards. I watched my mom through that windshield,

(01:26):
burst out of that store through the front door, and
run towards the car, reach inside the driver's side, and
while the car was moving, she's running along to put
the car back in park. I'm telling you, my mom
was a superhero. But now, in hindsight, now that I'm
a little bit older, probably have a little bit more
perspective and have children of my own, I realized that

(01:49):
the things that made my mom superhuman were really these
internal characteristics, things you can't really put a finger on,
and you don't notice them when you're younger, but they
come alive to you the older and older you get.
And now I also realized that it's not because she
was superhuman. It was because she had the power of

(02:10):
the Holy Spirit of God living on the inside of her.
You know, I've become more and more aware of and
appreciative of those values, not just the older that I've gotten,
but particularly in this past year. You see, last year
this time, my mom was diagnosed with a cancer that
the doctors told us upfront they didn't think there was

(02:32):
anything they could do to help it to be cured
or resolved. And even though many of them still prayed
with us for a miracle, they told us medically they
couldn't do anything to help her. And we had so
many people around the world throughout the past nine months
that were praying fervently that God would do something to

(02:52):
eradicate the cancer and to bring her back to full health.
And in the last three months of her life, as
we sort of literally moved in to care for her
and to care for my dad, we begin to notice
there in November and December of twenty nineteen that her
health was rapidly declining. We celebrated with her. We celebrated

(03:13):
her seventieth birthday on December first, that she wanted so
much to get to. We celebrated her robustly and fully
her grandkids surrounding her, reading her letters that each and
every one of her grandkids and her two great grandchildren
were able to read to her. To celebrate her seventieth birthday,
we even made it to Christmas, even though by then
she could barely communicate with us, she was still there.

(03:36):
It was during those last weeks of her life that
I saw those intangible qualities that I want so much
for myself, and that I appreciate her leaving that kind
of a legacy for me. It's the intangible stuff, like
a peace that passes all understanding. Anybody that can still
have joy, that can still have a smile on their face,

(03:59):
that has invested so well in family, that all her
family wants to do is surround her day and night
to be near her, Her grandchildren piled up on her bed.
What a heritage, What a legacy. On December thirtieth, she
went home to be with the Lord. She went to heaven,
and over that month before she took her last breath,

(04:21):
I saw her slowly but surely loosening her grip on
earth and looking forward to Heaven. In the end. She's
even taught me how to die, you know. It reminds
me of one of her favorite passages, Joshua chapter four
and Joshua chapter four. The children of Israel are headed
towards the promised Land. They've just crossed over the Jordan River,

(04:43):
but they turn around and they put stones of remembrance
in place, so that when future generations would ask what
do these stones mean, they could be reminded about the
faithfulness of God. I'm so grateful because that's what my
mom did for me. She's left stones of remembrance, and
my kids are asking about integrity and consistency and character

(05:07):
and faithfulness and all those intangible things. And when they
ask me about those stones, I can point to a
woman who left them behind for us to see and
pattern our lives according to I want to encourage you
to do the same. Remember that those intangible qualities, those
daily decisions to live well, they matter. Happy Mother's Day.