Mother, Don’t Sell Your Birth Right

Now when Rachel saw that she bore Jacob no children, Rachel envied her sister, and said to Jacob, “Give me children or else I die”. Genesis 30:1 NKJV

The feminist movement of the last forty years have preached the message that woman in our society are treated as second rate citizens, and that they will never feel fulfilled until they take their rightful place at the top of corporate ladder. Yet Connie Chung, a popular TV news anchor, resigned her position just a few years back. The reason? She wanted to stay home and have a baby. She was not fulfilled by being at the top of her profession; she resigned to follow her mother’s heart.

Ann Quindlen make the same decision between her career and her children – she followed her mother’s heart and chose her children. Ann decided to stay home with her kids. Ann had received the Pulitzer prize as a New York Time newspaper columnist and had a good chance of managing the paper in her future. She resigned her position in order to give more time to her three children, ages 11, 9 and 5. Ann Quindlen decided the price of “success” in the professional world was too high. Her values were with her children. Ann had a mother’s heart.

I spent twenty years as a school administrator. Most of my teachers were women and mothers. I watched the struggle in their lives. Teaching is a full time profession working with the children of others. My teachers were good teachers, yet many wanted to stay at home with their own children. Mothering, along with being a “homemaker” is a full time job. Where does a mother place her priorities today?

We are living in a day when couples are choosing to limit the number of children. They are putting profession and possessions before family and relationships. The childless marriage is the fastest growing family category.

Over twenty years ago, Readers Digest, [October 1995] wrote that since 1965, college-educated women seemed to have accepted the idea that babies must take a backseat to professional school and the establishment of a career. Statistics showed that 43.8% of 25-29 year olds were childless. Also, 26% of 30-34 year olds were also childless. This number doubled since 1960.

The article claimed that 20% of all first time births were to 30-44yr olds. Couples who wanted children were opting to have the children later in life. Then they were willing to go to extreme measures to have children, only to discover they could not. The writer warned that these women risked losing out on motherhood all together. The truth is that if a couple puts off having children until their late thirties, that choice decreases the potential to have a child altogether.

Having a single child, for economic reasons only is also very selfish and unwise. The “only” child becomes the center of the parent’s universe and usually the child expects others to view them in that position also. Children growing up together learn compassion, to share attention, and to help the family unit.

God has placed the desire in every woman’s breast for her own children. I do not think it is a cultural thing or just a custom limited to Bible days that caused Rachael to cry out to her husband Jacob, “Give me children—else I die”. Hannah was not satisfied with being the ‘favorite’ wife. She was not fulfilled until God answered her prayer for a child.

Many women would love to have a child, but cannot. If you are one if these, then adopt a child or take in foster children and give them a Christian family. You will be fulfilled.

Mother, you are needed! There can be no greater role than mother. There can be no higher profession than being a Homemaker. Mother, don’t sell your birthright!

Let us, as a church, lift mothers up and celebrate their importance! Remember: “Whoever rocks the cradle — Rules the Nation.” [William Ross Wallace]