I have no idea why May was chosen for Mother’s Day.
But I like to think maybe it is because (at least where I live) new life is emerging, needing nurture and care and bringing color back to the world.
Many of the most precious women in my life are newly or soon-to-become mothers.
There is much pressure in our world surrounding mothering.
Many people of influence telling us what it should and should not look like.
Some of it is useful, a lot of it is just style or trend or marketing.
Much of it creates an overwhelming sense of impossibility.
And I don’t think that is what God intends for those with whom He partners to provide and nurture life.
For things to grow, really just a few things are absolutely needful.
Light.
Water.
A secure and nourishing place to put down roots.
We won’t always know how to parent exactly right.
But we do know the source of all of those needful things.
He will give light, water, sustaining and security because He is those things.
So our most important and real work is to take them to that source and let them see that WE need that source as well throughout our lives.
When in His presence, they (and we) cannot help but thrive and flourish, growing steadily into our full, divine potential.
I think there is something to what William Martin wrote:
Do not ask your children to strive for extraordinary lives.
Such aiming may seem admirable, but it is the way of foolishness.
Help them instead to find the wonder and the marvel of an ordinary life.
Show them the joy of tasting tomatoes, apples and pears.
Show them how to cry when pets and people die.
Show them the infinite pleasure in the touch of a hand.
And make the ordinary come alive for them.
The extraordinary will take care of itself. (The Parent’s Tao Te Ching: Ancient Advice for Modern Parents)
Life is mostly lived in the ordinary.
So if we can embrace the beauty of those things, and I would add, point them to the Origin of all light, beauty, and truth, we will have given them the superlative gift of learning to live in the wonder and peace of genuine, sustaining, love-filled life.
It is a marvelous thing to nurture life.
To witness growth and blooming and fulfilling the measure of creation.
It is also challenging.
There are times when growth is imperceptible, when we wonder if that scraggly thing will ever reach its potential and when the care it requires to help asks more of us than we know if we can give.
Which is the very reason we remember that we are not the ultimate provider of the needful things.
We are the connection between them and Him.
And He never fails, never tires and never gives up.
In Him, each unique life finds purpose, fulfillment and glory.
Growing into the beauty and fullness of life we all came here to obtain.
