Mother May I

Okay, I appreciate that. Thank you, Jeff. It's good to be back with you. I came with bodyguards today. I kind of didn't come with last week. Couldn't trust those two guys last week, but I can trust these two. So it's good to be back, good to be with all of you. I wish I could be here next weekend, but I will be leaving, I think it's Friday, going over to Bahamas. I haven't seen them in 16 months, something like that, because they had the terrible hurricane before. They've had a couple years of tough, so I'm looking forward to being there. And then I'll be back the week after that, so I look forward to that. The title today, the sermon is, of course, Mother May I. Did anybody ever play that as a kid? Yes, almost everybody did. Remember where somebody would stand up and the others would be back there when you were young kids, and you'd have to get permission to come forward. And if you didn't, then you had to go back and pay the price for not showing respect. To whoever the mother figure was at that time. Well, as you know, tomorrow is Mother's Day. And this entire country takes one day a year and sets aside time for us to show respect, to show love towards our mothers, show respect towards you who are mothers. That's the question, is God on her mothers? I think most of you would say yes, He does. He gives the fifth commandment, it doesn't say, thou shalt honor thy fathers, that your days on earth may be long, does it? It says, you shall honor your mother and your father. On the same level. He also tells us that is a promise, a commandment with a promise that your days on earth may be long. Why honor mothers? Have you thought about it? Why honor mothers if God is, you know, from His perspective? But I'd like to look at from our perspective. Not that I am telling you anything you probably don't know, but I may give a few details you've never heard before. Why honor mothers? For one thing, they say, they give us birth. Don't they? They give us birth and even as Genesis 3 tells us that that birth will result in what? Pain. Pain. It can be excruciating. I know women who have been pregnant and they've been sick for seven out of nine months. Some were not even able to leave their beds because of issues and problems. Some have been in labor. One was twenty-eight hours in labor, in pain. For most mothers, they will tell you that it was worth it, that all that pain was worth it. My mother told me one time, I was almost in pain. I was almost worth it. If she's watching today, she was joking, I hope. But then, once they give birth, it continues. The job picks up with even more intensity as they will feed us. Feed us because we can't feed ourselves. We can't get by. So they take the time, the patience, and show the love of feeding us morning, noon, night, and as some have experienced three or four times during the night, mothers go without sleep for days on end. They did it for us. You do it for your children. They change us. Yes, change us. Anybody have an idea how many changes there are in the first year, the average child? Two thousand. Two thousand changes is the average in the very first year. But it doesn't end there. In the life of the average child, there are over seven thousand changes in a child's life. Time. And a job most of us don't want to say, pick me, I'll do it. I remember changing my younger brother and sister. I was about twelve or thirteen and watched my mother do it and then she said, well you need to learn to do it. No, I didn't. But it made me appreciate what she had done for me. They cook for us. Mothers cook for us over the eighteen years.

Two meals a day. You know how many meals your mother cooked for you? Over two meals a day.

Ten thousand meals. Amazing, isn't it? Ten thousand meals made for me, made for you.

Humbling. It is a humbling thought. They guide us. Guide us so we can be more comfortable.

You won't make mistakes. Were you told not to put your hand on a hot stove? I had to be told more than once. Because I just got close and it was warm. But not warm enough for me to stop. They guide us. They teach us. Mothers spend so much more time at the beginning, usually with the child.

Teach us right from wrong, trying to make us into decent human beings. So that when we become adults, we do not have those problems. We know what to do and why to do it. But then so many mothers pray for us, don't they? They pray for us and they pray before the birth. They pray during the birth, after the birth and never stop praying. That's what mothers do. They have such an impact on us. And most of all, mothers love us. They love us. They show an unconditional kind of love. They love us. That, no matter who we are, we cannot reciprocate that. We can try. But there's a deep, deep love.

It's why they do it. About 15 years ago, a mother in California was going to work with her 18-month child in the back seat. And in California at the time, she lived on a windy road. Floods came. Her husband was already at work. But he was worried about his wife and their child that morning. And when she didn't show up at childcare and she didn't show up at work, he left his work with a couple of friends and they backtracked all the way.

And they saw where somebody had left the road on a curve and had had a little bit of trouble. They hit a couple of trees and had gone down to this raging river. And when they got there, they saw the car was half submerged into the river as it was going through. They rushed down there and they heard a child crying because the water was all the way up to the windows of the car. They had to break the back window. And there they saw in the front seat was a little child with his feet on its mother's breast. And the woman had her hands up like this holding the child.

She had succumbed to hypothermia, but she kept her child high enough. And her arms were so locked in that loving and saving position that it gave life to her child. There are millions of stories like that of mothers. It's what they do. It's almost as if it's ingrained in them. It's as if it's not that's just who they are and what they do. What did you call your mom? I called mine, of course, mom all my life. Anybody else have another name? Mama, Mama, Mother, Mommy, right? Mommy. We all have those terms of endearment. I don't know whether even Norman Bates from Psycho Movie used to say, Mother.

I've said Mother a couple of times being a smart aleck to my mom, but most of the time it was always Mom. It's a relationship, and it's interesting that there's a game called Mother May I, not Father May I, because when you're younger you're used to getting more instruction from your mother than your father. And it's so nice. It's amazing that God never gave a man the ability to give birth.

Not even Caitlyn Jenner can do that, even if they want to, because God created the mother for the child, and the child for the mother. And you see it's such a special relationship that even on basketball tournaments or football or whatever, the young guy has a chance in college and he's showing for making these heroics afterwards. What does he say? Hey, Mom! Hi, Mom! Very seldom does he say Dad, because when you're out on your own you begin to realize just how much your mother has done for you. I think we all do, even if you didn't have the best mother in the world.

Right? And some of us, I cannot say that, some have not had good mothers, but she still gave you life, breath, and a future. So looking at the Bible, can God relate to mothers? I think He can. He not only relates to them, He admires them. He respects them, since they are part of His greatest creation. Just like the Bible says, God is the greatest in the world. Genesis 1 and verse 27, New Living Translation. So God created human beings in His own image. In the image of God, He created them both male and female.

So the male and the female both are made in the image of God. He just didn't make everything in one. There are those unique qualities that He instills. He has put in the DNA of a man that are His, and He's also put these things in a woman. Is that the reason He says, for them to come together and be complete so that when they're together they are one flesh? I think so. Because you begin to see the qualities. As the old song goes, you complete me. My wife completes me. She shows me things that I would not do on my own. And that was so important.

Scripture helps us to, if I can go there in the New King James Version, Scripture helps us to kind of see that duality of God in both the male and the female, both the husband and the wife. We will turn to Hosea 11, verse 3. Hosea 11, verse 3. I read from the New King James Version here. And it says, I taught Ephraim to walk, taking them by their arms, but they did not know that I healed them.

I drew them with gentle cords, with bands of love, and I was to them as those who take the yoke from their neck.

I stooped and fed them, visuals of a loving mother who stoops to pick up the child. It's how God thought of Israel. Even Christ said, I feel, as He looked over, I feel like a mother hen that wants to pull chicks, too, for protection. Like you go with me to Isaiah, and I'm going to Isaiah 49, if you're out there. Isaiah 49, verse 14. Yet Jerusalem says, the Lord has deserted us. The Lord has forgotten us. Reading from the New Living Translation. Never can a mother forget her loving child, her nursing child. Can a mother forget that? Can she feel no love for the child she has born? But even if it were possible, making the most extreme case, because it's almost impossible.

For a mother, not to love her child. It said, I would not forget you. I would not forget you, that your mother wouldn't.

Let me go to Isaiah 66. And it's empowering because Isaiah 66 talks about a future time. A future time that we're all looking forward to. A time when Jerusalem will be recovered from the damage it has done. And Christ's Second Coming.

And chapter 66 helps us all see what kind of world we believe. And how important and why He will forever save Jerusalem. 66 New Living Translation, verse 7. Before the birth pangs even began, Jerusalem gave birth to a son. Picturing like a mother. Who has ever seen anything as strange as this? Who has ever heard of such a thing? Has a nation ever been born in a single day? Has a country ever come forth in a mere moment? But by the time Jerusalem birth pangs began, her children will be born. Would I ever bring this nation to the point of birth and then not deliver it? Ask the Lord. No. No. I would never keep this nation from being born. Says your guide. Rejoice with Jerusalem. Be glad with her. All you who love her and all who mourn for her. Drink deeply of her glory, even as what? Metaphorically speaking, even as an infant drinks at its mother's comforting breast. He's going to be there. He's going to make sure that Jerusalem is safe.

Verse 12. This is what the Lord says, I will give Jerusalem a river of peace and prosperity. The wealth of the nations will flow to her. Her children will be nursed at her breast, carried in her arms, and held on her lap. I will comfort you in Jerusalem as, as what? A mother comforts her child. God is looking forward to that time so that he, like a mother, will preserve Jerusalem and the entire world at that point. He's going to save the world as a mother would save her children. God so cherishes a mother's love and total devotion. Do we?

In one way it's good that there is a mother's day, and another it's sad that there has to be a day set aside. And now not every day can we cherish and appreciate the love of a mother.

I'll ask you a question now. Most respected mothers in the Bible. Think on it for a few seconds. The most respected, maybe appreciated, maybe even honored mothers in the Bible. Who's on your list? Anybody? Moses' mother. Some said, Jacobed, but a Yacobed? Yacobed. Why Yacobed?

Well, then do whatever. Somebody else said... Yep. Somebody said, Mary? Jesus' mother. I guess we don't have to ask why, do we? Angel shows up and says, you're going to have a chop. What a shock. She wasn't even married. What a shock. She just engaged. Who? Sarah. Why Sarah? Mother of Isaac. The mother of all... The mother of all the French children. Which was born. The seed of everybody came from Isaac. Was he in Chicago? Or Austria? Reminiscent of Eve? Mother of all? Yes, sir? Ruth recognized the importance of carrying on the line when she was a widow to a husband. She recognized the need to carry on the line when she understood the Jewish law. You mean Naomi? Naomi's law. Ruth understood that law. She came to know it, apparently. Yeah, she said, your God will be my God. She went to go at it to fulfill the role she was to play in having a child. And we know she had children, right? We know who her great-great-grandson was. Yes, true. A diamond in the Messiah. Yes. Anybody else? Yes, Ampi. I think it was Samson's mother. Samson's mother, who wouldn't cut his hair. My mother was always on me, younger. Why don't you cut your hair? Samson's mother.

Samuel. What was his mother's name? Hannah. Very good. Yes, and she gave him up. That had to be tough, because that was her only child. She couldn't have a child, could she? And God blessed, but then again, He gave her children after that. Can you imagine, every year it says that Hannah would make a little uniform for Samuel, a little priest uniform. All the time he was growing up. So he'd walk out there with Eli, and hear this little mini-me. He would be there. Amazing! Anybody else? Think of someone else? Leah. Rachel and Leah. And she had most of the sons of her husband, was that Jacob? The majority of the sons, yes. The majority of the sons, right? She died. And she was...he is...because she was at his favorite. That's right. That's right. True. True. Mother Eve? Yes, she gave life. It'd be interesting to see her someday, won't it? See where it all began. Mother. Bathsheba to Solomon. Solomon thought so much of her that he actually had a chair brought in next to his throne, so she could sit there with him, showing that it had never been done before, but it was followed afterwards as a Queen Mother. I was going to point out a pure lady that we don't know much about. This is 1 Corinthians chapter 4, and you go through the lineage and all this genealogy in Chronicles. There aren't very many women's names mentioned, but there are some women's names mentioned. And one case of one woman whose name is mentioned three times. And that is? It's unusual, because it's the only one. And her name is Neera. Neera? It says in 1 Chronicles 4, verse 5, and 6. That's an obscure mother. But God noted it. The point is, he noted it. Not only did he note it one time, but the other is he just won. And he was another lady he mentioned twice. But in this case, he mentions her three times. There's got to be something about it that was special. Yeah, something. But he noted it. Interesting. Anybody else? Yes, ma'am. Did they do this? Did they do that with the mother? Yes. It had to be. Yes. She didn't think she was going to have a child. Did she? Yes. Anybody think of Rebecca? Rebecca? Well, you take Rebecca, you may say, well, wait a minute. She was a great mother, too. Jacob, just not so great to Esau. But you'd have to say to Jacob, she had a pretty good mother willing to do whatever it took.

Misguided as it was. And she had to be because she couldn't get him out of the house until he was 77 years old.

That's failure to launch.

Yes, Trish?

Yes, yes. She's the one that out in the desert. She looked after him. Very good point. Yes.

All good names. Everybody that I basically had down here. Except for one. The time I have left here today, I want to honor A, if not the most dedicated mother in the entire Bible. It's a story of such incredible love that it's not found anywhere else in the entire tea of the Bible. And it paints a picture of extreme devotion, emotion, and most of us wouldn't even know her name. I will read the rest of this and tell her story now, but I also want to tell you the way I am pronouncing the names and the words are from the Hebrew. There are some transliterations in English and so forth that you have, but I want to pay her the respect of what she was called at the time. So in case you wonder, wow, how did you know all these names? It took a few hours to dig these up in Hebrew and pronounce them and listen to them being pronounced quite a few ways. But I do that, not to impress you, but to impress upon you.

There's honor in a name. God shows that so many times. There's honor in His name and He honors people with their name. You have to remember, if you've ever been to Hawaii or ever announced things in Hawaii, the eyes are always pronounced as E. And in Hebrew, that runs most of the time. If you read Isaiah, you hear it over there. It's Isaiah. So I want you to look because the name of the woman is Risba. Her name is Risba. Risba. And Risba was a concubine. Risba was a concubine. And what were concubines? They were favored women of kings, favored women of rich people. Rich men. Concubines were not always taken to be concubines to give birth to children. Now we're usually left to the women who were queens or princesses. You think like that. Concubines were typically taken because, and they were beautiful. They were extremely attractive, were usually good conversationalists. They were very interesting women. And in this case, Risba found the heart of King Saul. So much so that she had two sons with the king, which didn't always happen in concubines.

And it's so interesting because Risba was there during most of Saul's rulership and part of David's. And even it was said by the Hebrews that she was such an attractive woman even into her 50s, 60s, that she would draw attention when she walked down the streets. Wherever she went, people noticed her. So much so that Saul, after he died his first cousin, Abner, who was the head of the military, top general, claimed Risba. Even though she was supposed to be in the king's court, she was not.

Abner found her to be intoxicated. So she was not only a gorgeous woman, an exciting woman. I want to show you today what a determined and absolutely fascinating mother that she was. She was a voted mother of two sons, Armoni, A-R-M-O-N-I, Armoni, and Mephebo Shalakh.

Mephebo Shalakh. I can say it quicker, but I'm trying to get you... It's actually spelled M-E-P-H-I-B-O-S-H-E-T-H. Mephebo Shalakh. Mephebo Shalakh.

I'd like you to go with me now, or you can watch up here, because I will be reading from the New Living Translation since it puts it in a better way, easier to understand. And I want to tell you this incredible story, so you can just sit and listen, or you can read it up here. But I hope you can appreciate her as much as God did. And what incredible impact it should make on all of us. So I read from 2 Samuel 21, verse 1, There was a famine during David's reign that lasted for three years. So David asked the Lord about it, and the Lord said, The famine has come because Saul and his family are guilty of murdering the Gibeonites. So the king summoned the Gibeonites. They were not part of Israel, but were all that was left of the nation of the Amorites. The people of Israel had sworn not to kill them. Well, what's interesting there? They swore before God. That incredible story is in Joshua 9, verse 19-20. You can read it. Even though the Amorites at that time came and lied, falsified, it's an incredible story in itself, so that they could be accepted, and that they went to great lengths to try to make them believe that they weren't from their areas, they knew that the tribes of Israel were wiping everybody out. And they were living in the tribe of Benjamin, which was just north of Jerusalem. And so they knew it was a matter of time before they were wiped out. They didn't want to fight, so they made a story that they lived way far away. And they got these old horses, old mules, and brought them down, and then they got old bread, molded bread, and said, We've come a long way to make peace with you. And Joshua, without checking with God first, accepted them, and said, We will make this peace with you, we will not harm you, we'll let you stay there, we'll bring no harm to you, and we'll swear by our God, we'll make a pact. And they did. And the amazing part of that story is God honored that. Even though the people lied, you do something in His name. It tells us this incredible, it gives us this incredible example that we should not take things lightly. We promise before God, we make an oath, we make a vow, God holds us to that, especially in His name. Just like your marriage vows before God. It's very important. It takes it serious. Well, let's move on to the story here. The people of Israel had sworn not to kill them, but Saul and his zeal, for Israel and Judah had tried to wipe them out. David asked them, What can I do for you? How can I make amends so that you will bless the Lord's people again?

Well, money can't settle this matter between us and the family of Saul. The Gibeonites replied, Neither can we demand the life of anyone in Israel. You have to realize, the Gibeonites, they were living in the area where Saul, the family, put down their roots, where Kish lived, Saul's father.

What can I do then? David asked. Just tell me, and I will do it. Then they replied, It was Saul who planned to destroy us, to keep us from having any place in all the territory of Israel. So let seven of Saul's sons be handed over to us, and we will execute them before the Lord of Gibeon on the mountain of the Lord. All right? The king said, I will do it. The king spared Jonathan's son. What was his name? That's right. Mephibosheleh. Mosheh. Mephibosheh. Well, that's a mouthful. Mephibosheh. Mephibosheh. Because Jonathan had named his son this. This name. But Risba had named her son this also. So it's not Jonathan's son that is about to be taken here. They said the king spared Jonathan's son, who was Saul's grandson because of an oath. David and Jonathan had sworn before the Lord. See how important these oaths are? But God gave them Saul's two sons, Armoni and Mephibosheleh. Mephibosheth. Mephibosheth. I said it how many times? Mephibosheth. Say it five times.

Whose mother was Risba? Daughter of how? Who? Iah. Iah. Iah. Iah. Which you would think, but that's the way they pronounce it. He also gave them the five sons of Saul's daughter, Mirab. Isn't that interesting? Mirab had five sons later by another man. If you go back in history, you can see Mirab was the daughter in which Saul promised to David if he did this thing. And then he backed down and gave her to another man. And it was the raider, Mikal, who he gave. So you have Risba's two sons and Mirab's five sons.

The men of Gibeon executed them on the mountain before the Lord. So all seven of them died together at the beginning of the barley harvest. When is that? Passover. Passover. So we see it happened in the spring, right?

Look what happened. Verse 10, then Risba, the daughter of Iah, the mother of the two men, spread burlap. On a rock and stayed there the entire harvest season. How long's the harvest season?

Four to six months. Four to six months. Are you getting what she did? These bodies were hung. Like this. Like this.

They were hung.

All in a row. And here she was. She was there because she could not take the bodies down.

And so she prevented the scavenger birds from tearing at their bodies during the day and stopped wild animals from eating them at night. This mother, because she was not allowed to take the bodies down, so she would have been there as the bodies became stiff as rigamortis set in. As then the heat, it was spring, into summer. As the heat of the day bloated the bodies and they would have burst. And then the incredible smell that comes from dead flesh. Night after night, after week, after week, after week, till all the skin was gone. Only bones were left hung up there until they too, with the wind, would have been blown down. They would have come tumbling down on her blanket, a burlap. Can you imagine what this mother was thinking, what she did? She so loved her child, she wanted to show there was some honor still in her sons. Can you imagine the incredible job? I read from you from Henry Baker Tristam, wrote a book. He traveled the Holy Lands in the 1800s when you could freely go through all these lands. And he wrote a book, Tristam's Natural History of the Bible. And I'll quote from page 169, as he spent a few years there, studying everything about the Holy Land. He said, if an animal falls at night, it is not attacked till daylight, unless by the jackals and hyenas. What would she have had to contend with at night? The smell would have drawn hyenas, jackals. But if it is slaughtered after sunrise, though the human eye may scan the firmament of the... for a vulture in vain within five minutes of the death, a speck will appear overhead, and wheeling and circling in a rapid downward flight. A huge bird will pounce on the carcass. In a few minutes, a second and third will descend straight down on it. Egyptian vultures, eagles, buzzards, ravens, till the air is darkened by the amount of scavengers. This was a time of an extended drought. There weren't many dying animals. What must she have confronted as she fought off the scavengers, the vultures, by the hundreds, all day until night came? And she's trying to sleep on this burlap. And then she has to worry about the sounds of the animals trying to get to the body.

Let's go back to the verse. She prevented the scavenger birds from tearing at their bodies during the day and stopped wild animals from eating them at night. When David learned what Risbaa, you think he didn't know who she was? He knew who she was. He just forgot. When David learned what Risbaa, Saul's concubine, had done, he went to the people of Jabesh, Gilead, and retrieved the bones of Saul and his son Jonathan. When the Philistines had killed Saul and Jonathan on Mal-Gilboa, the people of Jabesh, Gilead, stole their bodies from the public square in Beth-Shan, where the Philistines had hung them. So David obtained the bones of Saul and Jonathan, as well as the bones of the men the Gibeonites had executed. Then the king ordered that they bury the bones in the tomb of Kish, Saul's father, at the town of Zillah, in the land of Benjamin. After that, God ended the famine in the land. It took Risbaa to wake up a king. It took a mother's love to change an entire famine. Can you imagine her? Those thoughts? It must have gone through her mind night after night. Wouldn't we have quit? Because you see, it went on until the fall harvest. We're talking about the time of the Feast of Tabernacles. So from the time of Passover to the time of the Feast of Tabernacles, this woman, this mother fought day and night without ever stopping. For the love of the Son, for the love of sons. She did it for her Son and God, took care of the rest, taught David a lesson, taught the Gibeonites a lesson. You know they had to be thinking, who's that crazy woman? When will she stop? Not until she got justice for her sons. Risbaa did what no one else would have done, a dedicated mother even after her two sons were dead. She is a mother to remember. Certainly, brethren, God did. He preserved this incredible example for all of us to read. Because he, like us, should know. Mothers are incredible. And mothers, may I wish you a happy Mother's Day tomorrow.