I am a Mother

The doctrine of Motherhood is an eternal one, we are each mothers by the very nature of our earliest spiritual creation as daughters of God, endowed with eternal potential to become like our Mother in Heaven. As declared in the proclamation to the world on the family, “gender is an essential characteristic of individual pre-mortal, mortal, and eternal identity and purpose.” As women the qualities of motherhood and the longing to nurture little children and watch them grow is implicit in our divine nature as daughters of God. “Women for the most part see their greatest fulfillment, their greatest happiness in home and family. God planted within women something divine that expresses itself in quiet strength, in refinement, in peace, in goodness, in virtue, in truth, in love. And all of these remarkable qualities find their truest and most satisfying expression in motherhood.” (Gordon B. Hinckley)

This something planted in women is not as scientist would define it, originating in mere animal instinct, but inherited and cultivated in us through the love and diligent efforts of a loving Eternal Mother in Heaven in our premortal state. “When we sing that doctrinal hymn and anthem of affection, "O My Father," we get a sense of the ultimate in maternal modesty, of the restrained, queenly elegance of our Heavenly Mother, and knowing how profoundly our mortal mothers have shaped us here, can we suppose her influence on us as individuals to be less?” (Spencer W. Kimball) The longing to bear and rear little ones to maturity is manifest with intensity in the breast of women in a truly unique fashion. This “ability is characteristic of and inherent in true womanhood…that only the yearning soul of such a mother can know…This ability and willingness properly to rear children, the gift to love, and eagerness, yes, longing to express it in soul development, make motherhood the noblest office or calling in the world.” (David O McKay)

We are not made mothers simply by the act of childbearing in this brief earthly existence, though motherhood is a profound and important part of our “premortal, mortal, and eternal identity and purpose”; we were made mothers long before, when we were born daughters and not sons of God, we were endowed with potential for eternal motherhood in the our premortal existence. Eve was pronounced “the mother of all living” in the garden by her Father and Husband, long before she was ever a mother of earthly children. In her innocence it was her title, her name, her role, and her eternal destiny. As women it is intrinsic in us to be mothers, to practice the qualities of motherhood in our daily lives, to nurture both physically and spiritually the children the Lord has placed in our arms. “The mother's image is the first that stamps itself on the unwritten page of the young child's mind. It is her caress that first awakens a sense of security; her kiss, the first realization of affection; her sympathy and tenderness, the first assurance that there is love in the world…” (David O McKay)

We know very well the phrase “I am a Daughter of God”; it is a statement of our divine infancy, our spiritual birth in the mansions of our Father. We hold tight to this statement as it reaffirms to us that we have a loving Father who constantly cares for us and who desires our safe return home to him. Let us go one step further in our understanding of who we are, and ask the question, “What is a Daughter of God?” The answer would be found in Genesis “she is the mother of all living.” (Genesis 3:20; Moses 4:26) “I am a Mother” is a statement we should associate with who we are, weather we are mothers to children here and now, or weather we wait on the Lord; we each have the potential of eternal Motherhood, it is who we are now, and who we will be eternally as we follow God’s plan for us.

What is his Plan? He states it simply in the book of Moses when He says, “This is my work and my glory to bring to pass the immortality and eternal life of man.” (Moses 1:39) It is our fathers plan to save his children and bring them home to an eternal life, it is his desire to give us “all he hath”. To gain all our father has and to live forever in his Kingdom we must first embrace his work, and essentially his work is the work of parenthood. In fact this one statement gives us more understanding of who our Father is and what he does than almost any other scripture in the standard works. So much doctrine is packed into such a simple statement.

In the world we are so defined by “what we do” that we sometimes lose track of “what we are”. One of the first things a new acquaintance will ask to get to know you better will be “what do you do?”, it continually amazes me when the look of shock comes across their faces when the reply is simply, “I’m a mom”. And yet, our Father in Heaven, when stating “what he does”, what his work is, he does not say, “well, I create worlds without number and manage the universe.” No he majestically proclaims “This is my work…” I am a Father. The world may never understand the divinity of motherhood, and therefore they may never value its place in the world, but as Sheri Dew put it, “If the day comes when we – meaning covenant women of God – are the only women on earth who find nobility and divinity in motherhood, so be it. For mother is a word that will define a righteous woman made perfect in the highest degree of the celestial kingdom, a woman who has qualified for eternal increase in posterity, wisdom, joy, and influence?”

Elder Neal A. Maxwell once said in regards to our Heavenly Fathers vocation that “God has no distracting hobbies off somewhere in the universe. We are at the very center of his concerns and purposes.” As elect women of God, we are mothers, it is not a temporary condition, and it is an eternal phase. If we are to embrace our divine nature as mothers we too must strive to be like our Father and Mother in Heaven, who have embraced this most important eternal role, and make our vocation in life the work of motherhood. Like our Father in Heaven we too must put our children at the center of our concerns and purposes, our hobbies, educational pursuits, career interests, and other worthy pursuits must not take us from the constant care and teaching of our most important trust, our children.

The prophets and apostles have often spoken of the importance of a mother who is at home with her children, to rear and teach them in the ways of truth. Elder Boyd K. Packer wrote in his talk “For Time and All Eternity” that “This divine service of motherhood can be rendered only by mothers. It may not be passed to others. Nurses cannot do it; public nurseries cannot do it; hired help cannot do it – only mother, aided as much as may be by the loving hands of father, brothers, and sisters, can give full needed measure of watchful care.”

The Proclamation to the World on The Family reaffirms that “children are entitled to birth within the bonds of matrimony, and to be reared by a father and a mother that honor marital vows…” We cannot talk about motherhood as an eternal role without a mention of marriage as an essential part of motherhood; it is the rock upon which it is built, the foundation upon which it thrives. Wife and mother are roles indivisible by design, there are no single mothers in heaven. Dedication and nurturing of her husband can not be separated from the work of motherhood, because fatherhood and motherhood are bound together for eternity. “By divine design fathers are to preside over their families in love and righteousness and are responsible to provide the necessities of life and protection for their families. Mothers are primarily responsible for the nurturing of their children. In these sacred responsibilities fathers and mothers are obligated to help one another as equal partners.” (The Proclamation to the World on the Family)

Even for mothers who are home with their children today, the world is constantly trying to encroach on the family unit in other ways. Richard G. Scott has said that we must “beware of the subtle ways Satan employs to take you from the plan of God and true happiness. One of Satan’s most effective approaches is to demean the role of wife and mother in the home.” Satan works actively to take us from the plan of God at every turn, and what is the plan of God again, it is the work of parenthood. We must not let the world crowd out the precious few opportunities that come up to teach the gospel daily to our children, we must ever be on the lookout for those moments to teach them. If our lives are too busy, and we are over scheduling our time with the hobbies and pursuits of the world we may very easily miss the quiet moments when the instruction of eternity might otherwise take place.

If our desire is to grow into worthy and elect daughters of our Heavenly Father and Mother, and to return and live with them someday, then that desire must be woven into our lives like a golden cord that binds us to the promise of eternal motherhood. The desire for this eternal blessing of motherhood is intrinsically part of our nature as a woman, it begins when we are just little girls rocking our dolls and putting them gently to bed in the nurseries of their youth. It is planted in our hearts as young women, as we lovingly tended to the needs of younger siblings or the little ones in our ward family, it becomes a yearning as a young newly married woman kneels in humble heart felt prayer and pleads with her Father in Heaven to be a mother soon.

There is great joy in motherhood, but it is not without pain. Pain has always been associated with this “highest and holiest calling assumed by mankind”. Heavenly Father said that this is “his work”, work is a word that denotes toil, struggle, and exertion; it is not a word that means ease and tranquility. Even our Father in Heaven who is perfect feels pain in parenthood, “Enoch says in wonder and amazement to this most powerful being in the universe: “How is it that thou canst weep?...Thou art just [and] merciful and kind forever;…Peace…is the habitation of thy throne; and mercy shall go before thy face and have no end; how is it thou canst weep?” (The Grandeur of God, by Jeffery R. Holland) Our Father hears our cries over our children, he understands our sorrows, he shares them, are children are his children.

For those mothers who are blessed with the great joy of marriage and motherhood here and now, there are many struggles inexplicably connected to the teaching and nurturing of God’s precious sons and daughters. Mothers are not strangers to heartbreak and pain. Motherhood is the hardest work that can be assumed by a woman, at times it is exhausting and laden with trials; but when mothers find their strength in the Lord, and exercise faith in his plan they are buoyed up by the power of his spirit.

For those mothers who still desire with all their hearts to begin their eternal calling now, but are for reasons known only to the Lord, denied the wish of their hearts, theirs is the longing that is only quenched by faith in the Lord and his plan for us. Their sorrows are swallowed up in the out pouring of service and love to those around them, their comfort is in the kisses of children who they have given their empty arms too. Their strength is their ability to give to other women and children what only they can give; hearts, hands, and time free of other ties.

For those mothers whose children are grown, and who daily call to their children and plead with them to take hold of the rod of iron, as father Lehi did so long ago, who like Lehi, watch as their children turn away from the love of God. For those mothers whose lives have taken heart breaking turns, and life crashes upon them in their years of maturity, when dreams of youth are left behind and make way for the harder realities of human travail, their strength and their balm of Gilead is the hope of an eternal reunion with their beloved children, and motherhood in their Fathers kingdom.

When our faith falters and we cry for the sorrows and trials of motherhood, or when we cry in confusion at why we are denied the blessings of babies we so desperately long to hold, we need only to remember our Father’s plan for us is to be mothers, not just now but forever. Our Father in Heaven loves us and desires to bless us with eternal motherhood without the heart aches of this earthly probation. If we will live worthy of who we are, if we will prepare ourselves today to be mothers tomorrow we can look forward with an “eye single to the glory of God”, and live forever as mothers who have a fullness of joy.