"Because She Is a Mother"

One of my all time favorite talks from General Conference (a great big huge gathering of our church in which the leaders of our church speak to the world) is a talk given by Elder Jeffrey R. Holland, "Because She Is a Mother".  This is my talk/article I chose to focus on today.

Elder Holland begins his talk with some lines from Victor Hugo, and I too am going to quote them:

"She broke the bread into two fragments and gave them to her children, who ate with eagerness.  'She hath kept none for herself,' grumbled the sergeant.

"'Because she is not hungry,' said a soldier.

'"No,' said the sergeant, 'because she is a mother.'"

This is how I am feeling today.  Not hungry because I do not have any food to eat.  Quite the opposite, actually.  We've just had dinner, and my little chilies are all in bed.  I can hear the boys still playing, even though I wish they were trying to quietly sleep.

No, I feel this way today, because I tried to give them everything I could, and tonight I feel that there is nothing left.  And this is only Day One of my challenge!

Something to remember, Elder Holland shares a quote from a letter from a sister, to whom I will forever be grateful.  She writes to Elder Holland regarding "the one thing that keeps her going": "Through the thick and the thin of this, and through the occasional tears of it all, I know deep down inside I am doing God's work.  I know that in my motherhood I am in an eternal partnership with Him.  I am deeply moved that God finds His ultimate purpose and meaning in being a parent even if some of His children make Him weep."

Today, even though I have nothing left to give, I was doing God's work.  That's what I need to remember.  That's what each of us need to remember.  As we sit down at the end of the day, hopefully to a quiet house (although that seems to rarely happen) and look at the dinner dishes on the table, and the laundry sitting on the couch waiting to the folded, we remember what we spent our time doing.

Do I want my children to remember me doing the dishes all the time? Or folding the laundry as they run around me?  Do I want them to remember me barking at them to get homework done or to practice the piano (although these are probably ones they will remember for sure)?

No!  I really want them to remember us hiking together.  I want them to remember us swimming in the summer at the pool.  I want them to remember us visiting the zoo, or the farm.  Playing at the park, or playing a game on a rainy afternoon.  I want them to remember us reading stories together, and reading the scriptures together.

In closing tonight, I just want to end with something Elder Holland says, "If you will show others, including your children, the same caring, compassionate, forgiving heart you want heaven to show you; if you try your best to be the best parent you can be, you will have done all that a human being can do and all that God expects you to do."