...like a mother

Like a mother with her children You will comfort us each day,

giving guidance on our journey, as we seek to find our way.

When we walk through fiery trials, You will help us take a stand;

when we pass through troubled waters, You hold out Your tender hand.

---Jann Aldredge-Clanton, 2000

Motherhood is often a balancing act. When to insist on vegetables first at dinner, when to sneak a little dessert in? When to stretch that last bedtime story to two (or three, or…)? When to let the baby cry it out, when to gather her up in your arms and tuck her in beside you? When shorts pants and knickers, when blue jeans and khakis? When to protect, when to challenge? When to comfort, when to brush off? When to support, when to caution? When to hold on, when to let go?

The same could be said of fatherhood, I’m sure (don’t know, never been a father). The thing is, this holy dance of parenthood is a weaving, the weft and warp that colors the character of our children. And God, in whose image we are created, and our pattern in all things, models for us both the compassion and the courage of a mother or a father for us.

For God offers both comfort and guidance, each in appropriate measure and at appropriate time. And when flood waters or trial fires rise around us, God’s hand is reaching out --- ahead of us, to rescue us; or at our backs, to urge us on to our own brave action. Because, in our best moments, that’s what mothers, and fathers, do.

We can hear You gently saying, “Do not worry, do not fear;

for I’ll always go beside you; every moment I am near.”