Mother’s Day   5-14-2006

Read Genesis 7:1-10

Key verse Genesis 7:1
Then the Lord said to Noah, “Go into the ark, you and all your household, for I have seen that you alone are righteous before me in this generation.” Genesis 7:1

She is the mother of everyone you will ever meet, yet we don’t know her name. For someone who was so very important, it is amazing how little we know about her. We know neither where she was born nor where she lived - not even where she died. We do know, however, that she lived during a period of world calamity and distress - unlike anything the world had ever known before or since. We also know she supported her husband and became a woman who rightfully takes her place in the annals of history.

Who is this mother we are honoring today? In the Bible, she is identified only as “the wife of Noah.” For lack of better identification, let’s call her Mrs. Noah. Does it ever strike you as strange that someone so very important, so little has been written about her?

Her husband is mentioned over 50 times in the Bible. Ezekiel describes Noah as being a man of righteousness (Ezekiel 14:14.) In the New Testament, Peter mentions Noah in both of his books (1 Peter 3:20 and  2 Peter 2:5). He describes him as “a preacher of righteousness”.

Today all the people of the world can trace their lineage to this woman. And when you look at the record carefully, you have to immediately recognize what a great woman she was and how much she contributed to the history of humanity. First, there is Mrs. Noah, the wife of an unpopular preacher. Behind almost every successful man there is a woman, and few ever consider what it must have been like to live with a man who was the mockery of his day. Think how discouraged old Noah must have been facing the crowd of hostile men and women who laughed at him when he pronounced the coming judgment of God. Then, too, Mrs. Noah knew the heartache that comes to preachers’ wives today when there is a failure. Second, Mrs. Noah is the mother of three sons who grew up playing with the children of those whose values were so much different from what she and her husband believed. Mrs. Noah did a good job with her boys. surely Mother Noah had to wipe tears from her boy’s eyes when their friends mocked them because of their father’s strange ideas. She was there when they needed her; and , subsequently, not a one of her three sons was lost.      I saw a cartoon in a Saturday Evening Post magazine. It showed Mrs. Noah with her fishing gear standing on the deck of the Ark. She said to her husband “Mr. Noah, how could you, put on the Ark, only one pair of fishing worms?”

PRAYER: Lord today we honor our mothers, and other mothers like Mrs. Noah . We remember how they taught us to be good and to love everybody. Reach deep into the hearts of those who are conformed to this world and transform their hearts to turn them toward loving you. Amen.          

Luther McCollum