Musings from an Old Mother
Thea Coker

Last Friday night at the Raising Arrows planning meeting, I had an “Ah Ha” moment. Looking around that long table… we were ALL MOTHERS, assorted shapes, a wide range of ages, many different personalities but we all have one thing in common: we are Sisters IN Christ, adopted daughters of our Heavenly Father through the precious life-blood of our Savior and Bridegroom, Jesus Christ!

We have been given one of God’s greatest gifts…to BE A MOTHER. And of course, we all want to be good mothers, or we wouldn’t have been sitting around that table. But, as we are very honest with ourselves, we don’t know how to get it all right! It’s kind of scary. Just as soon as we leave one stage and think maybe we finally have this mothering thing down pat, we enter another stage and realize how utterly helpless and desperate we are. “God help us!”

The very next day was Saturday, August 21st, my oldest son’s birthday. He would be 51 years old. I thought about how much I loved him, how excited I was throughout my pregnancy and then how overwhelmed in love I was when I finally held him in my arms and prayed, “O God, thank You for this precious child and help me be a good mother.” I also thought about my own good mother and how God worked in her life and realized, it’s all GRACE, from beginning to end. GRACE, God’s undeserved favor!

If you know me, you know I’m a storyteller and each story has a hero. And it’s God, not us. If we are to be good mothers, it’s the same…it’s never our great parenting skills, even though we should seek and apply wisdom, but it’s always and forever…God’s grace and His mercies that are new, every single morning, for each stage of our mothering journey!

Oh Mama, keep your eyes on Jesus and in His Word, pray hard, love unconditionally and enjoy the journey! He wins!


Let’s talk about it….

  1. What stage of mothering have you left behind and what lesson/lessons has the Lord taught you?
  2. What stage of mothering are you in now? Are you having any scary thoughts about it? What are you doing to bring those thoughts under the captivity of the Lordship of Christ?