It’s Mother’s Day again. All over the country, children of every age will greet their moms with sentimental expressions of love and gratitude. Some will treat their mothers to breakfast in bed; others will give them bouquets of freshly cut flowers. Pastors will honor mothers for the role they play in shaping their children’s faith and for modeling the steadfast love of God.

While we mothers enjoy the meal we didn’t prepare, love the bouquets gracing our tables, and will keep those handwritten notes until the day we die, nevertheless, with each gift, a familiar pang resurfaces for many of us: mom guilt. It never lets up, not even for Mother’s Day. Though these holiday rituals are meant to encourage us, they also remind us of the gravity of our calling and confront us with the reality that we are unequal to the task.

God-Like Calling

A mom’s work is divine work. As God built a world, so women are called to build their homes (Genesis 1; Proverbs 14:1). As God ordered his world at creation (Genesis 1:14–19), so a mother structures and orders the world of her home (1 Timothy 5:14). As God continually clothes and feeds all his creatures (Matthew 6:26, 28–29), so a mom continually feeds and clothes the ones placed in her care (Proverbs 31:15, 21). As God sustains the weary with a word, dishing up the bread of life to nurture souls (Isaiah 50:4; Deuteronomy 8:3), so a wise woman also plates the words of life, measuring her speech by the law of kindness (Proverbs 31:26).

When God opens his hand, his creatures are filled with good things, and the whole earth is satisfied with the fruit of his work (Psalm 104:13, 28). As God’s image-bearer, a mom also opens her hands to nurture her home, filling its inhabitants with good things and seeking to satisfy them with the fruit of her work.

Divine as the work is, however, a mom struggles to keep all the bellies full, having barely begun to feed the souls in her care. Her family trails along behind her, undoing the order she has worked to impose. The roof leaks. The clothes wear out. The food spoils. In place of contented sighs, grumbling can become the white noise of her home. At times, it seems as if no one is satisfied with the fruit of her work, and she despairs of being able to say of her children what Jesus spoke of his disciples: “Not one of them has been lost” (John 17:12).

Not Enough

The apparent futility of her work tempts her to complain: The scope is too big; the demands are unrelenting. Lack of appreciation may tempt her to neglect the work. Success in one area tempts her to pride; failure in another tempts her to despair. Comparison to other moms plagues her, robbing her of joy in her work. Weariness tempts her to emotionally withdraw. More immediately “fulfilling” work distracts her with its delectable-looking fruit. At every turn, sin crouches at the door.

So, when the Mother’s Day card reads, “Thank you for always being there for me,” she remembers how, in her exhaustion the previous night, she quickly ducked out of the bedroom before the child could ask another question.

A simple “thank you for always loving me” summons vivid memories of irritable words and ungracious acts of service.

“Thank you for your sacrifices” recalls the resentment that quickly bubbles to the surface when another fever threatens to cloister her at home.

“This Mother’s Day, give me Jesus.”

Mother’s Day reminds us that we aren’t what we want to be, we aren’t what we should be, that we simply aren’t enough.

But for all this and more, there’s Jesus.

Give Me Jesus

This Mother’s Day, give me Jesus, the one whose blood keeps cleansing me from all unrighteousness (1 John 1:9).

Give me Jesus, the one who beckons me to the throne of grace, where he stands ready and eager to dispense every mercy and help in time of temptation (Hebrews 4:16).

Give me Jesus, who died to deliver me from sin’s tyranny so that I might walk in newness of life and turn in love and mercy to my own children (Romans 6:3–4; Ephesians 2:4–6, 10).

Give me Jesus, who loved to the end (John 13:1).

Give me Jesus, the one who delighted to shoulder the work his Father gave him, a work far beyond the scope of my little world and far beyond the strength of my frail hands (Psalm 40:8).

Give me Jesus, who was not immune to the futility of work under the sun but cried out, “I have labored in vain; I have spent my strength for nothing at all” (Isaiah 49:4 NIV).

Give me Jesus, who died without seeing the fruit of his work.

Give me Jesus, who did not give way to despair, but entrusted himself to God, who would make his will “prosper in [Jesus’s] hand” (Isaiah 53:10).

Give me Jesus, who was raised to see the fruit of his labors and who now redeems all of mine, so that I never need to say, “I have labored in vain,” but can instead joyfully proclaim, “In the Lord [my] labor is not in vain” (Isaiah 49:4; 1 Corinthians 15:58).

Give me Jesus, who walked this path before me and has passed through the heavens, where he now prepares an eternal home for me.

Give me Jesus, the one whose face I’ll see when I follow him there, finally made perfect and complete like him (1 John 3:2; 1 Corinthians 15:48–49).

Fruitful in Him

Moms, we are not enough. And that’s okay. Because in sin, there is a Savior. In temptation, there is new life and ready help. In weakness, there is strength; in futility, the promise of fruitfulness; and in death, life. The task before us is daunting, but praise God, its success does not depend on us but on the one who is more than enough.

This Mother’s Day, receive the cards and gifts with hope. In joy, labor on — for the one who is enough is with you and for you and has gone ahead of you. It is he who will establish the work of your hands (Psalm 90:17). It is he who will make you fruitful in every good work (Colossians 1:17). And it is he, the one who now enjoys the fruit of his hands, who will make you delight in the fruit of yours (Proverbs 31:31).