“We are living at an unusual time in history, when great pressures are being brought to bear on us to offer up our children on the alter of mammon. We must not give in to this hideous idol, no matter how desperate our financial situation may seem…Though many day-care children spent many, many happy hours playing in my home, I would never willingly put my child through what I saw my little day-care children go through…Perhaps if every young mother had to do ten years of home day-care, a revival of sacrificial mothering would sweep across America.” (Helen Aardsma)

Many young women today don’t understand the impact of their choices upon their children. They haven’t been taught that they are the ones that should be raising and loving their children deeply which means sacrificing for them and being home with them instead of having others raise them. Even if a mother is home full time with her children, she stills need to focus upon loving them or God wouldn’t have had older women teaching young women to love their children.

My mom didn’t feel loved by her mother. Her mother may well have loved her very much but from the things she said to my mom and the way she treated her, she didn’t feel love from her and has struggled with insecurity her entire life, even at the age of 87 years old. My dad was an only child and deeply loved by his mother. He doesn’t have an insecure bone in his body. I felt deeply loved by my mom and am a secure adult.

I conducted a poll with the women in the chat room about this topic to see what their responses would be. The options were: 1) Loved by mom = grew up secure. (54  women); 2) Didn’t feel loved by mom or not loved by mom = grew up insecure. (60 women); 3) Loved by mom = grew up insecure. (19 women). So from my very unscientific poll, women grew up to be much more secure if they felt loved by their mothers than those who were not.

It makes common sense to me that those women who were deeply loved and cared for by their mothers would most likely grow up to be secure adults, especially if their mothers were home full time. (This wasn’t accounted for in the poll.) I know Dr. Brenda Hunter who wrote the book “Home By Choice” found the same thing to be true from her scientific studies.

It’s so important, women, to deeply love your children even if you don’t feel like you like them. Decide to be affectionate, tender, kind, and loving towards them. Remember, we don’t live by our feelings but by obedience. Your children, who you may love but not like so much, know how you feel about them. Most of us aren’t so good at hiding our feelings.

Some of these women who grew up not feeling loved, thus insecure, by their mothers became secure when they learned who they were in Christ. Teach your children from a young age who they are in Christ. Teach them their value and worth comes from Him and not what others will say about or to them. After feeling loved and secure in your love, then they will be prepared to go out into the world and be secure in who they are in Christ. They will remember that God promises to never leave nor forsake them.

Hug your teenage children. Smile at them when you see them. Let them see that you find joy in them. They still need your love and affection. The world is an insecure and scary place but if your children have a warm and loving home with an affectionate mother in it, these children will grow up secure and most likely emotionally stable.

Discipline and train them in love. Tell them that you are spanking them when they are young and disobedient because you love them so much. Build a loving relationship as they grow up so you’ll have a loving relationship when they are adults. This is how it goes with this eternal principle: We reap what we sow!

That they may teach the young women to be sober, to love their husbands, to love their children.
Titus 2:4