Pray
Zhangcun Furong
Thanksgiving Day is around the corner and I appreciate her more each day. My mom does not change, but I do. As I grow older and wiser, I realize what an extraordinary person she is and every little thing mom said and did was right for me. So now I see through mom’s eyes, all that she did was love and all I can give her is love.
How does a daughter begin to thank her mother for life itself?
For the love, patience and just plain hard work that go into raising a child?
For running after a toddler, for understanding a moody teenager, for tolerating a college student who knows everything?
For waiting for the day when a daughter realizes her mother really is?
How does a grown woman thank for a mother for continuing to be a mother?
For being ready with advice (when asked) or remaining silent when it is most appreciated?
For not saying: “I told you so”, when she could have uttered these words dozens of times?
For being essentially herself-loving, thoughtful, patient, and forgiving?
Dear God!
Maybe when you made the woman, she had to be special. You made her shoulders strong enough to carry the weight of the world; yet, gentle enough to give comfort.
Maybe you gave her an inner strength to endure childbirth and the rejection that many times comes from her children.
Maybe you gave her a hardness that allows her to keep going when everyone else gives up, and take care of her family through sickness and fatigue without complaining."
Maybe you gave her the sensitivity to love her children under any and all circumstances, even when her child has hurt her very badly."
Maybe you gave her strength to carry her husband through his faults and fashioned her from his rib to protect his heart."
Maybe you gave her wisdom to know that a good husband never hurts his wife, but sometimes tests her strengths and her resolve to stand beside him unfalteringly."
I don’t know how, dear God, except to bless her as richly as she deserves and to help me live up to the example she has set. I pray that I will look as good in the eyes of my children as my mother looks in mine.
As a mother she can do a lot of things for her children, but no matter how hard she tries--she can never be their father. So, a father's job is unique. Let’s pray for Daddy as well!