I remember hearing a sermon a few years ago by John Piper with the title 'To be a Mother is a Call to Suffer'. It made an impact on me at the time, and some of it came back to me in the middle of the night last night:
How do you handle the setbacks, the disappointments, the abuses, the heartaches, the calamities, the bitter providences of your life? And I ask it specifically to mothers, because to be a mother is a call to suffer. When Jesus looked for an analogy of suffering followed by joy, he said (in John 16:21), "Whenever a woman is in labor she has pain, because her hour has come; but when she gives birth to the child, she no longer remembers the anguish because of the joy that a child has been born into the world."
To be a mother is a call to suffer. Not just at the beginning of life, but also at the end. Simeon said to Mary, Jesus' mother, "Behold, this Child is appointed for the fall and rise of many in Israel, and for a sign to be opposed – and a sword will pierce even your own soul" (Luke 2:34-35). Mothers suffer when their children are born. Mothers suffer when children leave them and go to the mission field. Mothers suffer when their children die. Mothers suffer when their children are foolish. "A wise son makes a father glad, but a foolish son is a grief to his mother" (Proverbs 10:1). To be a mother is a call to suffer. Oh yes, it's more. But it's not less.
(taken from 168hoursblog.com.au)
