Proverbs 31:1 - Homiletics

A mother's counsel

The last chapter of the Book of Proverbs gives us the picture of a mother's counsel to her son—wise and good and eloquent with love and yearning anxiety. Here is a picture to suggest the inestimable advantage to a young man of a mother's guidance. In thoughtless, high-spirited youth this too often passes unheeded, and precious advice is then wasted on ungrateful ears. It would be more seemly to consider its unique merits.

I. IT SPRINGS FROM A WOMAN 'S NATURE . We have many beautiful pictures of women in the Bible. Inspired women have conveyed to us some parts of the biblical teaching. Deborah ( 5:7 ), the mother of Samuel, and now the mother of Lemuel, all help us with great Divine truths or holy thoughts and influences. It is the gift of women to see into truth with a flash of sympathy. The wonder is that we have so small a part of the Bible from the tongue and pen of women.

II. IT IS INSPIRED BY A MOTHER 'S HEART . The biblical gallery of holy women does not introduce us to the cloisters. The Hebrew heroines were "mothers in Israel," not nuns. Maternity completes woman. "The perfect woman, nobly planned," is one who can think, love, and act with the large heart of a mother.

III. IT IS CHARACTERIZED BY UNSELFISH DEVOTION . There is nowhere in all creation such an image of utterly unselfish, of completely self-sacrificing love as that of a woman for her child. She almost gives her life for his infant existence. All through his helpless years she watches over him with untiring care. When he goes forth into the world, she follows him with never-flagging interest. He may forget her; she will never forget him. If he does well, her joy is unbounded; if he does ill, her heart is broken. Without a thought of self, she spends herself on her child, and finds her life or her death in his conduct.

IV. IT IS GUIDED BY DEEP KNOWLEDGE . The mother may not know much of the outer world; she may be quite ignorant of the most recent dicta of science; some of her notions may seem old-fashioned to her modern-minded son. But foolish indeed will he be if he dares to despise her counsels on such grounds. She knows him— his strength and his weakness, his childish faults and his early promises. Here lies the secret of her wisdom.

V. IT CANNOT BE NEGLECTED WITHOUT CRUEL INGRATITUDE . The son may think himself wiser than his mother, but at least, he should give reverent attention to her advice. So much love and care and thoughtfulness do not deserve to be tossed aside in a moment of impatience. The wise son will acknowledge that his mother's wishes deserve his most earnest consideration. It may be, then, that he will be held back in the hour of temptation by the thought of the poignant grief that his shameful fall would give to his mother. It is much for a life to be worthy of a good Christian mother's counsel.