XV. THE WEARY MOTHER.
Many things below make a mother weary.
The blessing of _rest_ is chiefly future.
Notice various things that often make mothers weary, and the remedy for them.
CAUSE. REMEDY.
I. Weary with cares and I. Do not carry your burden sorrows-ready to exclaim, "My alone. Ps. lv. 22.
burden is greater than I can bear." 1 Pet. v. 7. Jer. x.x.xi. 25.
_Hereafter_ rest.
Psa. xciv. 13. Isa. xiv. 3.
II. Weary with work. II. Make more use of the rest of the Sabbath.
Exod. xx. 8.
Called "Sabbath of _rest_."
Lev. xxiii. 3.
_Hereafter_. Heb. iv. 9.
III. Weary with sickness. III. Comfort in time of sickness. Ps. xli. 3.
Job, vii. 3, 4. Isa. x.x.xviii.
12, 14. Great alleviation in true spirit of submission.
May be your own, your husband"s, your children"s. _Hereafter_. Isa. x.x.xiii. 24.
Rev. xxi. 4.
Wearisome nights of pain, or watching.
IV. Weary of your sins. IV. Come with your sins to Christ.
Ps. vi. 6; x.x.xviii. 4.
Matt. xi. 28, 29.
Oft repented.
_Hereafter_. Rev. xxi. 27.
Oft repeated.
V. Weary with your children"s V. Correct, and they shall give sins. you rest. Prov. xxix. 17.
Consider Christ, _lest ye be weary_. Heb. xii. 3.
Do you know where to go for rest? Jer. vi. 16. Or are you wandering hither and thither in vain, having forgotten your resting-place? Jer. l.
6. Remember, it is only to those who are in Christ that these promises of rest apply.
It is only His own sheep who can say, "He maketh me to _lie down in green pastures_."
To others there is no rest here, or hereafter, for, "The wicked are like the troubled sea, when it _cannot rest_... . There is no peace, saith my G.o.d, to the wicked." Isa. lvii. 20, 21.
XVI. THE CARELESS MOTHER.
Isa. x.x.xii. 913.
Motherless children are often uncared for. No one "_naturally_ cares for their state." No child with a mother _ought_ to be so. But too often mothers are careless about-
I. Their _minds_.
No schooling-no teaching-no training-no Sunday School. Cares not whether in time, or too late-regular or truant, &c., &c.
II. Their _respectability_, and _a.s.sociates_.
Will take in bad lodgers, hire bad characters to help at the wash-tub because they can be had cheaper than the respectable, forgetting that "a good name is rather to be chosen than great riches." Prov. xxii. 1.
Eccles. vii. 1.
What guilty carelessness!
III. Their _happiness_.
What misery here awaits a neglected child!
What woe hereafter!
IV. Their _souls_.
To a parent guilty of this carelessness, it is said, "His blood will I require at thine hand." Ezek. iii. 18, 19; x.x.xiii. 6.
Have you ever lost a child, for whose soul you never cared? Pray Ps.
li. 14.
_This_ arises from want of real religion.
You do not know the immense value of a soul.
Would you be thus careless of an earthly treasure? Would you not watch it-lock it up-guard it with a jealous eye? Your child"s soul a treasure pa.s.sing all price. Yet you allow Satan to steal it-bad companions to corrupt it-ruin it yourself by neglect. A thing neglected is ruined.
Keep in view the judgment day.
Will your child then say, "No man cared for my soul"-"even my _mother_ cared not that I perished!"
XVII. THE CAREFUL MOTHER.