Mother's Day Is Coming

                Mother’s Day is almost here once again. I know that my children will honor me in some way, but my thoughts are on my own dear mother, my husband’s sweet mother, and our daughters. All women are mothers whether or not they have borne children because the instinct to mother is part of being a mother.

                As Mother’s Day approaches, I thought I would share a message by Elder Jeffrey R. Holland and his wife Patricia T. Holland,  adapted from their new book To Mothers:  Carrying the Torch of Family and Faith about the sacred influence of mothers today.

                There are comments by Elder Holland and a sweet story by Sister Holland about her great-grandmother.  The article closes with these words from Elder Holland:

                “I fear that virtually nothing—or at least not much—that the world says to you acknowledges your divine role as women. I am reminded that throughout the Creation sequence of Genesis, God viewed His work, including the creation of man, and called it “good.” But for the one and only time in that Creation story, He then said something was “not good.” He said it was not good that man should be alone. In short the Creation, even with Adam, was incomplete. Here I invoke President Gordon B. Hinckley’s language:

                “`As His final creation, the crowning of His glorious work, He created woman. I like to regard Eve as His masterpiece after all that had gone before, the final [great] work before He rested from His labors’ (Ensign, Nov. 1991, 97). I join my testimony to President Hinckley’s in that assessment. Surely it must have been at this point, with so much that was “good” having been done and having remedied the one thing that was “not good,” He could say after Eve’s arrival it was all “very good” (Genesis 1:31).

                “In this great, eternal work, mothers have carried the torch of faith and family from the beginning. The need for that torch to burn brightly and dispel darkness has never been greater than “in this time.” Little wonder that the Prophet Joseph said, “If you live up to your privileges, the angels cannot be restrained from being your associates” (History of the Church, 4:605). The scriptures speak of women being “elect.” What a powerful doctrinal and covenantal term! And who “elects” you? You do!—and so does God Himself, who has all the joy and delight of a father in you as His daughter, you who pass on light and hope, pass on life itself and a glorious gospel legacy until the work is finished.”