How beautiful are the feet of mothers who preach the good news! Our feet do not grow tired in vain if our mouths do what God designed them to — daily proclaim to our children the greatest love story ever told. Preaching the gospel is not one to-do item on a mother’s endless list. It applies eternal eyes to earthly days. It takes on a life in the home that sees gold mines hidden deep within the sticky brown grime that seems to have become part of the dining table. Our mission takes place in small moments that build into larger ones, all of them becoming something glorious.

Moms often measure their lives by the opportunities outside of the home they say no to. Regularly, we say no to serving more in ministry or taking on more hospitality. We say no to opportunities to grow or use our gifts. We say no to free-time activities because our time is not free.

In the midst of every no, we can forget to count the yeses in motherhood — perhaps because what we say yes to is impossible to measure.

It is simply too glorious.

Glory fills the way we wipe up a banana lathered on the floor — and how we talk about it. Glory spills over in how we prize misshapen airplanes and smiling stick figures. Glory shines behind our eyes that pause, gaze into our children’s, and enter into their stories, ready to show them the way of the King.

During these ordinary moments, I sometimes imagine a great cloud of witnesses in heaven celebrating because God, through one small act of a mother’s faithfulness, breathed life into a child. Mothers are operating a rescue mission outside the very gates of hell — one banana, one stick figure, one story at a time. Sometimes, we just don’t know it.

Beautiful Feet

As we stumble through seemingly mundane days, God has a word for mothers who question the eternity-shaping ministry he has given: “How beautiful are the feet of those who preach the good news!” (Romans 10:15). Though the apostle Paul did not specifically have mothers in mind, few preach the gospel to our children if not us. If a mother’s greatest desire and prayer is that her children be saved, this Scripture governs that work too. God has sent to us a people — children who, in most cases, have not yet heard and believed (Romans 10:17).

How beautiful are the feet of mothers who preach the good news! Our feet do not grow tired in vain if our mouths do what God designed them to — daily proclaim to our children the greatest love story ever told. Preaching the gospel is not one to-do item on a mother’s endless list. It applies eternal eyes to earthly days. It takes on a life in the home that sees gold mines hidden deep within the sticky brown grime that seems to have become part of the dining table. Our mission takes place in small moments that build into larger ones, all of them becoming something glorious.

Little Moments

Perhaps the day in, day out call of giving our children the gospel seems too out of reach. But here is the good news for good-news-preaching moms: we have time, grace, and a God who calls us not to be perfect, but to proclaim. And when our hearts dwell on Jesus, “we cannot but speak of what we have seen and heard” (Acts 4:20).

The little moments moms sometimes wish away are God’s open doors to faithfully and joyfully preach the gospel. A hidden dirty diaper inspires conversations about the aroma of Christ — while we laugh and plug our noses. Temptations toward selfishness, grumbling, anger, and quarreling give chances to deny the power of sin already defeated on the cross. Messes in the playroom or on the kitchen table remind us of the messes that Jesus died to cover (Romans 5:8). Waking up in the middle of the night turns from inconvenience to opportunity to speak and pray the truth of the gospel over fear. Our sadness brings forth the truth that Jesus took on our sorrows as well as our sins (Isaiah 53:4), and one day he will deliver us from them too. We share our testimonies in growing detail as they grow, from the moments we hoist our children till the day they hoist us — when little moments have come to an end.

Read More