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How Motherhood Can Shape a Nation

by Kelly Crawford

“When life is divorced from a larger dominion purpose, the eventual result will be frustration and misery.” –Andrea Reins

We would mother differently, wouldn’t we, if we saw the direct connection between our investment in domestic life and the shaping of the world in which we live?

WOMAN.
BY EDWARD D. MANSFIELD
May, 1852

“THERE is a beautiful parallelism between the condition of woman in her domestic life, and the character of a nation. She is the mother of men, and the former of their minds, at that early age when every word distils upon the heart, like the dew-drop upon the tender grass. There is to that young mind no truth or falsehood in the world but that whose words flow from the mother’s lips. There is no beauty in character, nor glory in action, which has not been concentrated by her praise. There is to that climbing child no path where the mother’s feet has not trod. Her mind is to his the supernatural pillar of fire which illumines his mid-night ignorance, and the silvery cloud which at mid-day precedes him in every highway to the world.

And, even when science has conducted her pupil through the highest walls of knowledge; or when art has polished him into the accomplished citizen; or when power has dignified him with the memorials of office, she still lives in his soul, which she has imbued from her heart’s “pictured urn, With thoughts that breathe, and words that burn.”

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12 comments

I Live in an Antbed January 10, 2011 - 5:28 pm

It is for this very reason that the whole idea of a nurturing family circle where the mother pours her life out in service to her husband and children is under such concentrated attack by the evil one. Every attempt is made to define this, highest of tasks I can do on this earth, as lesser, unworthy, even lazy. To accomplish what He intends in the lives of those He has entrusted to me requires all I have to give. In fact, more than I can give. Only allowing Him to work through me am I able to do His Will for and in our children. And what He is doing in them will ripple out into eternity. They are being equipped by Him to do battle for our culture.

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Misty Smith January 10, 2011 - 8:11 pm

Simply beautiful. So glad you are continuing the good work of uplifting and encouraging mothers. You are making an impact.

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Kate January 11, 2011 - 5:03 am

Hey Kelly ~
John Adams would have agreed with you:
“From all that I have read of history and government, of human life and manners, I have drawn this conclusion, that the manners of women were the most infallible barometer to ascertain the degree of morality and virtue of a nation. The Jews, the Greeks, the Romans, the Swiss, the Dutch, all of them lost their public spirit and their republican forms of government when they lost the modesty and domestic virtues of their women.” ~ John Adams, Second President of the U.S.

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Taryn January 11, 2011 - 8:53 am

One of the feminists’ agendas is to have all adult women paying taxes. I have 5(of 6) children that pay taxes(I’m 55) but they’re not happy about that. According to the feminists I know-I should have had 1 or 2 children, put them in daycare, worked in a bank where I would be trained to give extra praise,attention and respect to the customers with the most money. I recently heard of a man that hadn’t seen his mother in 20 years and they were reunited. A friend and I were talking about how this woman’s countenance didn’t have any joy. I thought of Luke 15 and the father’s joy with his prodigal son. We Bible Christians have so much joy. It’s because we praise the God of the Bible. respect our husbands and give our attention to our priceless gifts from heaven-our children. We know they are eternal souls for however long they are entrusted to us. My 4 granddaughters make me laugh out loud every day. Proverbs 17:22-A merry heart doeth good like a medicine…(KJV).

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ANNIE January 11, 2011 - 9:07 am

thank you for this. that quote contains the truest words ever spoken about our job as mothers. we are literally “growing” a soul…..

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Taryn January 11, 2011 - 9:22 am

I should correct “priceless gifts from heaven”.Some people believe in pre-existing souls-I don’t. I should have typed “priceless gifts from God”.

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Diane January 11, 2011 - 12:05 pm

loved this. It’s always seemed to me that women want the right to “do something important” when the most important job is already right in front of her. To me, pursuing a career is settling for second best. Besdies that, if God gives me a husband, children and home, why would I expect someone else to take care of what is mine? If my husband said, “I know I have a family, but I don’t really want to provide for them, I’d rather pursue my “gifts”, or, “I’m really not cut out for working a full-time job at ______; I think I’ll do something different. What would we think of him?

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Kelly L January 11, 2011 - 2:14 pm

Beautiful! So glad I get to be a shaper of our future!

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Kim M January 11, 2011 - 4:53 pm

I’m seeing this more and more daily. It wasn’t something I used to even think about. Thanks so much for pointing your readers to think in this direction.

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No Apologies January 11, 2011 - 10:40 pm

[…] How Motherhood Can Shape a Nation […]

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Tono Fonseca January 12, 2011 - 3:24 pm

This is so beautiful. That quote by the second President of the USA would have been perfect if he hadn’t used it to promote republican ideology (which all-in-all has proven to be far more destructive than monarchism).

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Taryn January 12, 2011 - 9:59 pm

Abeka Government 11/12th grade:(page 25)- It would seem that the founders of (the American) republic,after a careful survey of the governments of history, concluded that autocracy resulted in tyranny and democracy merged into mobocracy,and they strove to avoid the dangerous extreme of either tyranny or mobocracy by establishing … and founding a republic.-Harry Atwood,Back to the Republic(1918). Autocracy(rule by one) and democracy(rule by many) are discussed on page 24. Yes, John Adams favored a constitutional republic(he was a Federalist)-he was anti-slavery and saw how majority/mob rule could keep slavery legal. Slavery was abolished and we pray for abortion to be abolished. Page 132-America is actually a democratic republic,with a written constitution to protect the basic rights of the minority from being infringed upon by the majority.

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