Rejected Texts For a Mother’s Day Sermon

Mother’s Day is an odd Sunday in most churches. Pastors get up and talk about Proverbs 31 or some other predictible text, and then give every lady a rose. 

I’m not actually preaching this weekend (Paula is, as it turns out), but if I was I’d be looking for a more unusual angle. For instance, here are some lesser-known verses which touch on the theme of motherhood.

  1. Psalm 109:14 — may the sin of his mother never be blotted out.
  2. Isaiah 50:1 — This is what the LORD says: “Where is your mother’s certificate of divorce with which I sent her away? 
  3. Jeremiah 22:26 — I will hurl you and the mother who gave you birth into another country, where neither of you was born, and there you both will die.
  4. Hosea 2:2 Rebuke your mother
  5. Hosea 4:5 I will destroy your mother
  6. Luke 12:53 They will be divided, father against son and son against father, mother against daughter and daughter against mother, mother-in-law against daughter-in-law and daughter-in-law against mother-in-law.
  7. Deuteronomy 22:7 You may take the young, but be sure to let the mother go
  8. Exodus 23:19 Do not cook a young goat in its mother’s milk.
  9. Job 17:14, CEV: say to the worms, “Hello, mother!” 
  10. Lev 18:7, MSG She is your mother. Don’t have sex with her.

Maybe Proverbs 31 isn’t such a bad choice after all… 😉

Please note that most of these verses have been horribly wrenched from their context to make them even less appropriate for a mother’s day sermon.

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