God's Love for You is Like a Mother's Love

The Bible uses images of God as a mother, in addition to images of God as a father, to help us understand how great God’s love is for us.

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When we celebrate Mother’s Day, we reflect on the ways that mothers pour themselves out in love for their children.  If you have or had a loving mother, you know what I mean.  (If you did not experience the devotion of a loving mother, I want to acknowledge your pain.  That is a heavy burden.  At the same time, it is possible to be freed from the wounds of the past.  Women who have been hurt by their mothers have an opportunity, with the help of our loving God, to break the chain, as my mother did, so that the dysfunction ends and a new generation of love begins.)

What many people may not realize, is that God uses the image of a mother’s love to help us understand how great and deep God’s love is for us.

God is a spiritual being, so he does not have a gender – he is not a man or a woman.  And since he is a transcendent being, our human language cannot fully capture his essence.  God draws on human experiences to reveal himself in ways that allow us to glimpse his nature and character.

In the Bible, God has chosen to use both fatherly and motherly images to help us understand his love for us.

The Bible uses images of God as a father

To help us understand God, Jesus uses the image of a loving father:

• “Is there anyone among you who, if your child asks for bread, will give a stone?  . . . .  [H]ow much more will your Father in heaven give good things to those who ask him!” (Matt. 7:9-11, NRSV).

• “This is how you are to pray: Our Father in heaven. . .” (Matt. 6:9, NABRE).

• “While [the prodigal son] was still a long way off, his father caught sight of him, and was filled with compassion.  He ran to his son, embraced him and kissed him” (Luke 15:20, NABRE).

God also uses father images in the Old Testament.  God is described as the father of the Israelites (Ex. 4:22; Deut. 32:6; Mal. 2:10).

The image of God as father reminds us that he is our origin and that he loves and cares for us. That helps us understand who God is and what our relationship is with him.

But that is not the only image God uses for himself.

The Bible uses images of God as a mother

In the Bible, God also uses images of being like a mother to express God’s intimate love and tenderness toward us.  (Catholics might find it useful to read paragraph 239 of the Catechism of the Catholic Church to see how the Church spells out God’s use of the image of motherhood to help us understand God.)  In the Old Testament, we see this:

• In Isaiah 66:13, God says, “As a mother comforts her child, so I will comfort you” (multiple translations).

• In Isaiah 49:14-15, God responds to those who say that the Lord has forsaken them: “Can a mother forget her nursing child . . . ?  . . . I will not forget you” (multiple translations).

• In Psalm 131:2, the psalmist declares, “I have calmed and quieted my soul, like a weaned child with its mother” (NRSV).

God has given us these images in his Word to help us understand how tender and unshakable his love is for us.  God loves us even more fully and perfectly than the most loving and self-giving human mother.

Jesus turns to a motherly image at the end of his life to express his mournful love for the people of Jerusalem, the capital city of the Jews, whose spiritual and political leaders had rejected him.  He says:

• “Jerusalem, Jerusalem, . . . how many times I yearned to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her young under her wings , and you were unwilling” (Matt. 23:37, NABRE).

And yet he loves them anyway.  And when we are unwilling to receive his love, he loves us anyway.

God’s love for us is like a mother’s love for her children.

Both images can be helpful

God loves us more than the best of fathers, and God loves us more than the best of mothers; but he uses both images to help us understand how much he desires what is good for us and how far he is willing to go to help us flourish.

Over the centuries, Christian leaders have focused more on the father image than the mother image.  I do not want to take anything away from the father image – Jesus calls God “Father” and tells us to do the same.  But many people have anxiety-producing images of God as a stern disciplinarian.  “Father” does not evoke the image of “love” for some people.  (Again, I will say, if you are a man who has not seen a loving father in action in your life, God invites you to begin a new tradition in your family.)

At the same time, if we can recognize the ways that God has described himself as like a mother, it might help us form a more complete image of God.

God's love for you is like a mother's love. How can this image of God strengthen your faith?

The Scripture passages above use the image of a nursing mother or a mother of a young child.  I sometimes think of God as being like a mother crouching next to her toddler, giving the child the freedom to walk and run and staying nearby to nurture and protect when needed.  God, similarly, stands beside us while allowing us the freedom to use our unique lives in unique ways.

I also sometimes picture God as being like both the coach on the field and the mother in the stands as her child plays football –ever watchful, always on your side and hoping you will do your best, but allowing you the freedom to use the talents God has given to you and the coaching you have received in your own unique way.

How has God loved you like a mother loves her child?  How can you embrace the love of God as you would embrace the love of a tenderhearted mother?

Allow God to convey his love to you in the tender image of a nursing mother, or a hen bringing her chicks under her wings.  God loves you beyond what you can imagine.