On a Robe and a Prayer: What Counts in the Economy of Motherhood

Early morning runs have been at the top of my “what’s saving my life right now” list for decades, and trust me, my decades have added up! Waking birds fed by nature and a sun that rises sans any help from me serve as soul-filling signs that God is their caretaker and mine before I “run” to take care of those entrusted to me. 

God lays his creation reminders before us every morning. But, more often than I’d like to admit, my “before anyone needs me hour” of basking in God’s “God-ness” is interrupted by pangs of self-condemnation. As my feet pound the pavement in rhythm with beating heart and expanding and contracting lungs, my mind matches their cadence with pulsating mom-guilt—and a heavy dose of questioning to boot.

Sometimes it’s past-mom-guilt. Should I have worked in the long season of garage-sale clothes? Should I have worked less in their teen years? I ruminate on the skills I didn’t feel equipped to teach. Too few—or too many—emphases. Concerns that should have been addressed more—or less—seriously.

Other times it’s present-day-mom-guilt—same story/different twist in motherhood and grandmotherhood. When a previous commitment to babysit for one set of grandkids means saying no to others, unnecessary guilt rises. Similarly, self-imposed pressure sends me speeding across town to catch halves of different games when grandkids’ activities conflict.

Pavement pounding, guilt pounding. Early morning beauty robbed by a haunting scorecard—retained by the nemesis of my soul who seeks to extort right where I’m most invested and vulnerable. 

Then I run past them too—pajama-donned and tousled-hair toddlers transferred from car seats to day care hand-offs. I wonder if this tired, younger mom—doing what she needs to do in her circumstance to love her child well—is also laden with guilt. I hope beyond hope that she isn’t, because in motherhood, a guilt-ridden state often feels synonymous with our role—much to the enemy’s fraudulent win and our loss. 

When we find ourselves deflated by futile attempts to curb mom guilt, we can return to the foundation of our faith and consider . . . 

What counts in the economy of motherhood. 

A thriving family can feel unattainable when the guilt-rate increases. We unsustainably strive to add tallies to our good deeds column. We frantically do the math, questioning what counts and if it should be added or subtracted. Our wheel-spinning can only be stabilized when we return to the faith-based equation of our hope.[1] We can relinquish the anxious pursuit to balance the guilt scale, remembering that just as Abraham’s “faith was ‘counted to him as righteousness,’” so, too, is ours (Romans 4:22).

What counted for barren Hannah. 

Hannah endured immense sadness, intensified by the taunts of “the other woman.” Full of “great anxiety and vexation” and even greater faith, Hannah turned to the Lord in prayer (1 Samuel 1:16). God granted her a long-awaited son, whom she named Samuel.[2] 

Hannah kept her vow that if God blessed her with a son, she would “give him to the Lord all the days of his life” (1 Samuel 1:11). After he was weaned, Hannah offered her young son over to the Lord to be raised by Eli the priest. Once again revealing her faith-filled heart and mind, Hannah lifted up a worship-drenched prayer—and then went back home, son-less.[3]

We wonder if Hannah longed for Samuel when she saw other kids his age. Did she wish she could do “all the things” for her child that “counted” as good “momming” in her era? Hannah couldn’t add to her “super-mom” balance sheet by packing him healthy lunches with a side of heart-felt notes, having his friends over to play, or washing his bedding with yummy smelling detergent. 

Yet, she demonstrated love to her son in a way that she could: “And his mother used to make for him a little robe and take it to him each year when she went up with her husband to offer the yearly sacrifice” (1 Samuel 2:19). One “little robe.” Once a year. 

The prayers that she prayed, and the robes that she made, counted—not because they were deeds that added to her righteousness, but because they were acts of service and faith that looked beyond her “couldn’ts” to God’s “coulds.” 

The God who could and who can. 

God carried out his purposes for Samuel, the little boy handed over by a faithful mom. Samuel—who became a prophet and judge, who grew up to anoint Israel’s first kings, whose spirit was brought up from the dead and reproached Saul, and whose name is listed in the Hebrews 11 “Who’s Who” of Bible heroes—was entrusted to the God who could.[4]

When we consider what God did through Hannah’s faith, it’s not a license to neglect discipleship, to be lazy, or to live selfishly at any point. What we do during the state of any economy matters—especially when nurturing and investing in our kids. But, in seasons of little margin and big deficits, we can trust our limitless God to multiply our faith-filled, tiny expressions of love. 

The bed-ridden prayers offered during chronic illness, the verse we help them memorize that they later recall in a difficult time, the washed lovey and well-packed diaper bag that reinforce a foundation of security, the tiny vile of milk rushed to the NICU nurse when our fragile infant can’t yet be fed in our arms—all of it counts. Every tiny investment can be used to bring about God’s purposes in our child’s life and help nudge them toward Jesus.

Hannah seemed to grasp what counted in mom-economy. She “mommed” in the way she could, depending on the Lord. Her faithfulness still echoes through Scripture today, reminding us what truly counts—not a post-able deeds column but an overflowing faith column that simply hung on a robe and a prayer.

[1] Romans 4

[2] 1 Samuel 1:19-20

[3] 1 Samuel 1:21-2:11

[4] 1 Samuel 3:20; 7; 9-10; 16; Hebrews 11:32