Maybe you wouldn’t think of an infantry platoon commander in the United States Marine Corps pointing to his mom’s selfless giving as a top secret to his success, but that is what Brent Niewoehner does in his article The Selfless Giver You Already Know: What Young Men Can Learn From Their Mothers.

In her sacrificial giving, Mom prepares us for love and life and is ultimately a reflection of Christ, who “died for us knowing that we could never repay Him.”

In the month of May, we typically take a pause to celebrate our mothers. While we look to our dads and our spiritual fathers as examples of manhood, marriage, and fatherhood, the lessons we learn from Mom are some of the most valuable when it comes to success in life.

I always say I got my love of working with my hands from my dad, and I got my love for reading from my mom.

Every night she’d read the newspaper, and I’d watch her read and prepare to teach her Sunday School lesson. If I hopped up in her lap today, she’d still read me my favorite book – if she could breathe! That’s the love of a mom.

While growing up, we probably don’t notice all our moms do for us. I like to say my life is like an all-you-can-eat pancake commercial I used to see. Every time the guy takes a bite, his pancakes reappear. Every time he drinks his coffee, his cup refills. That’s a lot like my sock drawer – it’s a miracle – just like never-ending pancakes!

I never gave it much thought that my dresser refilled itself with clean clothes, hot meals prepared themselves and made it to the table, and clean sheets showed up on my bed. It was just the norm.

We take for granted the sacrifices she makes in her own life to enhance ours. She gives and gives, and when she runs out of energy she gives some more.

I’ve watched Stacy do the same thing for our family, consistently and faithfully serving us at her own expense. On our oldest son’s last day of high school, she wrote him a note calculating all the number of lunchbox sandwiches she had made for him throughout the years. It’s a note he’s carried with him since – a reminder of love and sacrifice.

So on Mother’s Day and every day, we honor our moms.

If it weren’t for them we’d be a mess inside and out, and we’d miss out on some pretty important lessons about Christ.

“Who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself, by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.” Philippians 2:6-8