PODCAST TRANSCRIPT | EPISODE 194: THE LAND OF MOTHERHOOD, PT 5

LIFE TO THE FULL w/ Nancy Campbell

EPISODE 194: THE LAND OF MOTHERHOOD, Part 5

We discover two more points about the land today. It is a CHOSEN land, and it is a DELIGHTFUL land. Do we embrace our land or despise it?

Announcer: Welcome to the podcast, Life to The Full, with Nancy Campbell, founder and publisher of Above Rubies.

Nancy Campbell: Hello, ladies. Here we are, together again. We’re continuing to talk about the land of motherhood, this good land. I hope that in the last few weeks that you have been enjoying this good land, because that’s what the Bible calls it.

Today we are up to number two.

No. 2. IT IS A CHOSEN LAND

We began our series telling you how we are taking all these points from what God calls the Land of Israel, what was the Promised Land for His people. It was God Who chose this land. It wasn’t something the children of Israel found themselves or discovered for themselves. God went ahead and He chose this land. This portion of land in the middle of the world was what God chose for His people.

We read in Ezekiel 20:6: “In that day that I lifted up My hand unto them, to bring them forth of the land of Egypt into a land that I had espied for them.” Now, I wonder if you’ve ever heard that word “espied” before. E-S-P-I-E-D. It’s an old-fashioned word in that King James language. But it’s amazing.

I was just thinking about this Scripture the other day. Then I went for a little walk down to our spring. Our water comes to our home from about a mile away from a beautiful spring. Unfortunately, that day our water pipes had all frozen and we had no water. This often happens with us here out in the country.

So, Colin was out in the cold, trying to cut the pipes and get all the ice out and then put them back together again. In fact, when I got down there, it was quite amazing to see all these pieces of ice just shooting out of these pipes.

But anyway, on the way down, I met some guys. I thought, “Who are these guys?” I found out later they were surveyors. They said to me, “Oh, so, you are going down to espy Mr. Campbell, are you?” I couldn’t believe my ears! That I had just been reading this word in the Bible and here was this guy saying this word! Who in the world today says the word “espy”? But he did! So it’s a real word, ladies!

But it means “to choose, or to pick out.” I’ll read you some other translations, so you get the real meaning.

In the God’s Word translation it says: “A land I have chosen for them.”

The New English Translation says: “On that day I swore to bring them out of the land of Egypt to a land which I have picked out for them.”

Other translations say: “Which I searched out for them.”

The New Living Translation says: “I took a solemn oath that day that I would bring them out of Egypt to a land I had discovered and explored for them. A good land, a land flowing with milk and honey, the best of all lands everywhere.”

So, God went ahead. He had that land chosen out for them, ready years before they went in to possess the land. And dear ladies, this is true with the land of motherhood. We didn’t choose it. We didn’t plan it. We didn’t even think it out.

God chose this land for us. It was in His mind. It was in His heart before He even created the first woman. He planned the destiny for the women that He would create. And He espied, He discovered, He chose the land for them, our land of motherhood. A land where God has chosen, that we, as His female creation, will come into the home and embrace children, and bring forth the godly seed.

It’s a place, a sanctuary, a secure and safe place to raise a family, and where we build a strong, godly home. We build a beautiful marriage. It’s in this home, it’s in this land of motherhood and homemaking. In the world today, it is despised. But it is what God chose for us. So, if we love God, if we want to walk in His ways, we will love what He chose for us, won’t we?

Psalm 44:3: “For they got not the land in possession by their own sword, neither did their own arm save them: but thy right hand, and thine arm, and the light of thy countenance, because thou hadst a favour unto them.”

In Psalm 12:6, it says these words: “The words of the LORD are pure words: as silver tried in a furnace of earth, purified seven times.” I love that Scripture because it tells us there that every plan of God, every word has been tried. Not tried only once, but tried seven times, gone through the purification of trying seven times before we ever got His Word here on earth.

It is a pure word. It’s a tried word. It’s a word that works for all generations. It’s this plan, this chosen land, that He chose for us, He planned before the foundation of the world, and it’s been tried and purified, and it’s the best. No matter what the world says, IT IS THE BEST.

All right . . .

No. 3. IT IS A DELIGHTFUL LAND

Now there’s a number of Scriptures about it being a delightful land. Also, I found that there’s a number of different Hebrew words. God doesn’t only use one Hebrew word to describe the word “delightful” and to describe the land that He chose. So, we’ll look into them, shall we?

The first Hebrew word is chemdar. If you are writing it down, which I don’t think you will be, because you may be out walking, or you’re maybe doing the dishes, or you’re maybe holding your baby, or nursing your baby. But it is spelled C-H-E-M-D-A-R. This word means “delightful, beloved, precious, pleasant, beautiful, desirable.”

In Psalm 106:24 it says: “Yea, they despised the pleasant land, they believed not his Word.” This Scripture is talking about how they’ve come to the Land, but they didn’t believe that God could look after them. They despised it. And yet it was this beloved, delightful, beautiful land.

This is very much the testimony we see of motherhood today. God has given us a delightful land but so many despise it. They really don’t put much value on it at all, I think mainly because they’ve been brainwashed. Inside of us, if we don’t have all the brainwashing of our education system, and of our media, and of our society around us, in us, just innately, we love being a woman. We love to be a mother. We love home. That is innately within every woman.

However, the female creation today has been very, very brainwashed, especially by our education system to think that motherhood is insignificant. They do not know the truth. See, what we are doing in these podcasts, dear ladies, is reminding one another of the truth. We are constantly bombarded with deception and lies. We think they’re true. That’s how we live.

But they are lies. They are deception. We have got to come to believe and live the truth. And the truth is that the land of motherhood is a delightful land. So, you’ve either got to believe it or disbelieve it. You’ve either got to embrace it or despise it. We have to choose what we’re doing to do.

Jeremiah 12:10 (NET) says: “Many foreign rulers will ruin the land where I planted my people. They will trample all over my chosen land. They will turn my beautiful land (that chemdar) into a desolate wasteland. They will lay it waste. It will lie parched and empty before me. The whole land will be laid waste. But no one living in it will pay any heed.”

Now, this is a picture of what happened to Israel. God’s people went in eventually, after 40 years in the wilderness, to possess this good land, this chosen land, this delightful land. They conquered their enemies and they lived in wonderful joy and goodness for many years. But as the years went by, they began to take on evil ways. They became even more evil than the people whom they cast out of the land.

So, God cast them out of the land, because He could not stand that they, His own people, were living in such sin. But He never gave up on His people. He promised that He would bring them back. But the interesting thing is, that in all those years, when Israel was out of the Land, except maybe just a few living there, it was left to go to waste. The Land of Israel became a waste.

It was once a fertile, glorious, beautiful land. But when His people left, it went to waste and became barren. When the children of Israel began to come back to the Land, even before Israel became a nation, but especially after 1948, they began to come back. They came back to just barrenness and malarial swamps. It was an incredible challenge to work that land again.

But the amazing thing is that, as they have come back, the land is coming back to its glory again, it’s delightsomeness. It’s becoming fruitful and glorious and beautiful. It’s amazing. Every time you go to Israel, you see more delight, and more fruitfulness, and more blossoming which God said would happen. In fact, we see that in Ezekiel 36. Let me go to it now.

Ezekiel 36 is a wonderful chapter to read sometime when you’ve got your Bible with you. Just look up Ezekiel 36. It’s a prophetic word given to the people of Israel, who are coming back to the land, and what will happen when they come back to the land.

It starts off: “Also, thou son of man, prophesy . . .” Now when it says the word “prophesy,” we usually think, “Wow! There’s going to be a prophecy from a great prophet and he’s going to prophesy to some person.” But no, here he’s prophesying to the land! It says: “Prophesy unto the mountains of Israel, and say, Ye mountains of Israel, hear the word of the LORD.”

It’s speaking to the very land. “Therefore, prophesy and say, Thus saith the Lord God; Because they have made you desolate, and swallowed you up on every side, that ye might be a possession unto the residue of the heathen,” and so on. 

“Therefore, ye mountains of Israel, hear the word of the Lord; Thus saith the Lord God to the mountains, and to the hills, to the rivers, and to the valleys, to the desolate wastes, and to the cities that are forsaken, which became a prey and a derision to the residue of the heathen that are round about.” It goes on to say all the good things that God will do to the land.

Somewhere down in this chapter, it talks about how the land will begin to bring forth fruit for “My people.” That’s an amazing thing, because when you go to Israel, and especially you go out to the West Bank, to the hills of Samaria, you see these barren hills. All it is, is just barren stones. You think, “How can this land become fruitful and blossom again?”

Then you look, and there are these glorious, beautiful, fruitful vineyards. The fruit that is on them is luscious, and huge, and beautiful. Then you look a little closer, and you see that these vineyards are growing out of the barren stones! You cannot even believe it! It was one of the greatest miracles I have ever seen in my life!

And how are they doing it? Because it’s the prophetic word of the Lord. He said, “When My people come back, they will sow the land. They will plant vineyards, and the land will bring forth fruit for My people.” It comes forth through the Word of the Lord! It is absolutely amazing. But that is what is happening. It’s coming again to be this beautiful, delightsome land.

Jeremiah 3:19, New Living Translation: “I wanted nothing more than to give you this beautiful land (chemdar/delightful), the finest possession in the world.”

Then Malachi 3:12: “All the nations shall call you blessed, for you shall be a delightsome land, saith the Lord of hosts.” This is God’s intention for His land of Israel. It was, and it will be, a delightsome land.

It is His plan and intention for the land of motherhood. Dear ladies, He wants your land of motherhood in your home, and in the land around your home, even if it’s only a little plot, or maybe a lot of acres, He wants it to be delightsome.

Of course, you’ve got to help Him make it delightsome. That’s another thing God wants us to do. Nothing just happens. We are to make this land a delightsome land. You can make motherhood what you want it to be. It all comes back to our attitude.

If our attitude is one of, “Oh, I could be doing something else! Help! What am I doing here in this home? I’ve got talents and gifts and degrees to do something far greater than being in this home, imprisoned in these four walls!” If that’s your mindset, well, you’re going to be miserable.

But if you understand the truth that this is the land God has given to you. It’s a delightsome land. And you embrace it, and you pour your heart into it, it will become more and more delightful.

There’s another Hebrew word. The second one: chaphets. This one means “pleasure or delight.” They all have just about the same meaning. But it’s amazing how God uses these different words.

God has given this whole land, the land of marriage, yes. Marriage is very much part of this land. In fact, it’s the very foundation of this land. If we’re not making our marriage delightsome, how can the rest of the land be delightsome? It starts with our marriages.

So, lovely ladies, every day, you’ve got to put some delight into your marriage. You have to do something. You have to say something. Things don’t just happen! If you want to have a delightful marriage, you can have it! You can have it by your attitude, and by your actions, and by the words that you say. But you’ve got to get that right because that is the foundation of this delightsome land.

I noticed six things here where this word, chaphets, is used. Six things that we’re to delight in. Number one. We delight in the land, of course. We delight in our marriage. We delight in our motherhood and mothering our children. We delight in making our home the greatest place that it can be.

Number two. We delight in God’s Word. The same word is used in Psalm 1:2: “Blessed is the man that walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly, nor standeth in the way of sinners, not sitteth in the seat of the scornful, but his delight is in the law of the Lord, and in His law doth he meditate day and night.” As we delight in His Word, that will bring us into the truth of delighting in our land of motherhood.

Thirdly, we’re to delight in God’s people (Psalm 16:3). David is speaking here, and he says to the Lord: “My goodness extendeth not to Thee, but to the saints that are in the earth, and to the excellent in whom is all my delight.” God wants us to delight in His people.

All right, if we’re delighting in God’s people, we’ll want to be getting together with God’s people. We’ll love to show hospitality to God’s people. We’ll delight to get together each week to meet with God’s people, whether we meet on a Saturday, or whether we meet on a Sunday. But we will delight to be at the gathering of the saints, the gathering of God’s people.

When we stay away from the gathering of God’s people, when we think, “Oh, well, I’ve got something else to do today,” or we don’t put so much value on it, we’re not really delighting in the people of the Lord. And what is David saying here? He said, “My goodness extendeth not to Thee, O Lord, but to Your people.”

What he’s saying is that “This is how I’m going to show my delight in You, Lord.” Because Christ is the Head, we are His Body on the earth. The attitude of how we relate to God’s people is how we’re relating to God. It’s how we extend our love and our goodness to the Lord, by extending it to His people.

The fourth one. We delight in wisdom (Proverbs 8:11).

The next one. We delight in the works of the Lord (Psalm 111:2). We love to enjoy creation. We delight in our children who are His works. My, what a glorious world God has created! But the most amazing of all his creations are the children that He gives to us. Oh my! Every child is so special, so unique!

And even every child God gives to you, not one is the same. They’re not all cookie cutters. Every single one is different. There’s never been anyone like this little child in the whole of the world and there will never be anyone like him in the whole of the world again! It’s one, special, unique, amazing creation! The works of the Lord and we delight in them.

The last one. We delight in our homemaking tasks. Proverbs 31:13: “And she (the virtuous woman) works willingly with her hands.” The interesting thing, ladies, is that the word “willingly” is the same word, chaphets, meaning “delight, pleasure.” So, although they have translated this “willingly” in the King James Version, it really means to take delight in everything you’re doing in your home.

Take delight in the works of your hands and all the mundane tasks. Washing the dishes again because you’re going to do them at least three times a day. You’re going to be doing all the tasks that have to be done to keep a home clean and orderly. And the works of your hands that we take delight in them. As we take delight in them, we’re making our land a delightsome land.

Are getting the message, lovely ladies?

A third Hebrew word, so similar to the last one. This one is chephets. The only difference is that there is an “a” instead of an “e” in the Hebrew word. It also means “to be pleased with, to desire, to delight, to have pleasure.”

So, let’s read some Scriptures here. Numbers 14:8: “If the Lord delight in us, then He will bring us into this land, and give it us; a land which floweth with milk and honey. Only rebel not ye against the Lord.” So, we see God brought His people into this delightsome land because He delighted in them.

And dear, precious ladies, He brings you into the land of motherhood and the land of homemaking, your realm, where you are queen of your domain. Looking after our home is not some insignificant little task. It’s huge! It’s unbelievable! It’s as big and as amazing, and as delightful as you can make it, because God gives you a domain! You’re the boss! You can do what you like!

You can get visions to do wonderful projects. You can get understanding and visions on how to ultimately, and the best way, to train and teach your children. You’re queen of your domain. He delights in you, to bring you into this wonderful, wonderful domain, this realm, where you are queen.

2 Samuel 22:20: “He brought me forth also into a large place: he delivered me, because he delighted in me.” And he’s speaking there of the land. One of our 20 points down the road will be “It’s a large land,” so we’ll talk on that later.

Psalm 22:8: “He trusted on the Lord that He would deliver him: let Him deliver him, seeing he delighted in Him.” It’s all about delight. God delighting in us, and then we delight in Him, and in the land that He gives us.

The fourth Hebrew word: chashaq. It means, again “to delight in.” Deuteronomy 10:15: “Only the Lord had a delight in thy fathers to love them, and he chose their seed after them, even you above all people, as it is this day.” Well, that’s a similar Scripture to the ones we’ve just read, even though it’s a different Hebrew word. God brings us in because He delights in us.

Adan, this is number five. It means “to be pleasant, to delight.” Nehemiah 9:25: “And they took strong cities, and a fat land.” That’s going to be another point down the road, “It’s a fat land.” “And possessed houses full of all goods, wells digged, vineyards, and oliveyards, and fruit trees in abundance: so they did eat, and were filled, and became fat, and delighted themselves in thy great goodness.”

God has so many good things and good pleasures to give you in this land of motherhood so you can delight in them. Dear ladies, do you think you can change your thinking? Do you think you can begin to change your speaking? Instead of complaining and groaning, can you begin to speak the words that God says about the land He’s given you? That it’s a good land, and it’s a chosen land, and it’s a delightful land.

Oh, I do want to challenge you to begin to speak Bible language. So often, we speak the language of the kingdom of darkness, which is full of unbelief, and deception, and destruction, and everything the enemy is, for he comes to kill, rob, and destroy.

But God’s kingdom is a kingdom of life! And it’s a kingdom of righteousness, peace, and joy in the Holy Ghost (Romans 14:17). And it’s a good kingdom and it’s a delightful kingdom! Yes! So, let’s change our attitudes. Let’s change our thinking. Let’s change our vocab. Amen?

Here’s one more: eden. It’s actually in the Hebrew pronounced “a-den,” but we all call it eden because it is talking about the Garden of Eden. That Hebrew word eden also means “pleasure and delight.” Did you know that? Did you know that’s what eden means?

The very first home that God created was a home of pleasure, a home of delight. And, ladies, it was the prototype of all homes to come. Everything that was written in the Old Testament, whether it was written about a person, about a thing, or about a land, it’s a type. And then, when we go to the New Testament and we see it fulfilled there, it becomes the prototype.

And it is fulfilled there. This is a type and a prototype. The type was the land, the Garden of Eden, which was to be a home of great delight and pleasure. God wants this for all future homes. That can be our whole vision of our life, making our home a delight, a Garden of Eden.

Here it’s talking, not only about a home, but also a garden part of the home. In the Bible, home is not just a home. It’s a home and a garden. They are together. They are actually one, just like husband and wife are one. A garden and a home are one.

Well, it’s not always like that today, is it? Because many people don’t have gardens today. Many people live in the city, and they don’t even have room. But it was always God’s intention for a garden to be part of the home. Not only were beautiful flowers and trees to beautify our homes, but to provide for the home, to grow food for the home.

Maybe you’re saying, “Well, goodness, that’s beyond me. I don’t even have any space to do a garden at all.” Well, dear lovely mother, dear lovely wife, you can always do something. If you don’t even have one tiny little bit of earth, you can grow some herbs in some pots in your home. You can grow something, so you’ve got a little bit of a garden. Isn’t that good?

Oh, this is interesting. This same word is used in Genesis 18:12. It’s where God came to Abraham, Abram at that time, and Sarah. He told them that Sarah would have a son. But she couldn’t believe it, and she laughed. She said, “After I am waxed old, shall I have pleasure, my Lord being old also?”

The word is eden! That same word for the Garden of Eden. In that context, it is talking about not only the pleasure and delight of having a baby and mothering, but also the delight of sexual intimacy. That’s all contained in the meaning there in Genesis 18:12.

It’s all about delight, ladies. And time is up again. So, next week, we’ll look into some more points about this wonderful land.

“Dear Father, we thank You for Your Word. We’re always thanking You for Your Word. I thank You for Your Word every day because it shows me the way. It shows every one of us the way You want us to live.

“And, Lord, we find out that we’re often so far away from Your Word! We’re so far away from Your truth! Oh, God, we ask that You will bring us into Your truth! You’ll bring us into the language of the Bible. You’ll help us to see, Lord, God, and Lord, here today, we’ve only learned of two more descriptions that You chose this land for us. And it is a delightful land.

“Lord, even this is so amazing! Although we’ve got many more to learn. I pray that You will help us all to delight in our marriages, and delight in our homes, and delight in our powerful career of motherhood. We ask it in the Name of Jesus. Amen.”

Blessings from Nancy Campbell * www.aboverubies.org

Transcribed by Darlene Norris * This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.