title: Dear Mary: Lessons From the Mother of Jesus for the Modern Mom
author:  Sarah Jakes 
description: I am learning that many of the rights and wrongs of motherhood come down to what we believe to be true. If we are wise, we will build children with only the bricks God hands us, not the rocks life has thrown at us. We will choose to believe God. No statistic, employer, bank statement, or matter of paternity can rob us of our promise. Unless we choose to believe it can.<BR><BR>We can't <i>tell </i>our children how to believe. We can only <i>demonstrate</i> how. I once believed in fear. I even believed in pain. I began to doubt love. I saw my hope slipping away, but then I was reminded that I had little eyes watching and small hearts in my hands. I may not be the best math tutor they'll ever have. I can't guarantee each meal will be a hit. But I pray each day that I will model a walk of faith for them and all those with whom I'm connected.<BR><BR>--Sarah Jakes
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  ### one  
  THE WAY IT USED TO BE
  
  
  IF JESUS DIED ALMOST TWO THOUSAND YEARS AGO TO save us all from the worst we
  had in us, he’d failed in our area, except on Sundays between the hours of ten
  A.M. and noon. At least in my opinion.
  
  
  But what was my opinion? Worthy as onion peelings, I thought, as I pondered
  how Pa had married Sarah two months after my mother died in childbirth—and
  he’d loved his “angel” so much. And four months after I was born and my mother
  was buried, Sarah gave birth to the son Pa had so wanted when I came along and
  ended my mother’s brief stay on earth.
  
  
  I was too young to remember the birth of this first son, who was christened
  Thomas Luke Casteel the Second, and they put him, so I’ve been told, in the
  cradle with me, and like twins we were rocked, nursed, held, but not equally
  loved. No one had to tell me that.
  
  
  I loved Tom with his fire-red hair inherited from Sarah, and his flashing
  green eyes, also inherited from his mother. There was nothing in him at all 