Leaving a Legacy in Motherhood

“The earliest memories I have of my spiritual legacy are tucked inside the four walls of a small country church,” says Gail Clay, wife of General Superintendent Doug Clay. “My grandmother was insistent on taking me to church, and I loved putting on my Sunday dress and holding my grandmother’s hand as we walked up the steps of the whitewashed building.”

While growing up, Clay learned about the simple blessings found in a tight-knit country church and the importance of being part of a community that meets one another’s needs. She grew up living next door to her grandmother, affording her an intergenerational spiritual dynamic throughout childhood. For Clay, the impact of this intergenerational influence was embedded in life’s everyday moments.

When she became a mother, the legacy of her grandmother lived on through her, impacting the lives of her daughters and her grandchildren. Learning valuable lessons from her grandmother who helped raise her, Clay has held dear those childhood memories and now is making new memories with her family, living next door to both of her daughters and all eight of her grandchildren. She is abundantly grateful for the continual opportunities to pass down all that she has learned about motherhood to her girls through their various stages of motherhood and her two precious granddaughters who will, one day, be mothers themselves.

Clay states that one of her favorite verses as a mother and grandmother is Joshua 4:20-24 which says, “And Joshua set up at Gilgal the twelve stones they had taken out of Jordan. He said to the Israelites, ‘In the future when your descendants ask their parents, ‘What do these stones mean?’ tell them, ‘Israel crossed the Jordan on dry ground.’ For the Lord your God dried up the Jordan before you until you had crossed over. The Lord your God did to the Jordan what he had done to the Red Sea when he dried it up before us until we had crossed over. He did this so that all the peoples of the earth might know that the hand of the Lord is powerful and so that you might always fear the Lord your God.’”

For Clay, the impact of this verse has driven her to be intentional about leaving a legacy through her role as a mother, just as her grandmother and mother did for her. Because of the blessing of living so close to her girls, she states that she can continue to build her legacy of motherhood while simultaneously providing the same intergenerational spiritual influence that she had to her grandkids by being “Mimi.”

Clay shares that leaving a legacy in motherhood is something that requires women to be purposeful, present, and patient.

PURPOSEFUL

“When you look at this passage in Joshua chapter 4, you see that the Israelites were purposeful in building a memorial that would strengthen the faith of their offspring for generations to come,” she says.

She goes on to say that the instruction for this kind of spiritual transfer to the next generation was something the Israelites were instructed by God to do in Deuteronomy 6:6-9. The passage says, “These commandments that I give you today are to be on your hearts. Impress them on your children. Talk about them when you sit at home and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up. Tie them as symbols on your hands and bind them on your foreheads. Write them on the doorframes of your houses and on your gates.”

PRESENT

To do this, Clay states that a mother must also be present, not just physically, but emotionally as well.

“We can’t leave a spiritual legacy for our children when we aren’t present and engaged with them,” she says. “Legacies are built over a lifetime, and it takes being present with your kids every single day to build something that will live on inside of them.”

Often, parents fall into the trap of viewing their children as a burden rather than a blessing.

“But when mothers remember what David said about children in Psalm 127:3-5, they see their children as God does; as a heritage, a blessing, and a reward,” Clay states. “It was my grandmother’s view of me as a blessing and a reward that made our relationship so special. It fostered a spiritual confidence in me that has kept my faith solid.”

PATIENT

Finally, Clay encourages mothers to develop a spirit of patience.

“Imagine the patience it must have taken for the Israelites to carry 12 stones around the wilderness. It would have been easy for them to deem them as unnecessary, but instead they persisted in patience, carrying each of the 12 stones until the time for the memorial to be built had come.”

Clay states that patience is a dying characteristic in today’s culture of on-demand, instant-gratification. “As mothers, we are called to patient instruction of our children. We are called to quiet, consistent moments of teaching.”

She shares that Proverbs 1:8-9 speaks to the patience of gentle guidance from each parent.

“Fathers are listed as instructors while mothers are listed as teachers. Fathers have a special role to play in a child’s life, but the role is different,” she says. “Instruction is not the same as teaching. Instruction is often telling how something is done through specific directions while teaching is explaining something, a broader term of passing down understanding.”

Teaching takes patience, she reiterates, and patience is something that is necessary to leaving a legacy in motherhood.

Clay reflects back on the legacy left to her in the rural Ohio church in which she spent so many years learning about Jesus alongside her grandmother. “It was the purposeful way my grandmother made church a priority, it was the way she was present with me and saw the value in having me with her each Sunday, and it was the patient way she prayed for me and my family that made all the difference.”

Ashley B. Grant

Ashley B. Grant has a master's degree in Human Services Marriage and Family Counseling from Liberty University and is a credentialed Christian counselor through the American Association of Christian Counselors. Grant also holds certifications in crisis pregnancy counseling and advanced life coaching. Ashley is a fourth generation Assemblies of God preacher’s kid and has one daughter and three sons.