Mom Matters

This episode contains portions from the following programs:

"One Word"

"Hope from Hopeless Places"

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Dannah Gresh: What makes a mom unforgettable? Our listeners share the little moments—and the legacy—that left a mark.

Female caller: She was a special and remarkable woman in that she raised seven children on her own.

Male caller: Her commitment to God and commitment to family is just humbling.

Female caller: She has been the greatest prayer partner that I could have ever had.

Female caller: That's our comfort and my mother's greatest contribution—a life selflessly lived here with sincere longing to be with the One she loved the most, the One who had redeemed her soul.

Male caller: If you have a kind, good mother, you should consider yourself lucky, but if you have a godly mother, you should consider yourself blessed. I truly think I am in the blessed category.

Dannah: Me too! Praise God for faithful moms! Listening to these testimonies makes me wanna pull out my party hat and throw some confetti because, wow, these women—moms—sure are worth celebrating.

Happy early Mother’s Day! You’re listening to Revive Our Hearts Weekend. I’m your host, Dannah Gresh.

We’re celebrating Mother’s Day a week early. I know that for so many women this is sheer joy. You’ve been blessed with a wonderful mom, or you are a mom, and you’re looking forward to celebrating in the coming days. I just want to say: Mom, you matter! 

But you know what? You might be listening and your relationship with your mother is painful, or you’re hurting because you’re missing a mother you’ve lost, or maybe you ache to be a mom but struggling with infertility. For you, Mother’s Day might bring up feelings of grief, regret, or longing.

If that’s you, I want you to tell you about something that comforted me during a painful time in my life. In Genesis 16 we meet a woman named Hagar. She’s running away from her mistress Sarai, and she’s in the wilderness. It’s not just where she is, but a picture of how she feels—barren, lonely, dry.

The wilderness is a hard place to be, isn’t it? Ah, but often the Lord draws near to us in our desert places. He did so for Hagar. So that woman calls God by a beautiful name. It’s one I think we should remember more often. She calls him El Roi. It means “The God who sees.” Then she says, “Truly here I have seen him who looks after me.” Friend, this God—El Roi—he’s your God, too. He sees you today, no matter what wilderness you may be facing. 

Today’s episode is all about one simple truth: Mom matters.

Mom, the time you spend raising your kids—it echoes into eternity. Robert Wolgemuth’s mom knew that. Her quiet, faithful love showed Robert—and generations after him—the heart of Jesus.

I got to sit down with Robert and his wife, my sweet friend Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth, to talk about one word that describes our moms. And I loved what Robert shared.

Let’s listen.

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Dannah: At the beginning of the program, we each used a word; we chose one that would honor our mothers. Robert, you used your mother’s name: Grace. Tell us why.

Robert Wolgemuth: Yes, I did. In fact, I had the joy of delivering her eulogy. She stepped into heaven in 2010. My siblings and I had the privilege of giving eulogies, and I said, “Her parents named her ‘Grace.’ How did they know?”

As a boy going through awkward years and so forth, my mother cheered for me. I knew that she was in my corner pulling for me, praying for me, believing in me. In fact, I have something in common with the U.S. President who wrote, “All that I am or hope to be, I owe to my angel mother.” Do you know who said that, honey?

Nancy: Well, I know because you told me this morning. Do you know, Dannah?

Dannah: I don’t know. Who was it?

Robert: Abraham Lincoln. Isn’t that wonderful? “Honest Abe” and I have something in common: we had amazing mothers. I can remember over the years . . . In fact, I had friends who I was convinced were my friend because they got to come over to my house. 

When they walked in our front door, my mother hugged them, every one. It didn’t matter who it was, what he looked like—from high school, junior high, or grade school. My mother embraced them, every single one.

Nancy: And, Honey, I’ve heard you tell about how she wore glasses, the kind of hung around her neck.

Robert: Yes. One of her best friends was the eye doctor in town because she continued to crush her glasses between the hugs from my friends . . . and that’s the truth! 

Dannah: How beautiful! I resonate with that. I feel like as I was growing up, my memory is that my friends were coming over to see my mom. I don’t know if they were really coming to see me, because she just loved them so very much!

Nancy: And, Honey, I’m so looking forward someday to meeting Grace. I so wish I’d had the chance to know her. I’ve heard you talk a lot about her, because she did make such an incredible impression in your life. One of the things I’ve heard you say is how attentive and responsive she was. Like when you would walk in a room . . . just describe that sense.

Robert: I remember from a very early age, when I would walk into the kitchen or wherever she was when I’d wake up, she’d stop whatever she was doing and she would welcome me into the kitchen (or wherever she was or when I’d come home from school).

When I was a little boy and I’d bring home some underwater seascape done with finger painting—remember those on crinkly paper? She would stop what she was doing, she’d get down on one knee so that she was my height, and she would look at my painting.

She would hug me. She made me believe that I was worthy of that kind of love, even when I was a little boy. So when I invited Jesus into my heart at age four, at her knee, I knew what God’s grace looked like . . . in the form of my mother! 

Dannah: Beautiful!

Nancy: Wow, I love that, Honey! And isn’t that what it should be like for all of us as, whether our own children or others that we’re investing in, that they see the love of God in us? It reminds me of what the apostle Paul said to Timothy (going back to that passage we looked at earlier). He says to Timothy, 

But as for you, continue in what you have learned and have firmly believed, knowing from whom you learned it and how from childhood you have been acquainted with the sacred writings, which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus (2 Tim. 3:14–15). 

So he says to Timothy, “You had a mother, you had a grandmother, who modeled to you faith in Jesus Christ, and who made sure that you knew the Scripture. They acquainted you with the sacred writings, which then are what pointed you to faith in Jesus Christ.” 

And, Honey, your mother really loved the Scripture. She was faithful in passing it on—not only to you and your siblings, but to her grandchildren as well!

Robert: Yes, that’s right. In fact, my mother had thirty grandchildren, and two of them were Missy and Julie (Bobbie and my daughters). One time Bobbie and I walked into the kitchen. My mother said to us, “Julie has a surprise for you!”

So we thought, Okay, maybe she made a little raft out of popsicle sticks, or something that children make when they’re little, to surprise their parents. So Julie stood in the kitchen, looking up at us and said, “A: All we like sheep have gone astray. B: Be ye kind one to another. C: Children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is the right thing to do.”

And she quoted twenty-six Bible verses, each beginning with a letter of the alphabet. Now, the amazing thing was, this was July . . . and in October would Julie turn three. So she did this when she was two years old! My mother decided that this was important enough to pour into our daughters the Word of God.

In fact, when my mother stepped into heaven in 2010, all of her grandchildren and her great-grandchildren—which, at the time were about forty kids—stood in front of the church, and they quoted all these twenty-six Bible verses. Starting with, “All we like sheep have gone astray,” and ending with, “Zaccheaus, you come down; I’m going to your house for dinner.”

Nancy: Wow, what a beautiful picture of a modern-day “Lois” and “Eunice,” a mother, grandmother, and great-grandmother to those generations, who now, as Paul said to Timothy, can, “continue in what [they] have learned and have firmly believed, knowing from whom [they] learned it and how from childhood [they] have been acquainted with the sacred writings [the Scriptures], which are able to make [them] wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus” (2 Tim. 3:14–15).

And, Honey, it’s been an incredible thing for me to come into this family and see how many of those children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren of your mother, Grace, are walking in a sincere faith today because of that seed of the Word that was implanted in their hearts!

Robert: In fact, you know Sweetheart, one of the things that I’ve said so many times to you: “Oh, I wish . . .” And you’ve said, “In heaven we’ll meet . . .” But I so wish you could have met my mother! You and I started dating in 2015. She stepped into heaven in 2010, so you never got a chance to meet her.

Nancy: And yet, I feel like I’ve come to know something of her heart, just by seeing how it’s reflected in you and your tenderness, your gentle spirit. There are qualities in your life that you attribute to each of your parents, but it seems like that tenderness—that gentleness—really came from your mother’s heart.

Dannah: Amen. What a fun conversation that was. Praise God for the legacy of Robert’s mother—and so many mothers just like her. Mom matters! And Grace is just one beautiful example.

Not too long ago, Nancy sat down to talk with another faithful mom, Angela Yuan and her son, Dr. Christopher Yuan. This mother / son duo travel the country sharing their story—and let me tell you, it is a powerful one. Christopher and his mother were just recently at our local Christian high school and wow! You will be shocked to hear Christopher tell us just how lost he was. Just how deep the darkness was in his life. But we’ll also hear about the miraculous power of a mother’s prayers. Here’s Dr. Christopher Yuan.

Christopher Yuan: My drug business just exploded. I became not just a drug dealer, but a supplier. I was supplying drugs to dealers in over a dozen states. I was very active in the gay community, very popular.

I felt like I was larger than life. Unfortunately, I was living a very promiscuous life as well—just further and further and further away from God.

My parents had hoped that things would get better, and they were praying and praying and things just did not get any better.

Nancy: But you did not give up knocking on heaven’s door.

Angela Yuan: No.

Nancy: You kept praying.

Angela: Yes, for seven years.

Nancy: Without any evidence that God was hearing or answering those prayers. What kept you praying?

Angela: I think it’s just God’s Word. Every time I read God’s Word, He never gives up on us. I also have the picture of the persistent widow, knocking on God’s door. Maybe I’m not the first in the line, so I want to get up early in the morning and knock on His door, praying, crying, fasting . . .

Christopher: My mom fasted every Monday for seven years.

Nancy: Even an extended fast at one point.

Christopher: She once began fasting and felt that, “I’m going to fast until God tells me to stop,” and she fasted for thirty-nine days.

Nancy: And from all appearances, you were impervious to all of this, and it was having no effect. But God gave you the faith and the grace, Angela, to keep knocking on heaven’s door, and you even prayed that God would help you not to give up, right?

Angela: Yes. I just believed God’s promise.I just asked God, don’t let me give up that son.

Nancy: And you prayed that over and over again.

Angela: Over and over every single day.

Nancy: Another thing you prayed during that season was, “Lord . . .”

Angela: “Do whatever it takes to bring this prodigal son to You.” I think it’s important to realize that our children need Jesus Christ. We make sure it’s not pray for our son to come back home to this earthly home.

Nancy: The answer to your mom’s prayers and that miracle that was needed came in a way that probably nobody would have scripted.

Christopher: Never.

Nancy: Tell us how that happened.

Christopher: Well, it came simply with a bang on my door. I opened my door, and on my front door step were twelve federal drug enforcement agents, Atlanta police, and their two big German shepherd dogs. They confiscated all my money and my drugs. I was charged with a street value equivalent of 9.1 tons of marijuana, and that was ten years to life in the federal prison. I was facing ten years to life.

So finally I thought, Well, maybe I’ll just call home. I didn’t want to call home because in my mind I was still imagining my parents before Christ. They would just give me an ear full, tell me, “You deserve to be there. What did you do?” I remember what my mom first said as she answered the phone.

Nancy: You called collect?

Christopher: I called collect, and she said, “Son, are you okay?” No condemnation. She didn’t yell at me.

So it was three days after that, I was trying to stay away from the riff-raff—the bad guys. “This is just probably a mistake, and I’ll get out soon.” I was walking around the cell block. I mean, God was softening my heart, but my heart was so hard that there was a lot of softening to do.

Walking around, and you know, Nancy, I passed by this garbage can. It was just disgusting, things just flowing out of it, flies circling around. I looked at that and I thought, That’s my life. Everything in my life was going the right direction, and yet it just took this turn and now I found myself in jail among common criminals—just trash.

So I was just going over all my life and how horrible it was now and the place I was in. I was about to walk past this garbage can, and I looked on top of the trash—right on top of it—I found a Gideon’s New Testament.

Nancy: That somebody had thrown away.

Christopher: Someone had just thrown it away. Someone must have just thrown it away because nothing was on top of it. It was just sitting right there. I walked right by it, and I picked it up and I brought it back to my cell. I started reading God’s Word. I read through the entire gospel of Mark that first night.

That was just the beginning of God working. 

Christopher: I was reading Scripture and finding just this new life within me that was coming through, and yet really convicted of my rebellion against God, against my parents, against the government.

God was showing me the idols that I had in my life—so clearly. Where God says, “You shall have no idols in your life,” I thought, Well, what are my idols? And it was so obvious immediately—well, drugs. That’s my idol. That was my idol, as I was addicted to it. I did it every day. And yet amazingly, over some time, that hold that drugs had on my life was gone.

Nancy: But then, there was another issue that the Lord began to deal with you about, which was longer than a few months of wrestling it through, and it had to do with your sexuality. How did you begin to process that?

You’d been in the gay lifestyle for years, acting out homosexuality, you had a very promiscuous life, you were deep, deep, deep into that. Now you’re coming to faith in Christ. What did you do with this whole area of your sexuality?

Christopher: Well, I lived as a gay man for years. In prison, as God was drawing me to Himself I began to ask myself this question, “What is it in my life that I feel like I cannot live without?”

Nancy: Which is exactly what an idol is.

Christopher: I thought at the time that I could “have my cake and eat it too.” I could have God, and I could still be gay and still have this sexuality. But as I was reading Scripture, I came across those passages that seem to condemn homosexuality.

Nancy: So you realized you had a choice to make there. Were you going to accept the Word of God as the authority in your life, Christ as your Lord, or were you going to hang onto your idol?

Christopher: Yes. 

Nancy: You knew you couldn’t have both.

Christopher: I couldn’t have both. But that wasn’t so easy, because I still had these temptations and struggles within me. So I was reading through Scripture, poring over the Word of God and I came across a passage which is so profound. It says, “Be holy, for I am holy” (1 Peter 1:16).

Regardless of whether your temptations, your passions, your desires, your struggles change, God is calling us to live a life of obedience. God is calling us to live a life of holiness. So I realized that the opposite of homosexuality is not heterosexuality, but holiness.

The opposite of any struggle with sin is not, to not sin, but it’s to be holy. It’s to be like Christ.

Nancy: And as you began to pursue that identity, the Lord began to make it clear to you that He had plans for your life that were way different than anything you had ever imagined. In fact, you began to sense a call to go into ministry . . .

Christopher: So different! Yes! It was during this time God was giving me all these opportunities to share the gospel with these inmates who knew they were sinners. I would just come right in and open up the Bible, share the gospel to them, and these people were coming to faith.

I was leading Bible studies, I was preaching in prison, and that was when I felt a strong calling to full-time ministry . . . while I was in prison. And when that kind of change of heart happened, that’s when God did another miracle, and He shortened my sentence from six years to three years.

Nancy: You called your mom. I know, Angela, you’ve got to remember that call, when he told you he wanted an application. 

Angela: Yes, he said, “I want to go to a Bible college to learn more about the Bible. Could you send me an application to Moody Bible Institute?” At that moment, I realized, “He was coming home!” Before that I didn’t know what he was going to do. He might still want to stay in Atlanta with his friends.

When he said he would call me back about Moody, I said, “He is coming home,” coming back to Chicago, and I was just rejoicing.

Christopher: So, amazingly, Moody actually accepted me. I was released from prison in July of 2001 and started the very next month, in August.

Nancy: But there was still a sweet time coming up when you got out of prison and were going to be reunited with your family. I want our listeners to hear how that unfolded.

Christopher: Well, it was so amazing, the fact that I wanted to come home. For a time I thought my home was Atlanta, then I thought, I am going to come home when I get out of prison. I’m going to come to Chicago.

So my parents drove down to pick me up. I had what they call a furlough. They gave me a few hours to drive from the prison, then I needed to check into the halfway house within a few hours. They gave me some leeway time where I could swing by home. I knew we were going to do that. So we drove from southern Illinois to the Chicago suburbs.

I could not believe it. Three years doesn’t seem like such a long time, but . . .

Nancy: You’d been out of communication with each other and estranged from each other a long time.

Christopher: Yes, and so we pulled up to our home. As we pulled up to our home, we have this big tree in our front yard, and around it was tied a yellow ribbon.

I thought, “That’s so special.” So we parked the car, and we got out and walked up to the door and opened the door, and in our hallway were a hundred yellow ribbons. I looked at them and they were all signed by someone, I didn’t know who, and they had Scripture written on some of these yellow ribbons, just all over.

My mom explained to me, “These are all from people who have been praying for you.” There were strangers I’ve never known, many people I’ve still yet to meet, praying for me for years, those times that I was estranged and had nothing to do with my parents and while I was in prison. They were welcoming me home. I remember Mom said, “Welcome home.” I think it was at that moment that I knew that I was home, I was finally home.

Dannah: Now that’s redemption! A redemption story fueled by a mother’s prayers. Truly, only God could have written a story like it, but I hope you heard this loud and clear from their testimony: Mom, you matter. Your prayers matter, too!

If you want to explore that testimony more thoroughly, Christopher Yuan and his mother Angela have also co-authored a book called Out of a Far Country: A Gay Son's Journey to God.

Here at Revive Our Hearts, we are so grateful that we get to be a small part of the story God is writing for your life. And we rely on support from friends like you to keep bringing you rich biblical encouragement just like you heard today.

I’m so excited about something we’re launching this fall—an exciting six-year initiative called Wonder of the Word. Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth is preparing to walk us through the entire Bible on the daily Revive Our Hearts program. We’re asking God for a movement of true revival as we invite women around the world to learn, love, and live out His precious Word together.

It’s a big undertaking, and we need your help. Would you consider giving? When you donate at ReviveOurHearts.com, we’d love to send you our 50 Promises Scripture Card Set to say “thank you.” Again, that’s ReviveOurHearts.com. Be sure to ask for your card set when you donate so we can send that your way.

Next weekend, Mother’s Day will finally be here! Moms matter—and this includes spiritual mothers! We’re going to take some time to celebrate the women who disciple us—our moms in the faith—next time on Revive Our Hearts Weekend. I hope you’ll join us!

Thanks for listening today. I’m Dannah Gresh. We’ll see you next time for Revive Our Hearts Weekend.

This program is a listener-supported production of Revive Our Hearts in Niles, Michigan, calling women to freedom, fullness, and fruitfulness in Christ.

*Offers available only during the broadcast of the podcast season.