Children are gifts from God. We, as parents learn many things while we bring them up. Parenting is a tremendous joy as well as a responsibility. The relationship which we have with our children makes a lot of difference. God expects us to a have right relationship with our children and thus fulfil our responsibility towards them. Our values and priorities should be right in the sight of God.

Parents can be categorised into three kinds. One, those to whom children become personal possession along with their houses, lands, cars, or other things. They are overly concerned about their children, apprehensive of their every discomfort and worry about even the slightest indication of fatigue. Their whole aim in life becomes fixed on to the children, educating them, providing for them not only for the present but also for the future. Don’t get me wrong. I am not against providing for children. The Bible also says that he who does not provide for children is an infidel. But what I am talking about are those who make children an excuse for not doing God’s will or God’s work. They choose ease, comfort a lucrative job etc. because of the children; they do not go to the mission field because of their children. They build houses, accumulate wealth and acquire possession for the future of the children. This they do, inspite of a vague conviction that God wants them elsewhere for His work. Never let possessiveness over our children excuse us from doing God’s will in our lives. Children are not our possession. They are loaned to us for training.

The second group are those parents who are all too eager to do God’s will and God’s work and fail to recognise their primary responsibility as parents. So, their children become a nuisance and a hindrance to the more important work of preaching God’s word. Parents are so busy with speaking engagements, church activities, mission work, that the child gets pushed to the periphery and neglected. Their children simply feel that their parents are just too busy to give adequate thought and care to them. They also have the impression that their parents have so many responsibilities that are intrinsically so good that there is little opportunity for followship between father and son, mother and daughter. Therefore, grows up an insecure child who later turns a rebel.

The third category are those who through painful trial and error have struck at the right balance between the above two positions. Their children are gifts from God, for whom they are responsible both materially (and physically) and also spiritually. The home is the nearest and first mission field. Parents who put their family last in the order of priorities are not setting a good example to their neighbours. This does not mean that home is the only field, even though God has made us responsible for our homes on priority. He has also given us a responsibility towards our neighbours and the world at large. The challenge to Christian parents today is to be able to set their house in order first and then having mobilised forces from the home, to be able to reach out to world. The Christ centred family is the greatest force for God on earth.

I will conclude on a personal note. I have not written this article because I belong to the last category. Far from it. In fact, I have often found myself in the first two groups and thus have done injustice to our own children (who by the way are three lively, naughty and difficult ones)

Having erred, we seek God’s help daily to help us strike the right balance – not to use them as an excuse for not doing God’s will or make them feel they are a hindrance to God’s work

In fact, our decision to go Danta as Medical missionaries came as a challenge not to make children an excuse but to obey and do God’s will and trust him to look after the need of the children with us in the villages, though it was difficult and they were a bit of a nuisance to others. This we did so that they may feel involved with us and be a part of our work and vision.

Our prayer is that we, along with other Christian parents, will be able to balance our responsibilities to children as well as to society, so that we may be able to do justice to both.

-Mrs. Shalini shah