Mother, What Should I Ask For?
It was one party not to be forgotten in a hurry. Weeks and even months afterwards, people would gather in groups and discuss in hushed tones about how the despicable act had been made to appear so ordinary — a young and naive girl had simply followed her mother’s instructions.A pious prophet had been decapitated.
“Mother, what should i ask for?’
The question still rings out on many dinner tables. Young children sitted on the car seat at the back as Mum completes the school runs and she tries hard to concentrate on her driving with the torrential rain of questions asking, Mum, ‘Which should I go for?, What should I wear?, What do I say?, Where do I go? What do I do?”
Princess Herodias had just missed a golden opportunity. Houses and kingdoms, riches and wealth, all on a platter of gold sadly sacrificed on the altar of personal vendetta.
Queen Herodias had deprived her daughter of an insured future by giving her wrong counsel.
Would you have acted better? How do you advise your own children? How do you steer them in the right direction? How do you provide guidance for these ones over whom you are accountable to God?
Do you take measured and calculated steps to tailor them towards their God-purpose and calling? Or do you leave it to chance? Are you permissive or are you deliberate? Do you wait on God periodically to hear for your children?
The albatross for Queen Herodias was self aggrandizement. Searching deep within you, is that what you are all about too? Would your child be caught in the web of your self gratification?
I have posed these questions to get you thinking.
As mothers, we need to set perspective for our children educationally, spiritually, physically, morally, educationally and in every other way possible.
Be it in checking up on their homework or checking discussions on whatsapp groups on their smart phones. We need to pray for them and with them. We ought to be able to boast of their baptism in the Holy Ghost, or for starters, their exploits in teenage church
What about their appearance? Toddler, tween, teen or young adult, are they decently dressed or do we allow them to expose body parts?
I recently witnessed a 9–10 year old boy retort in loud angry tones at his mother and she didn’t even seem to notice anything amiss.
The perspectives we set will guide the questions they ask and the way we answer them.
But to answer their questions correctly, we must also be well informed. This is the age of information. A wise sage once said, there are two Gs you can’t do without in the 21st century — God and Google. Let me advise you to hook up with the first G — God. Make him your pivot, your foundation and your basis for answering every question to which your child would need answers and he will lead your search in the second G.
Our children’s lives are as open empty tablets, we write on them one letter, one word at a time. The pages we write, the volumes we publish will remain on the shelves of the hearts of many they come in contact with. It takes but one child to change the world. Afterall, Hitler was born a baby. With just one question Herodias will forever be remembered as the teenage and naïve princess who changed the world and the course of history for ever.
What are we writing? What are we teaching? What are they asking and how are we answering?
