Daughters

I’m raising a daughter. Sometimes it feels like such a scary thing- it is a daunting responsibility when I look around me in this world. There is so much to tell her, teach her. Yet there is so much she will not learn from me. She will be bombarded, impacted by a whole slew of things that are outside of my control. The generations before her have enacted so many changes in the core of her very essence. In so many ways, who she is and is supposed to be have been redefined by a society that she had no part of. She had no say in who her culture has decided she is supposed to be. And what I will teach her will fly in the face of what she hears around her.

I will tell my intelligent daughter that she cannot be anything she wants to be. Because first of all, life is not just about her desires, and secondly, there are other laws that govern what is and is not possible for a person to do. The simple act of wanting something does not make it possible or beneficial. This should be common sense, but it’s not.

I will also be telling her to NOT follow her heart, and NOT do what makes her happy simply because of that fact. Her heart is deceitful above anything else and not a good compass for her major life decisions. And what makes her happy is not necessarily what will bring her joy. Happiness is an idol built to ourselves. Her life will be more meaningful when it is lived for others instead of herself.

I will be telling her that her body is NOT her own- she was bought with a price. And the use of her body is meant to be a far more glorious one than the simple satisfaction of her immediate, impulsive desires. There will be many choices to be made, and I will teach her that every choice has a consequence, and lives are not haphazard moments, but eternal, meaningful opportunities.

I will teach her to be beautiful where it truly matters, in the hidden person of her heart.

I will implore her to find a man that she can follow, a man that follows God. I will teach her what it looks like to submit her will under another. She will see that it is difficult, but it is good.

I will advise her to be willing to let college and career take a back seat to walking down that aisle. Because the main thing she was created to do was to reflect something else, something greater, in the way she walks out her life.

I will show her to embrace what her body was created to do and give life as many times as she possibly can. I will encourage her to love life-giving, to desire it above anything else she could possibly do. I will tell her there is nothing more blessed she could do with her body.

I will teach her to nurse, nourish and care for the defenseless. I will set the example of pouring every ounce of my being out for the love of their little souls.

I will teach her to serve, to help. I will bring her alongside me as I show her to put herself aside for the sake of others.

I will tell her that time is precious and easily slips by; I will encourage her not to waste it sitting in front of screens of any sort or size, but to invest her minutes in the people around her. Those are the moments that will endure.

Finally, I will remind her every day to set her eyes on what really matters, what comes after this blink of an eye. For our time here is short, but there is so much more than this. I will take her hand so that she does not get lost in this messy, confusing, upside-down world. I will train her. I will love her. And by the grace of God, without fear, I will raise this daughter of mine to be what she was, from the very beginning of time, meant to be.