Jones Onigbinde – Great Mother Heart …
Of all the difficulties parents face, one of the most challenging to balance is what you want your child to accomplish and their own, very personal, goals for themselves. One of the most rewarding things a mother can do is nurture her child, set a foundation in place to help her child succeed in life, faith, love, and happiness and to become a positive influence in society.
Growing up, the people in my village were resistant towards learning and reluctant to educate their children. My mother, however, had a different view. Here’s an excerpt from page 8 of my book, Great Mother Heart:
My mother had everything planned. Although she knew she was short on resources, she had learned from somewhere or someone that if our condition was to change, it could only happen through my education. She motivated me the best she could, she could not read herself, but she had a strong mind … I was fortunate, thanks to my mother’s vision of education being my way out of poverty.
Because of her vision for me, and her dedication, sacrifice, and sheer willpower to make it happen, I excelled in school. She made education as important to me as it was to her and her vision for my future. My mother coupled the importance of education in improving my life situation with a strong foundation in faith. She did everything in her power to ensure I would be well-balanced, successful, and grounded spiritually.
I’m still amazed when I look back and realize how blessed I was that my mother didn’t just go along with what everyone else in the village considered “best” for their children, that she looked to the future and made the tough choices she needed too in order to give me a chance at something more in life.
Hannah in the bible was such a visionary; she prayed that if God would give her Samuel, she would God and the whole Israel a prophet. She envisioned that her son would serve God. The rest is history. (1 Sam 1: 1-18)
Parent would do well to envisioned greatness for their children; Christian parents would do better by envisioning that their children would have a great spiritual impact in their generation as Hannah did for Samuel.
Did your mother have a vision for you? Something she worked and sacrificed for to ensure you would have a better life than she did?
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