Owner or Ambassador?

This week we ponder on the Ambassador style.

The word that the Bible uses for this intermediary position is Ambassador. It really is the perfect word for what God has called parents to be and to do. The only thing an ambassador does, if he’s interested in keeping his job, is to faithfully represent the message, methods, and character of the leader who has sent him. He is not free to think, speak, or act independently. Everything he does, every decision he makes, every interaction he has must be shaped by this question: “what is the will and plan of the one who sent me?” The ambassador does not represent his own interest, his own perspective, or his own power. He does everything as an ambassador, or he has forgotten who he is and he will not be in his position for long.

Parenting is ambassadorial work from beginning to end. It is not to be shaped and directed by personal interest, personal need, or cultural perspectives. Every parent everywhere is called to recognize that they have been put on earth at a particular time and in a particular location to do one thing in the lives of their children. What is that one thing? It is God’s will.

Here’s what this means at street level: parenting is not first about what we want for our children or from our children, but about what God in grace has planned to do through us in our children. To lose sight of this is to end up with a relationship with our children that at the foundational level is neither Christian nor true parenting because it has become more about our will and our way than about the will and way of our Sovereign Saviour King.

We like sovereignty, we like ownership, and we like having our will done on earth as God’s will is done in heaven! We treat our children as if they are our possessions. We often suffer from ambassadorial schizophrenia – at moments losing our mind, taking our parenting into our own hands, and doing things that we shouldn’t have done. We are often a very poor example of joyful submission to God’s law. We are often a very poor representative of God’s grace. We are often more propelled by fear than by faith. We often want short-term gain more than long-term transformation. There are many times we forget who we are, lose our mind, and do things that really don’t make any sense, or at least not very helpful.

Let us be honest and admit that many times we are like that. We lose our way and forget who we are in the middle of the endless, repetitive tasks of parenting the children entrusted to our care. There are moments when we lose our mind. There are times when what we’re saying and doing just isn’t helpful and definitely not ambassadorial.

More on this topic in the next week. Till such time, lets do some honest introspection and ask the grace of God to change where needed.