“If you are a parent, I ask you to consider carefully your influence on your children and your responsibility for them. What are your ambitions for them? Almost all parents have ambitions for their children, but how many harbor ambitions for the children that are biblical?
Do your ambitions for your son or daughter include a certain vocation or certain level of education? Graduation from a certain college? Professional or athletic or artistic recognition? If so, let me ask this: Are any of these ambitions in line with true greatness as defined in Scripture?
And here’s a more important question: Are any of your ambitions for your child more important to you than their cultivation of humility and servanthood - the basis for true greatness as biblically defined? Are any of these ambitions more important to you than their learning to serve others for the glory of God? In other words, are you more interested in temporal recognition for you child than you are in his eternal reward?
Ultimately, that’s what parenting is mostly about - it’s about preparing our children for the final day. All parenting is ultimately a preparation for that day when your child will stand before the judgment seat of Christ and give an account” (pp. 157-159)
With fifteen year-old twins it is easy for me to start thinking about their higher education, jobs, career, future financial independence, etc. It is not that these are unimportant, but they can seem to call out for attention far more than servanthood, sacrifice and heavenly treasure. But as CJ points out, the call to worldly greatness is loud, but it is also potentially distracting to those pursing true greatness. To prepare our children for this world without an eye to the next is simply short sighted. We should not abandon a fervent pursuit of excellence in all we do or all we plan for our children. It’s just that worldly treasures and pursuits are never ends in themselves nor do they do much to lead our children toward true greatness.
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