I have a daughter. My daughter is called Abigail. Hello, would you like to meet my daughter? Nope. Sorry, still hasn’t sunk in. Not only do I have a baby in my house, but she’s not going anywhere and she will, God willing, grow up through being a toddler, a child, before herself possibly having children, growing old and dying. I helped start all that - she came from me!
I am relishing the opportunity and responsibility of nurturing her, teaching her and ‘instructing her in the way she should go’, including giving her the context and opportunity to love, worship and relate to God in her own way. I’m very wary of placing any of my expectations on her or recycling my own disappointed hopes onto her, but inevitably dreams and ideas float up and as long as I’m aware of the dangers I don’t necessarily think they’re a bad thing.
I’ve thought about this quite a bit and I genuinely don’t think I mind whether she’s clever or not. However, overwhelmingly I’d love her to empathise and reach out to the needy, the lonely and the sad particularly as a child and I’ll encourage her to do that from a young age. I really believe that outward looking families with children can be places of great healing for isolated people and that children can have a great impact in their peer group by actively including those that are left out in school and play.
My other desires are a little trivial in comparison:
1. Help her learn to catch well so that she can enjoy outdoor activity and sport (especially with me).
2. Teach her Cantonese from a young age – I can’t think of one other work related skill (other than reading and writing) that she might thank me more for in 15 to 20 years time.
3. Hope that she likes train sets. Because I do. They’re fun.
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