Ministry Begins at Home

My coworker found out that a very well-respected and high-esteemed preacher has a daughter who had a child when she was 14 years old. This information was not exposed to the public and no one knew about it except for the church (comprised of 35,000 people on an average Sunday).

Because my coworker recently found out, she was shocked and her immediate thought was... for this preacher, family became second priority and ministry in the church became first. He was too busy attending speaking engagements around the world and caring for other people's lives that he did not have enough time to care for his family.

She was a firm believer that ministry begins at the home. If she was offered a speaking engagement elsewhere, she would say no if her son (she's a single mother) was not right with God. This was very important for her. She's a firm believer that the parent has to be present in the child's life not to watch everything he/she is doing, but at least to speak truth into their life. It's great to be praying for the kids twenty four hours a day, but it is also very important to not just pray but be present in the child's life.

It then made me think about a pastor I know who had three kids that has already grown up. He's a very spiritual and well-respected pastor, prays for hours and hours a day and everyone can tell he's a spiritual man. His three kids, though, have all seem to keep God as the farthest thing from their mind. They attend church for the sake of respecting their parents, but when it comes to their relationship with God, it was not so important. It's interesting because in the Asian culture, it does not seem that the parents take so much of an active role in the child's life. Our Christian Asian parents pray for their kids all the time, but don't spend enough to be intentionally around their kids and speak life into them.

Growing up in a family where my parents spent most of their time outside of the home made me think how I would raise my future kids. I, also, am going to be in ministry for the rest of my life with my other. I hope that we can actively always pray for our kids together as well as be actively involved in their life too.