MAY 27 will mark another memorable day in the lives of children all over the world including the vulnerable ones. As those who, by the grace of God, will lead our nation tomorrow, today, we thank God Almighty that the nation still exists and nothing has succeeded in dividing us. A nation is a large body of people living together and united by common descent, history, culture, or language, inhibiting or living in a particular country or territory.
Raising godly children in a godly nation is the responsibility of all and sundry. Everyone has a role to play in raising godly children. There is no doubt that God has tremendously blessed Nigeria as a nation with a vast number of agile, creative, dependable, responsible, and promising children. If they are well tutored, nurtured, and trained to become pillars of our nation tomorrow, then we shall have a nation of our dreams, void of chaos and godlessness. And, as the scripture has admonished us, “Train up a child in the way he should go, even when he is old, he will not depart from it.” In essence, we must not compromise our ethical and spiritual standards to compete with the world and we must also not forget to teach, reproof, correct, and train up our progeny in righteousness as commanded by God. Without children, there cannot be a nation and without a nation, there cannot be children. The two are intertwined and inseparable; we cannot have one without the other. Hence, there is the need to raise godly children that will constitute a godly nation.
Godly children in a godly nation are a two-edged sword; that is, one leads to the other. Godly children will build up a godly nation, all things being equal. The existence of godly children in a godly nation should be the desire of every good citizen of the nation. It will constitute the proverbial round peg in a round hole. The questions we may ask ourselves are these: Is Nigeria a nation by the definition in this write-up? Do I desire that Nigeria is known as a godly nation? What are the characteristics of a godly nation? Is Nigeria a godly nation if assessed by its current standing?
A godly nation is where the leadership directs the affairs of the nation with the fear and wisdom of God, plus sincerity, integrity, fairness, impartiality, and commitment to democracy. This would be a nation where the leaders exercise good governance that will promote a free and fair election without any manipulation, provide stable food at the table for common people, provide adequate security, and have good control price of essential commodities for affordability by the commoners, among other things.
A godly nation is where the principle of egalitarianism is practiced to the core where every citizen has free access to medical treatment in hospitals at an affordable cost and where necessary equipment is available at all times. A godly nation is one where the lives of the citizens are well protected at all times without fear or intimidation of any armed robber, terrorist, kidnapper, hired assassin, fraudster, and the like. It is a nation where there is effective execution of political manifestos rather than sugar-coated programmes or promises which are never implemented.
A godly nation is where the youth are adequately and gainfully employed on merit and not by sentiment, favouritism, or tribalism. A godly nation is where an apparent brain drain among her productive and vibrant youth is quite minimal. It is a place where godly ideas and issues are discussed by the National Assembly to make life bearable for the citizens. A godly nation is one where the leaders live by example, love righteousness, transparency, and accountability, and hate iniquity and injustice.
A godly nation is where the fear of God is instilled in the hearts of judges, and magistrates so that they mete out fair judgement without fear or favour of whose ox is gored. A godly nation is one where the police force is effectively equipped and well trained and psychologically motivated to efficiently perform their roles in the society to bind the spirit of brutality, lack of respect for humanity, destroy and root out the spirit of bribery and corruption that has eaten deep into the fabrics of the police in our society. A godly nation is where the religious bodies are after the salvation of souls rather than establishing more church branches and mosques while sins in the land are geometrically on the increase. A nation that shuns affluent and ostentatious living but stands against all the plans of the devil to lure the leaders to himself through the riches and lusts of the world by shutting them up from speaking the truth and compromising their faith and integrity is a godly one. In a godly nation, the masses should know their fundamental human rights so that the “money-bag” politicians can no longer buy their conscience.
A godly nation is one where the military force is properly disciplined to faithfully perform their primary role of adequate security by protecting the country against terrorism, kidnapping, assassination, and any external aggression. It is a nation where the paramilitary unit is committed to its duty with the fear of God to combat smuggling, importation of deadly weapons, hard drugs, contraband goods, and so on. A godly nation is where the citizens make good efforts to combat idolatry and occultism in the land which come under the guise of cultural revival. A godly nation is a nation where the citizens obey simple rules and regulations, law and order, pay their taxes at free will, and in exchange for doing so enjoy government facilities like good roads, uninterrupted power supply, pipe-borne water, and other social amenities. A godly nation is where the gospel is spread to all nooks and crannies of the land, thereby instilling love, and fear of God in the hearts of all and sundry. This is a nation that overcomes the spirit of religious fanaticism and bigotry. Certainly, it is a nation that can raise godly children. A godly nation is one with a stable educational system and is free from incessant strikes. At school, there is adequate provision of infrastructure and good equipment in the laboratories; and there is peaceful co-existence among the unions. For a nation to have godly children, the government must govern the citizens very well, and satisfy and meet their physical, spiritual, and social needs to a great extent.
The next question to ask is this: how does a nation raise, rear, nurture and train godly children? Rearing, nurturing, and training godly children are the responsibilities of all members of society, though the greater responsibility lies on the parents, religious bodies, and leaders. Parents must give their wards sound spiritual, moral, social, and educational training.
Parents should not compromise their primary responsibility to train their children by living by example, warning, rebuking, correcting, counselling, and praising them when need be. They must never spare the rod and spoil the child.
Government must not relent in its responsibility to provide a conducive environment for the educational and social training of children. The government must beware of policies that may jeopardise the upbringing of a child such as tampering with the morning devotion of the pupils and students in institutions of learning. The government should make laws that will mandate pupils and students to have morning devotion at the assembly in both primary and secondary schools to have deep and sound knowledge of God at their tender age. Any government policy that does not protect husband and wife from being separated because of work transfer is not ethical for upholding and promoting sound training in families.
Other societal training that can be rendered by an individual adult to the young ones cannot be overemphasised. We should be our brother’s keeper.
In conclusion, there is a common saying that, “You cannot give what you do not have.” If we desire godly children in a godly nation, the fear of God and godly living should be our watchword to train our children spiritually, socially, morally, and academically. Children trained in these ways will in turn build a godly nation. Parents have the primary responsibility to mould the lives of their children physically, socially, and spiritually for nation-building. A godly nation is one where the leaders serve with the fear of God, sincerity, faithfulness, transparency, and selflessness. Is this true about Nigerian leaders?
Ogungbemi, a cleric sent this piece from from Ibadan.
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