GOD'S PROPERTY

This drama references the one posted early on of Parent’s Responsibility. Ownership of people is a thread in African culture. Chiefs own the people in their area or territory. Husbands own their wives. Men even pay for them, which reinforces the belief. And the bride price or lobola has been called by anthropologists—the child price—which is why parents own their children.

Like many things, this is just a given, and therefore not questioned. I wrote this drama to start tweaking this concept. Psalm 24:1 says that just as the earth is the Lord’s, the people in it are His also. It’s a paradigm shift when we realize we don’t even belong to ourselves.

This is doubly so for a Christian. 1 Corinthians 6:19 and 20 says that we have been bought with a price. Humans are possessions—but not of other humans. We once belonged to God, but we chose to leave Him. He allowed that because He wants us to return to Himself of our own choice. We must choose to return to Him. Then as the verse says, “You are not your own. For you are bought with a price: therefore glorify God in your body, and in your spirit, which are God's.”

In Africa children are viewed as an asset—and the more children you have the more “assets” you have. Biblically, I believe children are given by God as a responsibility. The expectation in this part of the world is that someone else should handle the costs of my child—school fees, illness expenses, whatever. That someone else would be the government, employer, missionary, expat. And one should be able to just keep on having more and more assets (children) because others will take care of them. I know that sounds racist, but practically, that is what I’ve experienced.