Rev Dr Mary Oluwatunbi Celebrate Life At 67, Advocate Intentional Parenting with A Book Launch 

 

Rev Dr Mary Bosede Oluwatunbi is a graduate of Ahmadu Bello University (ABU), Zaria, and a quantity surveyor by profession. She is a mother, grandmother, friend, and devoted servant of God.

She recently celebrated her 67th birthday — 67 years of life, grace, wisdom, impact and resilience. The milestone was marked with a new chapter of her life to be read through the launching of her new book, INTENTIONAL PARENTING – Raising Thriving and Faithful Kids.

In this interview with Gracious Akintayo, she reflects on 43 years of marriage, her motherhood and parenting journey, and raising three daughters who all got married as virgins, just as she did. Excerpts:

How does it feel to be 67 and launching a book on the same day?

It feels like God is crowning my years with goodness. I feel deeply grateful to God for life, for family, and for the privilege of living a purposeful life. At 67, I have seen God’s faithfulness through different seasons, and I have learnt that life is not about how long you live, but how well you impact others.

Launching the book, INTENTIONAL PARENTING – Raising Thriving and Faithful Kids, is my way of saying God has given me a message to share. The book is my birthday gift to families and parents – to young couples, single parents doing their best, and grandparents helping to raise the next generation. It is simple, practical, and faith-based.

What inspired you to write the book?

For a long time, I realized that the lessons, the tears, and the victories I have gathered over the years could help someone else. I didn’t want to leave this earth without documenting what life has taught me.

The book has been in my heart for some years. As a mother, mentor, and counsellor to many young families, I have seen the struggles parents face today and felt it was time to document what I have learned – not just from books, but from practical life experiences, mistakes, and God’s grace. I believe it is my responsibility to pass on what I know.

It is a collection of true life lessons, reflections, and encouragement for everyone.

What is the greatest lesson has life taught you at 67?

That nothing is wasted. The pain, the waiting, the joy – God uses it all for His glory. Contentment, good health, and family are true wealth. We must also keep learning and keep giving.

Life has taught me that parenting is not about perfection; it is about presence, principles, and prayer. Children don’t need perfect parents; they need present and intentional parents who raise them with values, love, and discipline.

With love, discipline, and God, you can still raise thriving children in this challenging world.

What do you want readers to learn from the book?

That parenting must be done on purpose. You don’t leave parenting to chance, thinking that taking them to a missionary school, to the university, or to church is enough. Those are additions. Charity begins at home. The work must start with the parents. You must be intentional and bond with your children, and that comes with having a personal relationship with God. Both parents must join hands to do the work.

There is also a place for single parenting and does not remove the responsibility of raising children well, but such parents must pay extra attention to their children. Also, there are people who had bitter and difficult childhood experiences and were not raised well.

You should not transfer the bitterness of the past to the next generation. The uniqueness of Intentional Parenting is that it brings a turnaround. There should be forgiveness for whatever the past has done. Our parents did what they thought best, and no one is perfect. Rather, we should strive to get better.

In particular, the book addresses grandparenting, relating well with adult children and married children.

There is this sense of entitlement among mothers and parents of husbands that it is their son’s house. No, it is no longer their son’s house. There should be no competition or contention. You must contribute your part and allow your son’s wife to be a wife in her own home.

Most often, the competition or contention is between the mother-in-law and the sister-in-law. Therefore, women need to be properly enlightened and trained.

What are the principles that have kept you strong?

Number one is God’s grace, then family, purpose, and peace of mind. The peace in our relationship as husband and wife is important. Not that there have not been storms; there have been, but it all boils down to the grace of God, healthy living, and a healthy lifestyle.

I also have contentment. Whatever I don’t have, I don’t worry about it. I am satisfied with what I have and I have learnt to wait for God’s timing. God has helped me with good health, which I don’t take for granted. Like Psalm 103:1-5 says, I bless the Lord for how He has helped me, and whatever I have is for His glory.

Whatever you don’t have, don’t envy others who have it. If you need it, God will provide it at the appropriate time.

What is one parenting mistake many parents are making today?

Many parents take things for granted. You have to play your role as parents so that your children may learn and grow. If you don’t teach them, there will be problems. The Bible says, train up a child in the way he should go, and when he is old, he will not depart from it.

We have to play our role and do what we can, then leave the rest to God. It is easier to build children than to repair men.

Many parents don’t pay attention to their children. They focus on providing for them without being there for them, and they assume that phones, gadgets, and good schools will do the work. But parenting starts from the home.

Again, many parents are no longer role models. You can’t just teach your children; they must see it in your life. Personal attention matters. They need more of your time, your listening ear, and your example.

How do we balance parenting between African and Western cultures?

Outside the country, if you beat a child, you can be arrested. In Nigeria now, you don’t beat children anyhow. You have to apply other forms of discipline. Among believers around the world, it is the same. They also believe children should be disciplined, but with love. There are many ways to discipline than beating or hurting a child.

With your eyes alone, you can correct a child, or talk to a child. Today, things are getting worse with bad things happening in other countries gradually spreading to Nigeria because children are left on their own, and they are not supposed to be left alone.

There has to be a measure to how you raise them, how you correct them, and how you instill values in them.

From my exposure and interactions, foreign believers also have values they instill in their children. But with trending online movies, you have to know what your children are watching because those things can corrupt their minds.

What is the most memorable lesson you learnt raising your own children?

It is praying for my children. I wrote in the book that I had three girls and a boy. When they were young, every night I would go and lay hands on them, telling God what I wanted them to become. On the days I forgot, they would be the ones to remind me. That continued for years until they grew up and went to higher institution – though not to boarding schools – and that helped me. They did not watch secular films; they watched children’s ministry materials their father bought for them while growing up.

The day I went to my daughter’s house and saw her children watching the same films, I was filled with joy and gratitude to God that what we imparted in them, they have continued with their own children, and that has now become a pattern of children’s upbringing.

The three girls are happily married with their own families; the boy remains, and we are still praying for them as required. It is a thing of joy seeing them succeeding in their various fields of endeavour.

It is not 100% perfect, but we were ready to learn and do what we could, while God covered our weak areas. When we commit everything into God’s hands, He will complete the rest. Psalm 112:1-3 talks about the person who fears the Lord and does His will. It says his seed shall be mighty on earth, and the generation of the upright shall be blessed.

The work most fathers are doing is still laborious; that is why we have to empower, equip, and educate the children to do better than we, their parents did. What we suffered, our children will not suffer them. If that is what we can do and hand over to the next generation, the future will be bright.

What is the missing link between the older and present generation’s marriage values?

That everyone is empowered and knows their rights is a mentality that does not help at all times. The older generation endured some things. Mama Oyedepo once said, you don’t fight to win an argument that will break your home, and that calls for wisdom. Rather, we must fight the devil and not ourselves. The devil is behind all those misunderstandings and crises. If there is no spiritual maturity, we would not have been able to endure and enjoy our 43 years of marriage.

Not that we don’t have issues, but God has been faithful. There are times one has to be a goat and the other a sheep for the sake of the marriage and the peace of the home.

We don’t have to resort to beating, hurting, or inflicting pain on one another as a couple. But when partners are properly brought up and contribute to the success of the marriage without waiting for, “Until he loves me, I won’t submit,” or “Until she submits, I won’t love her.” When we see each other as a gift from God, it makes things easier.

Though, it is sad that today, the devil is seriously fighting homes and marriages.

The devil is behind many pastors who are married and divorced and still go to Facebook and other social media platforms to announce it without giving a damn. We need to pray more for grace, wisdom, and tenacity, especially for our young ministers.

Because of education, technology, and civilization, no one wants to submit to one another, and that is affecting society.

At tender couples and marriage classes, people should be taught to pray for, trust, and encourage one another.

With the current socio-economic situation and survival mentality in the country, financial constraints are causing a lot of stress. We have to keep praying for God’s provision, wisdom, and guidance on how to go about it.

I am persuaded that life is a journey of faith; there will be no disappointment because God makes a way for His own.