I have taught my daughters to pray. This usually happens in one of the more popular prayer times. You know them—breakfast, lunch, dinner, and bedtime. We pray for other things from time to time also; things such as a boo-boo, for daddy to get a job (prayers welcome), and other, more spontaneous, events.
But when my daughter prays, I think she’s a Calvinist
Breakfast sounds like this: “Thank you God for the food and all the stuff, amen.” Lunch sounds like this: “Thank you God for the food and all the stuff, amen.” Dinner sounds like—well, I bet you can guess. This is my youngest daughter, who just turned 4 the other day.
Today, I let her know that she can thank God for what ever she wants to before she prayed. She began to pray, and to my surprise, she prayed, “Thank you God for the food and all the stuff, amen.” I reminded her after her prayer that she can thank God for many other things, and even gave her examples. She proceeded to explain the reason for the way she prayed: “Because I can’t say EVERYTHING, so I just say ‘All the things.’”
I am taking this as her way of trusting God in prayer without being repetitive.
You know how the story goes: the Calvinist prays short prayers, trusting God has all under control and gets chastised by the Arminian for not spending enough time in prayer. The Arminian prays long prayers, sometimes falling asleep during them, and may add a little worry in his prayer and gets chastised by the Calvinist for rambling. Of course, this is just a silly illustration.
Is my child a Calvinist?
I don’t know what her little mind can understand. Also, that does not concern me. I just find it humorous.
What does YOUR prayer time look like?
—Jonathan J.
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Usually a lot more whining than probably should be.
I can't possibly see you whining . . .
Amen to that. And a good bit of begging and groveling. Though maybe that's appropriate when dealing with the Omnipotent Creator of Everything
Ummm. I wonder if HE knows?
very good. I raise my kids word of faith. Now they pray like your daughter does
Hah! great. Maybe my daughter just wants to get to her food quickly???
I'll be honest, I've given up on praying before meals as of late. Feels repetitive and meaningless when I do it. I'm sure that can be critiqued.
My private intercessory prayer has taken a turn lately as well. I used to grow weary praying over a list of people and requests, it felt like repetitive begging. Something is different now though. Pleading someone else's case before the throne, reminding God of promises, has taken on new life.
I know what you mean. I think I do it now mostly out of guilt and tradition. And I do it with my children for different reasons.
One idea interested me though, as an aid to the difficulty of dry meal prayers: Instead of just praying for a blessed meal and a productive day, pray Psalms back to God. Not sure where I heard that idea (not that praying scripture is a new idea anyway). I think the approach was paired with memorizing a few verses from the Psalms each week. Fuel for the prayers.
Another thing I need much work with: memorizing Scripture.