Dear Jesus
by Katie Harding on September 12
At what age can you start teaching children to pray?
Years ago, I was buckling our oldest granddaughter, who was three at the time, into her car seat and she said to me, “I want to pray for my mommy.” Her mom was in the hospital experiencing some challenging health issues, so I responded, “Okay, we can pray.” And before I could say anything further, she replied, “No. I can do it myself.” Okay, then. I closed the van door, left her to pray, and proceeded to get into the front seat to drive. As she got older, she would pray before dinner, often thanking God not only for the meal but also for the butter, which she loved.
Our very active grandson has a consistent bedtime routine: pajamas, brush teeth, read two books, pray, and then a song. Our daughter sings “Summertime,” and when I’m there, I sing my own rendition of Tom Hall’s “Little Baby Ducks.” It’s a song I sang to our children and now to each of our grandchildren. One night, when we were recently caring for them while their parents were away, our grandson was so tired, he didn’t want his books, just his bed. But as soon as he got under his covers, he said, “Oma, pway.” So I put my hand on his head and prayed. What amazed me most, not just that night but each night, was how still he would lie as I prayed for him as long as I desired. Even as a toddler when the family said they were going to pray before dinner, he would stop eating, put his hands together and wait while his sister prayed.
In observing the bedtime routine for our youngest granddaughter, the night before their parents left, I saw where this love for prayer begins. Even as a wiggly eighteen-month-old, she sat very quietly in her mother’s lap as her mother read her a story and then started praying over her with “Dear Jesus…” So, it should have been no surprise when we received a video of our oldest grandchild praying at dinner, the middle echoing his big sister, and the youngest, at eighteen months, not only holding her hands together but “praying along.”
“Dear Jesus, thank you for Mommy and Daddy and Oma and Opa and our meat and our butter,” may not seem like much of a prayer. But a five-year-old encouraged to express her own thoughts to Jesus helped her to learn she can share whatever is on her heart with Jesus as she has grown from a praying preschooler into a praying pre-teen.
I don’t know if there is a “magic” age of when it’s best to start teaching children to pray, but it’s never too early and it’s also never too late. Even at the age of ten, our daughter still prays with her oldest at bedtime and then for her and her classmates on the way to school each morning. Children live what they learn, and learn best by watching and then doing.