Welcome to Proverbs 31 Wannabe where Alexis Heaslip, a stay at home mother of two and follower of Jesus, shares her personal walk with Christ. Her goal is to help women explore the Bible and walk with Jesus by being a Proverbs 31 Wannabe woman of faith. Today we are going to be diving into praying with your little ones. Hope y’all enjoy 🙂 

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Transcript

15 February 2023

PRAYING WITH YOUR LITTLE ONES

1. PODCAST INTRO (1-2 MINUTES)

Start with podcast music to set the stage (appx. 15 seconds before speaking.)

1. Voice Introduction
   1. Hi there and welcome to Proverbs31 Wannabe where we discuss biblical womanhood in our constantly busy and sometimes crazy daily life. I’m Alexis Heaslip and as a wife and mother of two, I am always striving and praying to be a Proverbs 31 woman of faith. I am really excited for today because what we are going to be diving into is something that I am still learning about and working on myself. Today we are going to be talking about praying with your little ones. This is a really exciting topic for me because there is so much versatility with how we as moms can go about this important task. SO let’s dive on in y’all and learn about how we can pray with our littles. 
   1. Segue music            
2. WHY PRAY WITH YOUR LITTLE ONES? 
   1. What does the Bible say?  
      1. As as mom we have many roles to play, and one of those roles is to be a teacher and guide for our children so they can grow up knowing and understanding the importance of living in a way that reflects the will of the Lord. Just like we love having relationships and conversations with our children, our Father in heaven loves to do the same with all of us…even the little children. He doesn’t think that conversations with children are silly or a waste of time- indeed it’s quite the opposite. In the book of Matthew we see just how much Jesus wants children to come to him. If you will, please open your Bibles to Matthew chapter 19. Starting at verse 13, the Bible says, “One day some parents brought their children to Jesus so he could lay his hands on them and pray for them. But the disciples scolded the parents for bothering him. But Jesus said, “Let the children come to me. Don’t stop them! For the Kingdom of Heaven belongs to those who are like these children.” And he placed his hands on their heads and blessed them before he left.” You see, Jesus makes it really clear that He wants everyone in the world, including small children, to be able to come to Him for anything. What else does the Bible say about children and our duties as parents? Well one passage that slapped me in the face and showed me how important my job as a mom is is Psalm 78 verses 1-8. Turn to that passage if you have a Bible. This powerful passage says “O my people, listen to my instructions. Open your ears to what I am saying, for I will speak to you in a parable. I will teach you hidden lessons from our past— stories we have heard and known, stories our ancestors handed down to us. We will not hide these truths from our children; we will tell the next generation about the glorious deeds of the Lord, about his power and his mighty wonders. For he issued his laws to Jacob; he gave his instructions to Israel. He commanded our ancestors to teach them to their children, so the next generation might know them— even the children not yet born— and they in turn will teach their own children. So each generation should set its hope anew on God, not forgetting his glorious miracles and obeying his commands. Then they will not be like their ancestors— stubborn, rebellious, and unfaithful, refusing to give their hearts to God.” WOW. When I read this, my whole perspective changed. I don’t know about you, but it seems like the culture around us seems to be saying that being a stay at home mother is a waste of time. That we should be more focused on a career. Now there’s nothing wrong with women who work- there are amazing examples of women in the Bible who worked and loved the Lord. What is dangerous; however, is that the focus of the mothers in the world is so much so on being a successful worker, whether it’s because of a demanding job OR if it’s a mom who pours her energy into volunteering, that their energy isn’t being placed where it matters most-towards raising up their children to know the Lord and show them what a personal relationship with Jesus looks like. The Lord tells us throughout Scripture that this is what we as parents are supposed to be doing- and one of the ways to do this is by praying with your little ones daily.   
      1. Transition music
      1. Segue: Ok so we see how Scripture points us on a path of teaching our children but how are some ways that we can teach our children? How should we pray with our little ones so that they come to understand how important it is to have a relationship with Jesus? 
   1. Putting Scripture into Action
      1. Those are some great questions and I know it can feel overwhelming, but I want to offer up some ideas on how we as moms can easily integrate praying with our little ones into our day to day life. Just this past Sunday my pastor reminded my church during his sermon on how prayer should look like and I feel as if his message deeply applies to how we are to pray with our children.
         1. ADORATION
            1. The first aspect of prayer that Pastor Will talked about is adoration. We should be starting off our prayers by praising the Lord. There are a couple of ways we can do that with our children. We can sing praise songs with our little ones throughout the day. In the car, play some songs. My son loves the songs from VeggieTales- they have a whole worship album on Apple Music,  as well as the praise baby collection. My daughter loves music and this is a great way to introduce praising the Lord at a young age. Instead of listening to Cocomelon or other kid music, try making the focus more on praise music. There’s nothing wrong with traditional nursery rhymes- I’m not saying to not use them, but what you can do is mix in the praise songs with the nursery rhymes to make it a habit of praising and adoring the Lord daily. With the songs you can do different things- you can play dress up and dance around the house to the music, you can make puppets that sing the songs with your children, you can even make a music video of your children singing their praise songs to God! There are so many fun ways to pray with your children and these are just some of the ways we can show adoration to our Creator. 
            1. CONFESSION
               1. The second aspect of prayer that we need to look at is confession. This is a hard one- who likes admitting the mistakes we make, let alone showing our children the mistakes we make. BUT it’s so important that we do not skip over this step. If we just ignore confession as part of prayer time with our children, we are showing them that it doesn’t really matter if we say what we do wrong or not. That is dangerous, especially in our world where right and wrong aren’t defined in black and white anymore. That is why I try, and struggle with, confessing to God and to my children when I make mistakes. The other day, for example, I was quick to anger.  My son accidentally spilt something on the floor and instead of being calm, I yelled at him. I let my initial emotions get the best of me and I made him sad because of that. After I saw his reaction to my yelling, I took a step back and immediately felt ashamed. Instead of wallowing in the shame, I went to my son and told him that I was sorry. I yelled at you and hurt your feelings. I shouldn’t have done that because it wasn’t nice. Because of this I was able to ask for his forgiveness and he learned how when we make mistakes, we can choose forgiveness. After our talk we prayed to God and thanked Him for loving us even when we make mistakes. That is one way you can show confession to your little ones. Another way to show this aspect of prayer to your children and pray them through confession time is to ask them a question: is there anything that you did today that you know isn’t right? Let them know that you aren’t asking to get them in trouble, but that you want to pray about it with them and help them learn from their mistakes. Then you answer that same question and show them how mommy’s make mistakes too. As a mom, I want to be a person that my children feel comfortable coming to when they make a mistake and this is a great way to build this relationship of trust and then offer it up to God. You can also do different activities to talk about emotions and how you feel when someone is mean to you or how you feel when you don’t do what is right. You can make this time interactive by having your little ones draw what they think it means to be sad, mad, or draw a time when they did something that was wrong. The possibilities are endless when it comes to connecting in different ways with your children on confession and why it’s important.
            1. THANKSGIVING
               1. The next aspect of prayer is thanksgiving. This step and part of prayer shows your children that God gets the credit, not us so we need to thank the Lord for all we have. You can use different stories in the Bible to show thankfulness- some of my son’s favorite Bible stories at the moment are Jonah and the whale and Daniel in the lion’s den. You can use these stories and many more to show how we should be thanking God for all that He does for us. Another thing you can do is ask your children this question- what is one thing that happened today that you loved? Let them talk about this and then you can thank the Lord together for this moment in the day. Then you as mom can do the same thing and talk to your children about what you did that day and how you are thankful to God for giving you that moment. Being thankful doesn’t have to be just a once a year thing at thanksgiving! It can and should be a topic of conversation every day!   
            1. SUPPLICATION
               1. The fourth aspect of prayer, and the one we are most familiar with, is supplication. I feel like its so easy to get into the habit of just going to prayers of supplication to the Lord and not remembering to do the other aspects of prayer. That is why I feel like supplication prayers should be the last thing we do during prayer time with the little ones. Although it is important to cry out to the Lord when we are desperate for his intervention is important, it’s not supposed to be the most important and main part of our prayer time. It’s so easy for this time of prayer to be focused on the things we want when we should be praying about what we need. If we are able to show that this time for prayer is about the Lord’s will and not our own, they have the opportunity to grow so deep in their relationship with the Lord. One way to use supplication prayer with your children is to use the Lord’s prayer as a guide. The Lord’s Prayer is found in Matthew six and says “Pray like this: Our Father in heaven, may your name be kept holy. May your Kingdom come soon. May your will be done on earth, as it is in heaven. Give us today the food we need, and forgive us our sins, as we have forgiven those who sin against us. And don’t let us yield to temptation, but rescue us from the evil one.” When you read this passage, you see that the prayers of supplication are not like this : Lord, I pray for a new iPhone; or, Lord I pray for a bigger nerf gun; or, Lord I pray for the best spot on the baseball team. These are inward prayers. But what we should be doing is praying outward prayers- prayers that the Father’s will be done; that we are looking towards the Kingdom, that we are forgiven of sins, that we are given what we actually need, and that we are able to forgive others. These are what are important- not just praying about stuff. Ways you can ignite prayers of supplication are asking your kiddos about how their friends are doing. Is there anything we need to pray for for their friends? Is there anything that you are needing help with? These are some great questions that you can use to start the conversation. Something fun to do is to use a prayer board in your home so that you and your little ones can have a visual of all the different prayers you have. If your little ones aren’t able to read yet, you can make drawings of your prayer requests and then put them on the prayer board. You can also use this as an opportunity to practice writing with your little ones who are preschool age and have them trace the words you write for the prayer board. These are just some ideas of how you can pray prayers of supplication with your little ones and what you do can change over time with age.  

• OUTRO (2-3 MINUTES)
  • Recap:   I know that praying with your little ones can be challenging, especially when you are getting started. But as you heard, there are so many fun things that you can do to get your children engaged in praying. Lord I thank you for these moms today. You are our solid rock, our Father who wants us to have a relationship with Him. Lord I confess that I use the busyness of my life as an excuse for not talking to you more. I pray that my focus can be shifted back to you. Lord I thank you for giving me the opportunity to use this platform to share my experiences with others. It is only because of your will that I am able to do this and I thank you for that. Lord I pray today that our children are able to learn from us parents, learn from our mistakes, so that they can come closer to you and know you. We love you Lord. Amen.
    • Music segue 
  • Call to action:  Thanks for listening to Proverbs31 Wannabe. We hope you enjoyed the program. If you enjoy our show, please rate and review us on Apple Podcasts, find us on Instagram and Facebook, and check out our website at www.proverbs31wannabe.com. We would love to hear from you, especially in the comments. Please comment on our recent posts about how you pray with your little ones at home! Be sure to come back next week as we discussing the upcoming season of lent and how you can fast as a family. Until then, this is Alexis Heaslip, and I hope you have a great rest of your day. God bless. 
  • Closing theme