A Smidge about Prayer

"Jesus often went away to be by Himself and pray" -  Luke 5:16

I need to tell you a few things about memory verses and three year old boys, because it's hard to get them to sit for thirty seconds, to focus, and to memorize something, let alone do all this at once. First, anything that rhymes has a chance. Second, singing it to a snappy tune helps. I'm amazed at what can be sung to the melody of "Twinkle Twinkle Little Star." Third, watching mom say it is boring. Watching a frog, or whatever other puppet you have, is better. Watching that frog try to memorize the verse and completely fail proves enchanting.


Jesus often went away to be by himself and pray. The three year old pirate- I mean dragon- I mean bat- I mean I forgot what character he is in today- got it. Froggy the puppet never did, for whatever reason he kept saying Jesus often went away to be by himself and PLAY. There's something hilarious about a naughty frog, and by the time it was over Matt was screaming at him to get it right, jugulars buldging and all. Now that's a smidge of the Word.

As for application, I thought the Lord would bring me some situation where the kids were struggling and I would gently help them go away and pray, just like Jesus did. But - as per usual- God has pointed out that I'm the one needing a little lesson. So this is how it went - the kids were drinking milk at the table. Correction - they were supposed to be drinking milk. What they were actually doing was errupting volcanos. The phenomenon of blowing bubbles out their straws instead of sucking their milk down had taken over. When I rounded the corner to investigate the giggling, there was at least two square feet of frothy bubbles on the table. As I write this it seems like such a funny thing. But in the moment I blew just a tad of smoke out my nose and instead of articulating I exhaled fire.

Just days prior, a friend had given me a three page article on parenting that went something like this: Kids can be childish and kids can be defiant. Correct the defiance and let the childish go. Phoey.

Just as the flames from my tounge were about to scald the milk, one word came to my mind. Childish.

I clenched my teeth and turned heel. "Mommy needs to go away and be by herself and pray."