A Family That Prays Together Stays Together

A Family that Prays together........

As a people, aren’t we grateful that family prayer is not an out-of-date practice with us? There is not a more beautiful sight in all this world than to see a family praying together. There is real meaning behind the oft-quoted adage: “The family that prays together stays together.” The Lord directed that we have family prayer when He said: “Pray in your families unto the Father, always in my name, that your wives and your children may be blessed.” (3 Ne. 18:21.)

I am not sure if I truly ever knew the truthfulness of that statement. For a few weeks, Owen didn't want to pray with us even thought before that, he was doing really good. He was always eager to say prayers even though it mostly comprised of being thankful for his toys. But somehow, something happened and made him very "uncooperative" when its time to pray. He came up with silly excuses like: "I'm too tired. I'm too sleepy." Or sometimes, he would even resort to throwing fits. But these last couple of weeks, something changed again - almost like a small miracle that I was able to witness in front of my very eyes. Ever since we noticed how uncooperative he had become, we realized that we, as his parents, were mostly at fault. After all, it was our job to teach how to pray. We had not been good examples. We had broken that consistency of saying family prayers together when we were busy doing different things. But as soon as we learned to realize our mistake, and swallowed our pride, things started changing for the better.

Last night, we had another family home evening, and we had tons of fun again! Before I left for work, Owen came into our room and climbed into bed. I told him that it was the night for Family Home Evening again. He got excited, and remembered the game we played the previous week. His excitement made me happy and excited too! I looked forward to getting home from work as soon as possible and when I got home, we had dinner, turned off the t.v. and then we had our Family Home Evening. We had fun again!

When it was time to pray, Owen gladly said the prayer. Even when it's someone's turn, as soon as Michelle and I would start, he'd start saying: "Thank you for my toys." Of course....how can you not be thankful for your toys, right?

I guess I am just glad that we have been getting better. It does make a big difference to pray together. I feel like we are on the right track. I know there are still many things that we need to be better at, but this is a good start.

I want to end with this quote: "Let us not neglect our family prayers. That old saying is yet true: “The family that prays together stays together.” By providing an example of prayer to our children, we will also be helping them to begin their own deep foundations of faith and testimonies which they will need throughout their lives." How Firm a Foundation, Thomas S. Monson.

Family Home Evening

So, we finally did this right! At least, I think so! We decided that we were going to commit to doing this. I got home from work and we had dinner. We turned off the t.v. and spent some time together. Michelle made a yummy dinner, as usual, (with white rice of course!) and then we had our family home evening. It's not that we never did it before, it just always felt like we weren't committed to doing it. We sang and had the opening prayer. Michelle had the lesson. She taught the same lesson she used for her class in primary. It was about appreciating what blessings we have received. It was a very interactive lesson. We had one big tub of water, and an empty cup. We had a spoon to scoop water into the cup. We all took turns and each person said something that they are thankful for. To my surprise, Owen enjoyed it a lot! He kept saying: "My turn!" And of course, he was thankful for his toys, his movies, the t.v. etc. But the more we talked about the things we were grateful for...Owen started being thankful for more special things like: "I'm thankful that daddy's home." He was also thankful for "Heavenly Father" and for Jesus Christ, and then he was thankful that I haven't gotten into any car accident and that I'm getting better. I thought it was cute! But the more we thought of things we were blessed with, we started filling up the cup. And then it was overflowing with water, which symbolized how we have truly been blessed by our Father in heaven with so many blessings. Our cup truly "hath runneth over". I thought it was an awesome lesson!

And then we had play time together. A co-worker of mine gave me puzzles for Owen. They were all 25-piece puzzles. They were at Owen's age level, but come to find out, I am below that level! I hate puzzles! Always did! So, we raced to finish our own individual puzzles, and guess who lost? I won't say who! But the second round I won! (only because I cheated!) But we all had fun!

I think this is the very reason why the church started this program - not for the church - but simply for the families to find extra time to do things together -to be closer. I read an article entitled "Make time to be holy." And it was something that I think was written for me. I have always wanted to find time to read scriptures, or spend more time with my family, but my excuse is always: "I don't have enough time." But this quote has truly helped to put things in perspective:

“We will have to make some hard choices of how we use our time. But there should never be a conscious choice to let the spiritual become secondary as a pattern in our lives. Never. …When we put God’s purposes first, He will give us miracles.… Those apparent prison walls of ‘not enough time’ will begin to recede, even as you are called to do more.” President Henry B. Eyring, First Counselor in the First Presidency, “Education for Real Life,” Ensign, Oct. 2002, 18, 20, 21.

Oftentimes, we forget the simplest of things, and then we complicate things by trying to come up with something new. I am actually glad that I have the opportunity to make changes in my life. They are not drastic changes, more like improvements. I am happy to have a family who loves me even when I make bad choices at times, but they are still to love me. It makes me think of our Father in Heaven. How hard must it be for him when we don't find time to remember Him? But I know that He is there for us and that He loves us...always.