Answers · Marriage & Family
How do I pray with my children?
Praying with your children is not a program to add to the day; in Scripture it belongs to the day itself. The same charge that puts the teaching of God's words in the ordinary hours of the house — sitting, walking, lying down, rising up — puts prayer there too: a child learns to pray the way he learns to talk of God, by doing it alongside his parents, a few minutes at a time.
"And thou shalt teach them diligently unto thy children, and shalt talk of them when thou sittest in thine house, and when thou walkest by the way, and when thou liest down, and when thou risest up."
— Deuteronomy 6:7 (KJV)
Jesus removes the fear that children are too small for this. When his disciples would have turned the little ones away, he was displeased, and welcomed them:
"But Jesus said, Suffer little children, and forbid them not, to come unto me: for of such is the kingdom of heaven."
— Matthew 19:14 (KJV)
The Psalms give the reason the habit matters. What God has done is not to be hidden from the children, but shown to the generation to come — his praises, and his strength, and his wonderful works:
"We will not hide them from their children, shewing to the generation to come the praises of the Lord, and his strength, and his wonderful works that he hath done."
— Psalm 78:4 (KJV)
So the practice is plain: pray where the children can hear and join — at the table, at bedtime, on the road — and let them hear thanks given, wrongs confessed, and needs named, and name their own. It is the home altar of Deuteronomy kept in an Apostolic house, and the family teaching gathered below takes it up in detail.