Out of the Mouth of Babes: What a father can learn from his daughter
Just about every night my wife and I and our children say prayers together. My eldest son is 20, and I have three daughters ages 18, 13 and 11.
It is quite revealing listening to my children pray, but the most interesting is that of my youngest daughter. I marvel and smile a little at the content and direction of her prayers and I remind myself that adults and children don’t think alike. Obviously her prayers reflect her age and comes off sounding juvenile and sometimes a bit amusing. However, the Bible did counsel us about being “as a little child” in certain areas of your Christian life (i.e., having faith etc.)
You see, when she prays there is nothing too trivial, small or mundane to mention. For example, she prays that God will help her with the skin peels on her fingernails, or not to yawn during prayers. Sometimes she will say the same thing a few different ways in sequences; “Help me not to have bad dreams, help me to have good dreams…” It’s almost like she’s telling God stuff just to be clear… (You know, to avoid misunderstandings…) But nothing is off limits, even if it’s to give a lengthy account of her day… (At this point, I can hear her siblings impatiently shifting; but the unspoken rule during family prayer is that no one is to interrupt another person…)
(Now mind you, I do want my children to learn about the importance of reverencing and respecting the awesome presence and character of God, because after all, He is God…)
Getting to the point, do you know what I learned from her prayers? It revealed to me a lesson about transparency of the heart.
As a man, sometimes I put on a front, a particular face, or mask. Usually it’s to hide my emotional vulnerabilities. (Haven’t we all at some time or another?) You see, we have masculine, spiritual and cultural biases all wrapped up together into who we are, and woven into our expressions and understanding of masculinity. However, listening to my daughter pray night after night, it hit me in a very powerful way that my heart needs to be transparent to my heavenly Father. (Not only is it cathartic and healthy, but by golly it’s freeing…)
So, on my driving commute to work that morning, that’s exactly what I tried. I mentioned anything and everything to God, no matter how trivial, ridiculous or mundane it sounded. With transparency comes honesty, so I said some things to God that I only thought about but have not said out loud. I recounted my most petty feelings, the darkest thoughts, not to mention dictated the things in my mind that I knew were lies… But I said them out loud to him anyways. (The funny thing was that after exposing the lies I was feeling was much better and healthier than burying them.)
I would encourage men to practice being open, transparent and honest to the heavenly Father. Then take small steps towards that same feeling to our spouses, children and people in our sphere of influence. Men have a special mandate not to construct things, but to build into people. (I talk more about this in chapter 4 of the Genesis Man: The Masculine Identity – check it out.)
Now I encourage you to take a lesson from this seasoned teacher and learned something from my daughter.
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