As a mother, I spend a lot of time thinking about what my children need.
Sometimes it’s something simple, like new shoes or a snack. Other times, it’s harder to figure out. Is this a moment for advice, a consequence, a hug or a few minutes to calm down before either of us says another word?
With three daughters, there is usually something to plan, something to remember and somebody looking for something that is apparently invisible to everyone but Mama.
I can keep the calendar. I can check the homework. I can ask questions, set boundaries and try to make good decisions. But there are parts of my children’s lives that I cannot manage, no matter how much I love them.
There are conversations I won’t hear. Feelings they won’t know how to explain. Decisions they will eventually make without asking me first.
That realization can keep a mother awake, but it can also bring her to prayer.
There is something I can do for my children that no schedule, school or viral parenting strategy can do: I can bring them before the living God by name.
I’m learning to slow down there. To say each name and think about the child who carries it. Each of my girls has her own personality, her own worries and her own way of moving through the world. I want my prayers to reflect how well I know them, while trusting that God knows them more fully than I ever will.
“Lord, watch over my children” is a prayer I will probably pray for the rest of my life, but I want to pray beyond the general request, too.
For the daughter facing something unfamiliar, I can ask for courage. For the one struggling with hurt feelings, I can ask for comfort and the wisdom to work through them. I can pray for friendships where kindness goes both ways, for the confidence to speak up and for the humility to admit when they are wrong.
I can pray over their protection while also asking God to help them recognize when something isn’t right. I can pray that they will have the courage to leave an uncomfortable situation, ask for help or call me, even if they’re worried about what I might say.
I can pray over their purpose without trying to write the whole story myself.
That one takes some work. Mothers can get a little attached to our ideas about how things should go. We see a talent, an interest or an opportunity, and before long we have mentally filled out the application. (My five-year-old can do a cartwheel and now I am envisioning her olympic debut!)
But I want to ask God to help me notice what He is growing in each of them. To encourage their gifts without making their lives about my expectations. To give them room to discover how they can serve, create, lead and love.
And then there are the places in their hearts I cannot reach.
Every mother knows the feeling of wanting a child to talk and getting very little in return. You can sit beside them, ask gently and make yourself available. You can tell something is weighing on them and still have no idea what it is.
In those moments, I can pray, “Lord, You know what she cannot tell me yet. Help her!” Sometimes I need that prayer as much as she does.
Prayer gives me a place to bring my own fear before I carry it into a conversation with my children. It gives me time to ask for patience, examine my reaction and remember that I don’t have to solve everything in the next five minutes.
Some of the most powerful parenting may happen quietly on our knees, when our children aren’t even in the room. Still, I want my girls to hear me pray, too.
I want them to hear their names spoken with love. I want them to hear me thank God for who they are, ask for help with something difficult and admit that I need guidance myself.
They don’t need a mother who sounds polished when she prays. They need to know what it looks like to turn to God in an ordinary life, with ordinary words, during an ordinary time.
I want to pray with them before the big moments, but also in the middle of a regular day. When someone’s feelings are hurt. When we hear that a friend is sick. When something wonderful happens and we have a reason to say thank You.
And I want to give them room to pray. To let them choose the words without correcting every sentence or rushing to fill the silence. A child’s short, honest prayer doesn’t need much help from an adult.
Teaching them to pray is something they can carry into rooms I will never enter. They can pray at school, at a friend’s house, in a moment of uncertainty or years from now in a home of their own.
I cannot promise my daughters an easy life. I cannot prepare them for every disappointment or protect them from every hurt. There will always be something beyond my reach.
But tonight, I can say their names!!!
I can thank God for the privilege of being their mother. I can ask Him to meet the needs I see and the ones I have missed. I can ask for wisdom for tomorrow, then get up and keep doing the daily work of loving them.
That is how I want to pray my children forward: faithfully, specifically, one ordinary day at a time.
(Paige Gurgainers is a mom of three girls, digital journalist for Webster Parish Journal.)