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Today we welcome Christopher and Christine Perrin to the podcast to chat about prayer in your homeschool, Morning Time, and personal time. It is a fascinating conversation. Join us as we discuss:

  • How prayer can be both a personal discipline and a corporate practice.
  • What are the best ways to teach and model practice of prayer.
  • Tips for modeling something when we are just learning it ourselves.
  • Different types of prayer and the value of each.
  • Tips for praying the Scriptures.
  • And recommendations of prayers and more to read for moms.

This was a helpful and fascinating conversation I think you will enjoy!

Pam: This is your morning basket, where we help you bring truth, goodness, and beauty to your homeschool day And welcome to episode 62 of the, your morning basket podcast. I’m Pam Barnhill, your host, and I’m so glad that you are joining me here today. Well, today’s episode of the podcast is a one with dr. Christopher parent. And actually we have a special treat because at the end of the podcast, we’re joined by his wife. Christine. I thought that dr. Perrin would be the perfect person to talk to about prayer. And when we’re talking about prayer, we’re talking about communal prayer in your morning time. But when you talk about prayer, it’s really hard not to talk about personal prayer as well. So we also got off into that topic. And so this episode is one of our longer ones. It’s a well over an hour long. So you might have to break it up into a couple of cities, but it is totally worth it so much goodness here for your prayer life, whether that be communal prayer with your kids or your own personal prayer.

So many things to learn. And I really enjoyed this episode. So we’ll get on with it right after this word from our sponsor. This episode of the, your morning basket podcast is brought to you by the Christmas celebration a morning time plan. These are a lovely three week set up plans that you can use with your family during the holiday season to celebrate the birth of Christ,

to enjoy the holidays, to take a little extra time, to slow down and really enjoy each other and the season. And the best thing of all about these plans is they are absolutely free. All you have to do to get your very own set of plans is come on over to the website at Pam barnhill.com/christmas, and you’ll be taken to the shop,

or you can add them to your cart and download them for absolutely nothing. This set is full of holiday goodness, including selections from the Nutcracker for art and music, wonderful scripture to memorize picture study of the nativity, some meaningful prayers, everything you need to make the most of your holiday feed then. So don’t try to put this together yourself, let us do the hard work and choosing all the books and do the planning for you.

And you just come download the plans and look like a hero to your kid. That’s that Pam barnhill.com/christmas for your free set of morning time plan. And now look podcast Dr. Christopher Paran is the co-founder of classical academic press and a long time supporter of homeschooling. He’s an author consultant and speaker who is deeply committed to the renewal of the liberal arts tradition and to the idea of Scollay our learning from rest dad of three grown children,

dr. Perrin has wisdom to share about living out the pursuit of truth, beauty and goodness in the context of family life. And we welcome him back to the podcast again today as a returning guest, dr. Perrin, we’re so happy to have you here. Very good to be with you again. Well, Let’s, we’re going to talk about prayer today.

So let’s talk a little bit about prayer as both a personal discipline and a corporate practice. Could you talk a little bit about how it’s both of those things? Sure. You know, I’m thinking about the apostle Paul saying in Philippians that we should pray without ceasing. And of course there are many, many teachings and references to prayer in the, in the Bible and the new Testament.

I’m thinking of, you know, the disciples coming to Christ and asking him, how should we pray? And of course he teaches them what we now call the Lord’s prayer. And you think about commands of Paul to Timothy, that we would, we would pray other, other passages where Jesus tells us what prayer is and models for us prayer like in John 17,

the high priestly prayer of Christ. And then we just know from church history and church liturgies, a history of church liturgy or worship that prayer is a significant part of what the people of God do when they gather together to worship and celebrate the Eucharist or communion. So it’s clearly to be a part, a woven part of the Christian life. And I think when Paul says pray without ceasing,

you know, some have tried to take that literally and always be at least mentally, even subconsciously praying throughout the day, but others have taken that to mean it’s just to be a part of our life in the, in the, in the most quotidian ways, meaning throughout daily life, prayer should be a part of what we do. I think about how in the monastic tradition that was incorporated to say seven,

seven actual offices of prayer, like in the Benedictine rule, where there would be a regular offices. That means just appointed times during the day when the brothers or sisters in the monastery would gather and pray so that there was essentially prayer going on almost 24 seven. So with that as just kind of a context, yes, it’s, it’s both something that we engage in corporately in the church and something that we engage in personally,

when we’re not gathered together for corporate worship. Another way of thinking about this is that the home is to function like a little church. This is the way the Orthodox often talk about it. So that, and I think you would find this in other traditions as well, more liturgical Protestant traditions, the Catholic tradition where you, you might have a, an icon coroner say an,

an altar, a place dedicated in your own home, where the family may gather to worship to pray, to read scripture. I love that idea that the family is a little church. So, you know, when we gather and we scatter as the church, so when we’re gathered together, of course we, we pray, we worship, we, we,

we, we, we, we offer ourselves and all that. We have to God, even as he’s offering himself to us. But when we leave the church, we, we take with us this the same life, which is an ongoing conversation, an ongoing communion with God, that is the blessing of prayer. So I’ll leave that as kind of a general comment.

That’s what we’re to be. That’s what we’re to do naturally as being United to God through Christ. But of course, it’s a challenge in the way that we do that, how to do that is it’s, you know, perhaps a lifelong endeavor with maybe, maybe for most of us, you know, Hills and valleys along the way. Well, and that kind of leads to my next question.

And I love this idea of the family as the little church and, you know, having kind of this time and space set aside, what do you think, what do you think are some of the benefits for children to praying in community, as opposed to just learning about prayer is something they do silently on their own. Yeah, well, I think this was a similar question in the minds of the disciples when they asked Jesus,

how should we pray? It’s a great question to ask. And so Jesus models for us, what prayer could, can, and should be children are going to learn to pray by, by praying with others. We know that children are imitators and we know that a large portion of what education is is invitation. The children are going to become like we are Luke six,

40 student is not his teacher, but when he is fully trained, he will be like his teacher. So we know that we are reproducing ourselves in our students and in our children. And I think this applies to prayer. They’re watching us. I think I’m using the Lord praying the Lord’s prayer and using the Lord’s prayer as a kind of template for all.

Prayer is one great way to begin. If we want to know how to pray, the Psalms have been considered to be the prayer book of the church for centuries, memorizing the Psalms, praying the songs, using the Psalms in our own, our own worship in the home, you know, as functioning as a little church, which when we’re doing this together,

and of course our churches are doing this anyway, the Psalms should be a part of the prayer life of the church woven right into our services, our liturgies. So I think going to the scripture, going to the Lord’s prayer, going to the Psalms is a great way, great way to begin, but there are also some lovely recorded prayers that the church generally has,

has created and, and, you know, curated that are very, very much worth having a knowing. For example, just to cite one example of many but st. John Chris, Chris system, his, his divine liturgy that used in Eastern Orthodox churches is a very rich collection of prayers. There are various prayers, prayer books, like the Anglican book of common prayer.

The Catholic tradition has its own. And there, there, there are many others where you can, you can essentially get with sometimes they’re called Breviary as other kinds of prayer books that have lovely recorded prayers. I know some folks in the reformed Protestant tradition have enjoyed this collection of prayers called the Valley of vision, which is a collection of Puritan prayers. It may surprise some folks in the Protestant or evangelical church to know that in the past prayers were carefully crafted and written and,

and then prayed in services. They weren’t always made up on the spot by, you know, the pastor. Right. Well, and let’s talk about that for a second. What, what is the value of having a prayer like that that is already written where, where you, you read those words or you speak those words out loud. W you know,

does it, does it mean any less because it’s already written out what would be some of the value in that? Yeah. You know, it’s a really good question. The any good thing can be corrupted. So there’s a great value in say, memorizing a Psalm and, and letting that som become your prayer to God. It’s inspired. It’s been,

it’s been used by the church to great, great effect for, for, for centuries. Why wouldn’t you want to do that rather than just coming up with something on your own spot, but, but, you know, the devil can get in there too, and turn that into something kind of deadening and dry and unthinking. You can end up finding yourself,

going through the motions in some kind of a lifeless ritual, just reciting a written prayer that you’re not even not even thinking about. You know, your mind is a hundred miles away while you mouthed the words of something that’s recorded. And someone may say, instead of doing that, why not pray? Something that comes from your own heart and soul? Well,

you know, both things are appropriate. Both things can be done well. And as an honoring to God, there is a place for extemporaneous prayer from your heart, but that kind of prayer will be much the better instructed. If you have memorized lots of scripture, especially the Psalms. And if you’ve learned and memorize, say the Lord’s prayer, that’s a template for all prayer,

as well as being a wonderful prayer in itself. So Jesus is being asked by the disciples, teach us how to pray. And he’s not simply saying, just repeat this and recite this. And don’t worry about even thinking about what these words mean. Just recite it like a kind of magical incantation. That’s, that’s what I mean. Of course that’s not what he meant,

but can we lose, can we spiritually drift, even while we’re trying to pray a Psalm or the Lord’s prayer? The answer is yes. And we need to know how to kind of fortify ourselves spiritually so that, that doesn’t become some kind of empty, dead, rapid repetitious ritual. On the other hand, if we just decide what we’re not going to do that because we’re afraid of the empty ritual.

So we just want to pray from our heart. Well, the devil can get in there too. And some of the silliest things can be prayed if we haven’t actually prepared ourselves in other ways before we pray extemporaneously. So I would say it’s a both and proposition. You want to be able to pray your own prayers as it were, as the spirit leads you,

but those prayers will actually be cultivated and enriched by praying through the Psalms, the Lord’s prayer and other liturgical prayers that have been created. Sometimes we just don’t know what to pray, you know, and this is the case with me. When I begin my day or end my day with prayer, I use a prayer book and the prayers keep me on a track of praying and thinking about the things I need to be thinking about as I begin my day.

And as I end my day, but in the prayer book that I use, there’s a place where you’ve where you, where you pray your own prayers to where you pray from the heart. So in other words, it’s encouraging both some recorded prayers and your own from the heart say extemporaneous prayers as well. Does that make sense? Yeah, it does.

And so, you know, I’m, I’m thinking, I’m thinking about something like your classical academic presses writing and rhetoric where you don’t just turn the student loose and say, okay, now go write us a story. Instead, first you fill them up with all of these great and wonderful stories that have been written by these master writers. And once, you know,

you kind of internalized all of that as a student and, and you’ve, you’ve become used to the structure and, and some of the, some of the things that make a good story, and some of the things that are worthy, then you turn around and you start creating your own. And so what I hear you saying is that these written prayers,

as we pray them, especially things like the Psalms and the Lord’s prayer and make them our own, we can then turn around and be better able to, you know, come up with our own prayers and learn how to prayer and pray in a, in a way that is not silly, but is worth. Yes, I think that’s right. The,

the Lord’s prayer is a kind of a model for us, a pattern as are the Psalms and other passages of scripture as well. So it’s a both and proposition, but we, we, we want to be schooled certainly by Jesus and by the songs to know how to pray. So I think that’s precisely right, and it, it is analogous to say learning rhetoric or learning,

you know, the art of conversation, the more you have memorized, great poetry and literature, the more that’s going to influence your own tongue and your own way of thinking and expressing yourself. But there’s also a further, you know, spiritual dynamic at play, which is scripture itself has, has a kind of power to it that transcends mirror literature, as the writer of Hebrews says,

it’s living and active and penetrating to our heart and soul. So to memorize a biblical prayers is to be in a kind of communion with the Holy spirit that is also meaningful and, and makes it extremely wise to do so. I really liked that. Yeah, that’s, that’s an excellent thought. And just to think about once again, and as we memorize things,

we’re not memorizing anything, even, you know, prayer or anything else, just simply for the sake of memorization. And, you know, this speaks for scripture as well, but, but in order to write these words on our heart, and I like that thought of being in communion with the Holy spirit when we, when we pray these scriptures. So,

so how do we teach and learn the practice of prayer? What are some things that have worked in your family? Some, Some kind of have to use the Latin irregular rule, a routine, a practice that you don’t have to invent day to day it’s for those of us who are Christians, it’s a practice or a kind of a regimen for us to worship on Sundays.

And that’s been so habituated. And so we don’t have to think about what we might do on Sunday morning. We’re going to do that. We know it’s the right thing. It’s blessed us. It’s not even something we generally question. So I think it can be very helpful to create some practices or routines of prayer that are, are simple and achievable.

And I think the best way to do that is three things come to mind the beginning of the day, the end of the day and meal times. So whenever the family gathers and is quieted, there’s an opportunity for prayer, certainly mealtimes qualify, but you know, if you have younger children, you’re putting them to bed. This is a, this is a ripe opportunity to create a regular where w you know,

you, the day has ended with your children in prayer, Christians who are from traditions, where there is a kind of alter in the home, a place set aside for prayer, reading of scripture. I highly recommend that even for those of you. So those of those of your listeners who might be from a tradition that, that doesn’t have that there is nothing at all,

antithetical to any Christian tradition. I know of to setting aside a time and a place. I mean, even, you know, the most kind of low church Protestants probably have a Bible somewhere in their home, right? And so having the Bible in a place with, with the Psalms to there as a prayer book is a, is, is a great place to start just reading through the Psalms with your children and,

and letting you know, reading a song, praying the Psalm as you’re reading it, and then maybe having some, some prayer afterwards. But most, most parents instinctively know when they’re with their children, that they, there are certain things to ask a God for. Thank God for our churches, teach us this just by going to the worship services, we generally are going to engage in confession of sin,

the adoration of God, giving thanks to him and bringing to him our petitions or supplications. These are just, well-known, it’s just a part of Christian worship in every tradition. So why not have a time of adoration, confession, Thanksgiving, and supplication, and use the book of Psalms as a, as, as your prayer book. That’s a simple way to just begin to pray.

It’s a, it’s a kind of, is a kind of routine, but I think it’s also important for families that don’t have that routine yet to start simply and not to, you know, not to become too legalistic about it, not to beat yourself up when you can’t do it as regularly as you want. But if you’re, if you’re, if you’re waking your kids up in the morning,

you’re gathering them for breakfast. Why not set aside even two minutes to read a segment of, of the book of Psalms to read a small, small prayer from your tradition, from your prayer book, from a prayer book that you, that you procure and then have your own extemporaneous prayer attached to that where you think God for the day and ask for his blessing upon you and pray for those that are on your heart and mind.

So I think, and then establishing a routine, a lot of classical homeschoolers have appreciated this idea that Cindy Rollins made popular called morning time, which is just kind of a morning gathering that happens frequently during the week. Usually for the purpose of starting the day, making sure that children are kind of at the right set, disposed to learning. And it’s often at the time of where parents would read aloud to their children,

something, you know, true and good and beautiful. It’s a time to read scripture and pray too. So those are, those are the kinds of things that come to mind in what we’ve done in our home is just, just that, just try to have a beginning and an end to the day that’s guided by prayer. And we use a prayer book,

and yes, we have a place set aside in our home where the scriptures are out and some icons and candles, and it focuses us as focuses us and gap and disposes us to, to, to pray. Yeah. Yeah. And sometimes just that simple act of lighting the candle can get everyone kind of calm down and, you know, understanding that we’re moving into,

you know, the morning has been chaotic and we always light a candle at the beginning of our morning time. And we start with a greeting. I tell the children, the Lord be with you and they respond and with your spirit and because we’re Catholic, then we make the sign of the cross and we open with, you know, whatever our religious reading is at the time.

And so just that simple act of lighting that candle and, and doing that greeting and that greeting that we’ve pulled from, you know, in, from our church tradition. And so for the kids, it kind of turns them on to the idea that this is a time set aside. This is similar to the time that we have at church. And so kind of calms down any chaos that might be going on.

It doesn’t always last a long time, but it, it does kind of get their attention at them. That’s lovely. And, and if you able to occasionally include some singing that too, and at various times in our family’s history, we’ve been able to, you know, sing a hymn or a spiritual song of some kind, even a portion of it.

You know, those in the Eastern Orthodox tradition will often seeing or chant through prayers and scripture, and that creates a kind of a different ordered space and time. It changes the experience when you, when you chant or sing. And I love the fact that you mentioned lighting the candle because that orders space and signifies that we are attending in a different way to the Lord.

So I think looking for those ways of ordering our time and our space and our environment, so that it disposes us to pray and to contemplate for a period of time, even if it’s a short period of time, I think a lot of families and Christians make the mistake of aiming too high and thinking that they’re going to have a, you know, a 30 minute deep,

quiet time, prayer time, and it’s going to be rich. And I think it’s more important to, to do less regularly and to, to try to create these bookends for the day. And then I think helping your children to memorize some scriptures, you know, if they have helped them to, to memorize Psalm one and others, it will always be there to call forth whenever you need to pray,

even if it’s just going to be for a short period of time when you’re talking to a man and you only have a few minutes, for some reason, you can still pray through a song together or some other scripture passages or other prayers that have been memorized. Yeah. And, you know, speaking about memorizing the Psalm or memorizing other prayers, one of the things that I love so much about these written prayers are these prayers that we memorize and say again,

is that, you know, especially as a mom, and I know we just get so caught up in our day and I have 101 different thoughts whirling around in my head and so many things going on. And sometimes it’s hard to quiet myself to, to come up with the words that I want to say. And, and so I’m still able to pray,

even if I, you know, by, by calling on these other words. And so it takes some of the pressure off of me to, to come up with the words, I can still pray using someone else’s words. And so I, I just find it really helpful. And I usually am carrying around a little prayer book. I just keep it in my briefcase so that yes,

I don’t have to let that be an obstacle. I know I need to pray. Like I took it. I was, I had, I was out of the country for a week. And if I hadn’t brought that little prayer book along and, you know, my day was somewhat unpredictable occasionally, you know, and I’m to end the day, what do I do?

What do I do? I don’t, I, Oh, where did I bring my Bible with me? No, I have to go to my phone and I’ll get the Bible app, you know? And sometimes those little obstacles just, you know, the space and time has not been ordered regularly enough to ensure that it’s easier for me to pray, but having that little book,

a small little book with me at all times removes those obstacles and makes it, you know, when I’m tired and I can’t think well, and then when I’m looking at those prayers, when those passages scripture passages, again, I’m reminded that this, this is a good way to pray and I’m able to do it. And I think it’s so much more important that we do.

We know that we have a regimen set that enables us to pray without too much complexity and challenge so that we, so that we do pray. I think there’s, this is there’s so many, at least in my experience, and it might, maybe it’s more temperamental, but there seems to have been over the course of my life. So many silly obstacles that keep me from praying.

You know, I, I, I, because I think I have aimed too high a lot of the time. And then therefore, if I can’t do it at this level, I, I feel like I shouldn’t do it, you know, but I like the way a lot of church leaders and pastors teach us in this regard, you know, it’s,

it’s, it’s much better to pray briefly using scripture than not to pray at all. And it’s okay to be, to be making small steps in this direction. That’s fine. But, but, but doing it even, even, even modestly is a, is a wonderful thing. So I think what I hear you saying, and I want you to speak about this is,

you know, I think another barrier, because I’m quite familiar with this. I think, I think it’s perfectionist in it sees dr. Parents that, you know, if I, if I can’t do this really well, or if I can’t do this for a long time, I’m not going to do it at all. And I think another barrier that comes up a lot of time for moms is they’re like,

well, I am not, I’m not adequate enough to teach this. You know, I’m not up to the task of teaching this because my prayer life is imperfect. So what would you say to the mom who feels like that? This, you know, I can’t teach my children to pray because my prayer life isn’t perfect. So who am I to teach them?

Yeah. It’s, it’s like, it’s the same thing about an education? None, no one Mark van Doren says this in his book, liberal education. He says no educated person confesses that he is educated because to the person who’s even well educated, he’s more, he’s more conscious or aware of his ignorance than what he has learned. And it’s like going into a beautiful museum where you feel small.

The, the, and the knowledge of all things that we could know is so vast that no matter how much you’ve learned and mastered you feel like a child before the, this amazing astonishing world. So it’s, it’s only other people who call, call a man or a woman educated. And I think that’s true of our prayer life as well. It’s,

you know, it’s it, none of us feel like we’ve, we have a perfected prayer life. You talk to the most with tour spiritual, spiritual people that you know, and what they confess is humility. And, you know, their, their own lack of holiness before a Holy God, it’s, you just can’t get to the, you know,

the love of God and knowing God does not allow for a kind of complacency or pride or a sense of I’ve I’m, I’m done. I don’t have any farther to go. So I think it’s to that, to those people who are perfectionists, I would just say that none of us are there not, and won’t be, you know, until we’re with God and maybe not even then.

So I think that, yeah, the perfection is, tend to shut down and say, well, if I can’t do it at this level, I’m not going to do it at all. That that’s probably self-deception or a lie coming from somebody else it’s, it’s not worth paying attention to, but there’s another kind of person. And it’s the person who might not be the perfectionist,

but who just says, you know, I’m doing the best I can and it’s okay. Yeah. You know, I, I’m raising three kids, four kids, you know, I got a, I got a dog or two, so what, that, I’m not able to pray, you know, this way, God knows my heart and circumstances.

And, you know, we are making it to church once a week. That’s sufficient. That to me would be an error in the other direction because we are commanded to pray and we’ve been taught how to pray and we need communion with God. And so there’s, there can be a person who’s complacent in the, you know, this other direction of saying,

Oh, it’s okay. It’s just, God, God accepts me just as I am. And he knows I’m doing the best I can. It’s just not a problem. So there may be some of your listeners who have been tempted that in that direction, and that needs to be repented of as well, this kind of how you might call it a cheap grace or to too easily contented with our own lack of holiness and devotion.

There’s another kind of person that might say, you know what, we’re all a mess. We’re all broken before God, this is just the best I can do. And thank God for his grace and mercy. And so there’s, there’s a kind of modicum of truth to all of this. Yes. None of us are perfect, but that not, that should not keep you from praying.

Yes. All of us are busy and have much to do, and yes, God loves us and accepts us as we are unconditionally. But that doesn’t mean that we don’t strive to know God better and S and, and seek to, to grow spiritually and make every effort to be Holy. That’s what the scriptures say to be perfect as our heavenly father is perfect,

knowing that we, we never achieved that, but that’s the goal we’re seeking to, to, to present deeper and farther into the knowledge of God. And, and then to say, well, we’re all a mess. Well, that’s true too. Yes, we all are not where we want to be, but that doesn’t mean that we should be content to be a broken mess.

We should be seeking healing and restoration and wholeness. And that’s what the scripture say that Christ has set out to do. So it seems to me that the devil, as it were kind of gets in and, and take some of these things that are true and mixes it with a lie. So the virtue between those two vices is to pray as, as often,

and as well as we can, even if it’s only for a few minutes. Yeah. I often hear this about fasting. You know, if you, if you’re trying to start the discipline of fasting, and if you’re at a church that fast, say for, you know, about a month going up to Easter and you try to just do it for the first time in your life and cut out,

say, you know, dairy and, and cheese and eggs and meat for 30 or 40 days, and you’ve never done it before. Well, good luck. You’ll encounter some difficulty. And pastors who know this are wise to say, you know, you don’t, don’t, don’t try to do this that way. You’re, you’re, you’re your first time doing that?

You know, you don’t have to keep the fast that, that way as someone who was doing it for the first time, and that’s just why spiritual counsel that some of these things we have to grow into and it’s gradual and our habits and dispositions and practices will change gradually. So I think it would be the wise man or woman who would look at his or her life,

maybe in conversation with another, a wise friend, maybe even a pastor and say, how should I approach growing in this, in this practice of prayer? And I guarantee you, the vast majority of pastors will not say, Oh, you got to start doing a half an hour in the morning and a half an hour on the evening, go for it.

You can do it start tomorrow. It’s just like athletic training. There’s a kind of gradual process of beginning that needs to occur. And I see this as a place where going to need to understand that same concept with our children as well, you know, even as they mature and they mature past, you know, in our tradition, it’s a blessing was when I was a child,

was, God is great. God is good. And you know, before bed prayers, where now I lay me down to sleep. And so even as a child comes out of that into different kinds of prayer, they’re still over. They’re going to need that time to mature and to come to a deeper understanding of, of what prayer is and, and how it can kind of guide them.

I agree. And I think, I think one of the wonderful, another wonderful aspect that we hadn’t, we haven’t talked about yet of praying with your children is that they will instruct you to, you will see them praying in faith with hope and love that will warm your own heart as your children pray. And you will see God answer their prayers. You know,

it’s, we’re not just doing this because it’s, you know, we’re, we’re trying to have them win a ribbon at some kind of a recitation competition. They’re actually praying inspired by the Holy spirit, in the name of Jesus, to the father. And when children do that, the Lord hears and listens and answers. And when you begin to see that happening well,

isn’t that a wonderful motivator. So there’s some surprises in store for us. When we teach our children to pray, they will pray for us. They will pray for their parents, and God will hear those prayers and do things that are remarkable. Often they will pray with greater faith than we do with th with that kind of, that, that the great innocent faith of a child.

So that’s there awaiting for us as a blessing too. Sometimes we, we don’t anticipate or think about that when we begin, but the, the prospect of starting small and learning, memorizing a prayer, like the Lord’s prayer is not hard to do. And it wants to say the Lord’s prayer just to take that as an example is memorized and non-well by your children,

you can begin to explicate that prayer. It can become a, a teaching tool. You can, I think some parents make the mistake of memorizing the Lord’s prayer with out fully helping children to understand as they grow and mature, what, what, what that prayer means and how it leads to other prayers. It’s a model prayer that teaches us how to pray other prayers,

too. So to pray our father, you know, th there’s some, we there’s, Oh my goodness. What a remarkable phrase God is like father, he chose to be called by that name. What does that mean? What is the, what is a father like it, especially a father hers. Who’s perfect. What would a father who was perfect be like,

and what does it mean that we can pray our father? Why don’t we simply pray my father who art in heaven and your children will begin to see this as, Oh, that means that we are together, a family, you know, you can see the implications, right? And I can see, you know, like recommend to some of your listeners that,

you know, they get a commentary on the Lord’s prayer and read about the Lord’s prayer. It is, it is traditionally been conceived, not only as a prayer worthy of being prayed in itself, but as a model for how we can pray generally speaking. So we could just buy just with that one prayer. We could have a lifetime of unpacking what that prayer means and how it can lead to other prayer.

So, so conversation is beginning the, our prayer life and our ongoing instruction of our children, discipleship of our children can flow right out of, of just that one, prayer, not to speak of other things than other prayers, other Psalms and other prayers that might be memorized. So, in other words, there’s, there’s blessings at multiple levels for learning to pray and for praying.

First of all, I love that God hears just to summarize God, actually hears prayers. Why wouldn’t you ask God to bless your family and teach your children to do the same. If you believe that he answers prayers, James says you have not because you ask not and B. And because you ask with the wrong motives that you may spend what you get on your own evil desires.

Well, we need to get that straight, but consequently, to answer, know, answer those prayers. So we, maybe we’re just not always thinking correctly about why we should pray Is bad when you give me something to think about. And I have to think before I can talk Great. I mean, our, our, our motives, our, our obstacles to,

you know, I, I think I’m speaking to myself here, by the way, you know, in many cases it’s been, I viewed prayer as something I should do, kind of like, I should go to the gym more often. I shouldn’t die a little better. I should pray more, but in, and of course it’s true. But what I often haven’t thought about is that prayer is something that exists at a deeper level than just keeping fit.

It’s communion with God and God actually hears. This is making me think about wonderful passage in Proverbs two. And this does relate to education. Proverbs two says that if you know, it’s a father writing to the son, you know, my son, if you treasure these things up within you, if you call out for wisdom and discernment and understanding and knowledge as if it’s hidden treasure cry out for it,

like it’s silver and gold, then you will find these things and they will direct your ways. But note that the father is saying to the son, you must call out for wisdom yourself. I can’t merely call out for it for you. There comes a time son, when you, you yourself need to knock on the door. I can’t be knocking on the door for you.

You need to ask, and the door will be open and you’ll become wise, but you have to call out on the name of the Lord yourself. So that’s another to me, a motivating factor. You know, our, our, our children learning to call on the name of the Lord, are we teaching them to pray so that they are calling out on the name of the Lord?

Or are we simply trying to get through the prayers? You know, say our prayers and then check off the box. Well, to some degree, of course we’re doing that, but, but at a deeper level, our children are learning to pray and they are beginning to call the, you know, calling the Lord themselves. So I think there’s a place when we’re working with our children where we want to say,

you pray now. And of course we want to direct their, their minds and spirits, even when they’re praying, memorized prayers, to not just recite the prayers, not just to say the prayers, but to believe the prayers and to understand this as legitimate conversation with God. And then, and then we’re back to them growing wise. In fact, I think that perhaps what that Proverbs two passages teaching us is that our kids will not grow wise ever until they asked God to give them wisdom.

And that’s something they have to do themselves. In other words, you can’t really teach a student until he’s willing to teach himself. And you can’t, you can pray for someone, but you can’t have them grow in wisdom until they actually ask God to give them wisdom. So that’s, that’s how important it is in my view, if, if we’re Christians and we want the kind of wisdom that we would call divine wisdom,

our children are not going to get it until they ask for it themselves. You know, if there’s when the children are infants, you can open their mouth and feed them with a spoon. But at a certain age, they have to feed themselves. And at a certain age, our children need to ask, ask themselves, ask for themselves for the wisdom of God.

So that motivates me anyway. And I, but I can I’m confessing. I have not always, or very often thought that way about teaching my kids prayer. Yeah. It’s an interesting thought. It’s funny because I was reading in Charlotte Mason’s philosophy of education today about you heard her talking about all education being self-education and until the student is, is willing to self-educate and until the student understands that they’re not going to,

until the teacher understands to most specifically that, that the child is not going to be educated until they take ownership of this themselves. You know, the same thing. I that’s what I hear you saying about prayer from that Proverbs two passage, that until, until that child takes ownership of that, then it, you know, they’re, they’re not going to have fully learned how to pray.

And I, I know a lot of times we’ll have moms who, who ask us, you know, what can I do? You know, my teams are kind of getting disenchanted or they’re bored with morning time, or I have, you know, most of my kids have left home and I have one or two teens or one teen left. How do we do a morning time?

And one of the things we’ve, we’ve kind of always said to mom is let, let the team lead the prayer, let the team be, you know, part of this where they’re stepping up to lead everyone else. And I wonder if, if that would not be a way to then kind of help steer them in this direction, you know, as they’re leading others in prayer to pull in their own ownership of this,

I think that’s right. And, and that prob that process can probably begin earlier than when your child turns 17, that you can begin to give them various kinds of leadership early on. So that it’s a gradual and natural process of learning to lead and to pray some other related practices. I think that might be relevant to, to your comment there, Pam is,

you know, keeping a journal or a commonplace book where the things that you’re memorizing are recorded and reviewed, and maybe answers to prayer and contemplation and comments are recorded as well. Some families will record prayer requests in some kind of a journal that they keep with them in the, in the home. So that over time you can see those prayers being answered and,

and, and then give thanks to God when the children begin to see the Lord does hear an answer. And when you can remember the good things that he done your comment about the teenager made me think of Samuel and how, you know, when God began to address Samuel, he spoke to him and Samuel thought it was Eli. When to go to the priest and say,

you call you call. And finally, Eli said, look, when that happens, again, say, speak for your servant is listening. And I think we need to say to our children, there’s are going to be times when God is going to, he’s going to speak to you through scripture, through a sermon, through prayer, through an event in your life,

through friends, through your family. And you need to be attentive to hear what he has for you, because he’s going to do something with your life. And it’s going to be what gives you the greatest joy and probably some of the greatest suffering and challenge too, but he’s, he’s, he’s going to have a call on you and you want to,

you want to be listening when that time comes. And I think that’s that you see reading scripture will help this, but you want to kind of, as it were prime, the imagination of these children, so that they believe that the Lord wants to use them and direct them and is going to end, is going to reach out and direct them in various ways.

So those things just changed for me when I’m thinking about those matters, it changes what prayer is from just being a kind of a regimen that I add to my gym membership, to something very central, to the core of what it means to be a human and to be a human who has been redeemed by, by Jesus Christ. This is at the heart of what I’m about that the heart and core of what I’m about is to be a son in communication with my heavenly father.

And if, if I, as a parent can somehow communicate that to my kids, by the way I speak and live and, and model life. I think to some degree, they will catch this in other ways, besides just our morning prayer times and so forth. In other words, it just needs to be a kind of worked in practice. That’s woven into our life,

just the way we brush our teeth and make breakfast in the morning and get dressed. And so on. It’s just, this is what we do, but we do it because it’s at the core of what it means to be a human who has been redeemed. So those things, I think it’s partly a, just kind of, I don’t know how to say it,

but maybe it’s like putting on the mind of Christ. What would, how does Christ think about this? How, what would, how do I, how do I, how do I spiritually discern what prayer is really supposed to be like for my family? It’s a kind of, it’s a kind of dining. It’s a kind of eating that I need to be sustained and,

and nourished as a, as a, as a Christian. So my children need to see that too. And it will be modeled and caught in various ways. These practices that we’ve been talking about are not the only ways, you know, you may be driving in the van with your children and you get a phone call and find out that somebody that you love in your church or family is seriously ill.

And your response is on the spot to have the, all the children pray. And you are able to use prayers that you’ve memorized and scripture that you’ve memorized as you pray extemporaneously in the van for this loved one. That’s a tremendous teaching opportunity modeling opportunity for kids as well. So it doesn’t just occur in these kinds of scheduled times, although it should,

and we have to eat and eating is such a I’m. So symbolic of what prayer is, it’s, it’s a kind of nourishment that, you know, I think maybe, maybe sometimes I’m very guilty of this. You know, I’m hungry, we’re sitting down for dinner and, you know, it’s been, you know, maybe a little hectic and everyone’s finally got together at the table and there’s some really good food at the table and everybody’s hungry and the prayer is rather quick,

you know, kind of get to it, you know, but those are opportunities too, that maybe we can, we can deepen. I think that’s one of the toughest lessons about prayer at our house is, is you have to wait until we’re done praying before you actually start eating. It’s one of the hardest ones to teach anyway. Okay. So up until this point,

I had been chatting with dr. Perrin about prayer. And from here on out, we have a very special treat because his wife, Christine had just finished teaching a class and she was able to join us via speakerphone for the rest of the conversation. So the quality of the call is not quite what we usually have, but I still think that the insights that Christine Perrin brought to this conversation is so valuable for us.

And so we are adding her in for the rest of the call. Well, I’ve been talking with dr. Perrin and he has been actually, I think we’ve probably come up with content now for a couple of more episodes. He’s given me so many things to think about it really is, but I wanted to kind of get your perspective on prayer and teaching the practice of prayer in your family.

What do you feel like as a mom? What do you feel like has had the greatest impact on praying? Well, I, you know, I think I would hate to hold up our experience as a model because I don’t feel that we have done anything that’s model worthy, but I would say that the things that were most helpful to us were in a couple of categories.

So take That was formal. That’s had the capacity to be sustained regardless of our feelings or thoughts or scatteredness in the moment, something that drew us into itself and lifted us up into where it was instead of being dependent on our presence of mine or clarity, or even feeling as emotion in the moment. So that’s one thing I think sometimes we all need,

but especially children need to see what CS Lewis said so often, which is just, how do I create a habit of obedience habits that will sustain me when my own affection, it Rexes and wanes. Then I would also say that we all know the Lord helped me to have a good day and the way that he’s so easily falling into, even by a parent at the end of a long day,

when we’re so tired or dealing with all the dinner table dynamics that we all deal with. And so we use tickled, I’m sure Chris has told you collection called the divine hours. And so that was for the reasons that I mentioned helpful to us, but really I think these things are somewhat more or less helpful depending on the communities that you’re part of that are,

that you’re, you’re joining the flow of what they’re doing, as opposed to creating something de Novo from your own strengths and your own imagination and your own muscle, you know, how hard it is in family life to have momentum. You just feel resistance all around you all the time. So often, you know, and I love that term by William Meredith we’re,

which we might insert prayer into. But William Meredith has this poem called a major work. Poems are hard to read. Pictures are hard to see. Music is hard to hear and people hard to love, but whether some brute need or divine energy lost mind, eye and ear, and the great flop heart will move. And I think I would add prayer hard to do that because it is,

it’s so hard. And I know that sometimes I felt like prayer was being used as a vehicle to sort of, I don’t know, preach or be like, send me a message, or it was being used by the adults, not my parents so much, but some of the circles I was in. So I just think it’s very helpful when we have a flow of something that’s old,

that’s ongoing, that’s language that we can enter into. And when that flow is something that is not just being perpetuated by our own presence of mind in the moment, but by the communities that we’re a part of, whether that’s a homeschooling community or a church or a neighborhood or some kind of collective, so that the kids feel drawn along that stream by an independent to by forces,

not just within themselves, if that’s what you’re asking or assessing too much, I think you had some wonderful insights there. And it’s, it’s funny because as Chris and I were talking, I talked about the scatteredness as a mom. And, and I think that that tends to be a mom thing. You and I both brought that, brought that up,

that it’s so nice to, you know, w we both brought it up in the, in the context of, of having some of these written or structured prayers because of, of that scatteredness, that makes it sometimes difficult, I think, for us to slow down and pray. And so being able to, to then teach that to our kids, what,

what is some of your favorite ways to pray? I see, well, my favorite way of all with, I really loved playing with the, with a gathering of people or liturgy, where again, I’m entering into something with other people. My work, my labor is to be present, to concentrate, to participate in, but it’s something I’m doing with others.

That is my favorite way to pray. Apart from that, I, I just love the songs. They’re the most, probably the most important language that has ever happened to me in my life. They’re so human they’re so divine, it’s such a meeting place of, of language and affection and history of our story. They steward, if you will, they steward our story,

our narrative, the Christian narrative, and we share them with country people. So that’s another favorite way, reading the song as an act of prayer. And even, you know, if I were to be doing that with children, I would do it like I do it with students, which is to even stop after the song and lift lines or words or images that team from he texts that we were just,

so this is a method that I use with students, think of it as an answering back to the text. And I find that it’s really easy for people to be engaged with it because they can just respond without a lot of thought or preparation. But it’s also a cherishing of what is actually being said. And sometimes when you start cherishing words, you find yourself drawn into something and you’re less self-conscious I guess,

to answer your question, I like the forms of prayer that are the least self-conscious. I like the forest prayer that causes to be self forgetful. So that too, do you want more? Oh, I think, I think that such a wonderful nugget and I want to touch for just a second, and I know that you have some other obligations there,

but you talked about the liturgy being the work of prayer, and you talked about the discipline of quieting your mind and participating in that liturgy. And I think that’s something really important for moms is they, they have this group of little children in front of them and they’re, you know, reading the songs or they’re reading scriptures, or they’re praying some prayers it’s spontaneous prayer or set prayer.

That, that part of what we’re doing here is where we’re showing the kids that this liturgy is our work. It’s what we’re called to do. And there’s a discipline involved in quieting ourselves to be able to do this work. And it’s going to take a while to get there, but, but I love that you brought that up Of yours, the,

the discipline of quieting ones. So that’s really well. He topic, you know, what is it that quiet us? How do we cultivate that stillness? Perfect attention is prayer. So that this active prayer, in many ways, it’s essential for us to attend. It’s essential for us to know how to attend and dwell and be present, which I think we’re all pretty bad at.

So when I sent, she’s saying, it’s not even contemplation. Exactly. It’s more just present. And so I would think that even with children, it would be helpful to think about what is it, what are the circumstances that help to make that possible, make that happen, that sort of presence, you know, that deep breath. I love a book on prayer by Anthony bloom called beginning to pray.

And he talks about this in that book really consciously. And he says, you must start by coming before God and being ready to listen, because God won’t speak to you if you’re not ready to hear it, you know, because that would be a form of Soviet direct. And so he talked about a woman that would simply come to her prayer time or prayer corner,

and she would knit, but she’d be moving in God’s presence in contents of that in order to begin to still herself. And so I definitely think that what I hear you saying about, you know, about moms and probably dads is that part of our, the presence that we bring children, when we come to pray, probably have a huge impact on them,

you know? And so even giving ourselves some sort of routine or environment or practice or even community that helps us to do that and to take a deep breath and to remember what we’re doing and to enter into it, to settle into it, to come to stillness and maybe even language surrounding that, like let’s come to stillness, let’s enter in, let’s learn to be present,

to be here. I find it very fruitful to pray with other people. So, and not just other people within the family, but other people even outside the family, because the resistance then is just not as much about all the dynamics family. So I have a friend and several friends, and we pray prayers for our children and the children in our church and in our lives.

You know, we, we pray up a saw prayer service every week, whenever we can, usually it ends up being more like every month together. And we just really have a burden for that and we join each other. And I just find that, that joining of other than even prior commitments at the time slot create a stillness, you know, this system set aside for this.

There’s nothing else that we’re doing. There’s nothing else that we’re rushing. So this is kind of hollowed. And then whatever it is that makes us able to take a deep breath and enter into something, those conditions should be, I think, diligently attended to things we can control. Right. Well, dr. Perrin, before you go, could you tell me both dr.

Perrin doctors, parent, some of your favorite books. Now you mentioned Anthony blooms beginning to pray. Do you have any other books that might be helpful for moms who want to learn more about the practice of prayer and especially communal prayer? Yeah. Great question. You know, I, I think that one of the most important things I would place I would direct moms to is the book of Psalms first,

just because as we’ve mentioned already, it is a prayer book and some commentaries on the Psalm. So doing some, some study of the Psalms, I think is a really useful, another thing that I would direct people to is some of, I would look in your own tradition, but even outside of it, for some of the prayer books that already exist,

I think sometimes more than reading books about prayer. Although I think there are some good ones and I like, you know what Christina said about Anthony bloom? I’m thinking of the CS Lewis’s book letters to Malcolm as a chiefly on prayer. I’m thinking of some of the books by Ian bounds on prayer that have been meaningful to me in the past. I came out of kind of an evangelical tradition of prayer.

And I remember reading books on the power of prayer, et cetera. And when I was in a Christian fellowship in college, I remember being on the prayer committee and we would read some books about prayer, but the greatest difficulty I ever had was just finding a simple practice of prayer. And, and so I, I found that the most important things that to me have been actually having prayer books.

And we’ve mentioned several, the book of common prayer. I forgot. I did forget to mention the three books series by Phyllis tickle the divine offices, which are lovely as divine hours. Yeah. The divine hours there are, and you can get a Kindle edition of that as well. I have it on my Kindle. I have, I have the Eastern Orthodox prayer book with me most of the time,

especially when I’m traveling. And that has been very useful. I would look at the, it felt as a Protestant. I would certainly get the Valley of vision, the collection of, of Puritan prayers, beautiful prayers, very meaningful and deep. I would, if I was in the Anglican tradition, I would get the book of common prayer. Christine,

what else is coming to your mind as books on prayer or containing prayer? Well, I really, my figure of suggestion of, you know, of books containing prayer versus books on prayer, not that you know, I mean they can both support each other, but, and I did think of a couple of pedals about prayer. I know my mom loves the book,

practicing the presence of God by brother Lawrence. And I love the book contemplative prayer by Thomas Merton. But I agree with Chris that, that it’s, it’s much better to just get it. You know, the ideas that things since the fathers and mothers of the church taught us is that all you need is a very simple prayer rule that that is completable every day.

And that if you do what you can do, even if it’s the smallest thing, even if it’s just stopping for a moment and saying a few words, or seeing a standup of a song that is better than the scatteredness missing, the big ambitions that we can’t complete, and that make us constantly unraveled and attending. So I do think that it’s much better to find a prayer.

There’s a prayer that I think is a great daily prayer. If you Google it and I can get, would you like me to just send it to you in an email ham, I’ll send you this prayer and I can send you a couple of sort of daily prayers. That would be nice for maybe a family to say, one of you in the morning and one in the night or something like that.

And start with that simplicity. And I’d like all of Chris’s suggestions about thinking through what people in your tradition have done. Everyone in the Christian Church has used the Salter, you know, the songs. So that is definitely a place to start. And if your tradition, you know, I do remember when I was in college thinking that written prayers were very insincere.

And, and I think that maybe a lot of the written prayers I had heard were insincere, but there is a wealth of people in every tradition pouring out their hearts to God in language and emotion and even theology that is beautiful and rich and worth repeating. And if you think about how often we encourage students to read great works of literature, why wouldn’t we also encourage them to read language to God that is crafted and beautiful formal,

it’s not insincere. We certainly don’t call a song insincere. So anything that can be found, and if your tradition doesn’t have that, if, if you want more than the problems, I just encourage you to go back to a time when the church was not broken into all the smithereens that it is now, you know, perhaps a thousand a D and find some printers like Google prayers from 1,008.

You know, when the one and just see what comes up, because there are beautiful ones. And often they’re keyed to the beginning of the day, the middle of the day and the end of the day. And so this kind of old way of thinking about prayer was that you would tie the, the, the turns of your life, the key hinges of your life to prayer,

so that you could remember God, because that’s what prayer is just remembering God and being with God. And so when you write, you remember God, and when you come to the middle of the day, you remember God, and when you close the day, you remember God. And when you eat a little bit more, you remember, and you’re praying.

And so to kind of craftily thoughtfully tie it to the hinges, I think is the insight that most Christians had in ancient Rome. Of course, we’ve lost all of our ties to the hours sense of a sun, but it’s easily reconnected to that. Oh, I love it. And I love the fact that you’ve come on and just reiterated in slightly different language,

so much of what Chris has said. And so I think, I think it’s one, I think it’s wonderful though, because I think it’s, it’s well worth hearing it. You know, this is kind of the same song from two different, two different verses here. And so I think moms are really going to appreciate this. So I just want to thank you both so much for coming on today.

So many wonderful nuggets here that I’m going to take to heart and listen to again and again. So thank you. And thank you for giving us the opportunity to realize how similarly we see it. It’s nice to hear that we’ve said the same thing without knowing it. Yeah, you really have. I imagined Chris is sitting over there, nodding along as you’re talking,

so it’s wonderful. Hello. Thank you guys Would say too, that despite the fact that we have these ideas and we’re saying the same thing, we’re still very much trying to practice it and have a rule ourselves. We don’t always succeed. So it’s really not about understanding everything. It’s just about doing it and finding a cycle that does help you to do it.

I would like to thank dr. Perrin and dr. Perrin, Christopher and Christine for coming on podcast today. Now you can find more from dr. Christopher paran@classicalacademicpress.com. He’s over there. So many wonderful products for homeschooling your kids classically. Now we’ll be back again in a couple of weeks with a, another great morning time podcast. This time with Cindy West,

from our journey westward, Cindy and I are going to be talking about that in between the age between when your kids are little kids and pretty much quite willing to do anything that you say you’re going to do, because you know, you make it fun and exciting, and everybody’s happy to be there. And the teen age that Heather Woody and I talked about in episode 61 of the podcast.

So there’s kind of this middle stage there. And what do you do with those kids? Sometimes they’re a little bit Gnarly and not quite wanting to go along with whatever it is. Mom Has planned. Cindy and I are going to be talking about that transition age next week. How does your morning time shift and change as your kids move into those tween and preteen years?

So be sure to come back and check that episode of the podcast out in a couple of weeks until then keep seeking truth, goodness and beauty in your heart.

Links and Resources from Today’s Show

The Book of Common PrayerPinThe Book of Common PrayerThe Book of SongsPinThe Book of SongsA Handbook to Morning TimePinA Handbook to Morning TimeLiberal EducationPinLiberal Education

 

Key Ideas about Teaching and Modeling the Practice of Prayer

  • Dr. Perrin starts off by talking about the discipline of prayer as both a corporate practice and a personal discipline. By praying together as a family and in our churches we are teaching them the importance of worship in community. But we must also teach our children how to have a personal discipline of prayer.
  • Dr. Perrin discusses the best ways to teach and model practice of prayer. He suggests for beginners, creating a routine or Rule of prayer that includes prayer at the beginning of the day, end of the day and at meal times.
  • He also shares tips for modeling a prayer life when we are just learning it ourselves and provides tips for praying the Scriptures.
  • Dr. Christopher Perrin and his wife, Dr. Christine Perrin close the discussion with some recommendations of prayer resources for mom and family.

Find What you Want to Hear

  • 3:25 meet Dr. Perrin
  • 3:45 prayer as both a personal discipline and a corporate practice
  • 8:00 benefits of praying in community for children
  • 11:10 the value of formal written prayers
  • 17:40 teaching the practice of prayer to our children
  • 25:40 overcoming obstacles in prayer
  • 28:30 for the mom who thinks she can’t teach her children to pray because she’s still learning
  • 36:25 what our children will teach us in prayer
  • 45:40 teaching our children to take ownership by leading
  • 52:55 things that have had the greatest impact on prayer in the family
  • 1:05 resources for communal prayer from Christine Perrin
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