I have been wanting to write the Lord’s Prayer for my son in a way that is both rhyming and descriptive in a way that a three-year old can both memorize and understand.
I am determined not to teach my son this archaic, individualistic, and scary prayer (although it did make me feel better to pray while hiding from the boogie man way back when I was 24):
Now I lay me down to sleep,
I pray the Lord my soul to keep;
if I die before I wake,
I pray for God my soul to take.
This prayer might have worked in the past, but I want my son to know prayers with great depth even at an early age. I want him to sing and pray prayers to a God that cares about more than souls. I want a Kingdom of Heaven toddler. I know a bit over-reaching maybe, but I can’t help it.
And I think the Lord’s prayer (Matt 6:9-13) is a good place to start. Yet thinking and meditating on the Lord’s Prayer I find my heart breaking with the first line:
Our Father in Heaven…
What does this line mean to an entire generation of people, both grown-ups and children, without fathers (both dads who were absent and those who were present, but don’t deserve the high title of “daddy”).
For people who had no father; it is probably easy to be an atheist. God as a loving father? No such Father ever existed in their life.
For people whose father was present but uninvolved it is most simple to be a deist, even if a father God is there, just like their human father, he doesn’t affect/interact with them much.
Even worse, people whose dad was present and abusive. What could God the Father represent to them? A monster? A maniac?
This hits home with me, now a dad, due to my high blood pressure and the very fact that we are not in control of life and death. What if I don’t take care of my physical body and I die before my son gets to know me? Before I get a chance to be the imperfect father pointing to the all-perfect, all-loving one? What will my son think of God the Father?
I know I often find myself praying to Jesus instead of praying to God the Father in the name of Jesus. I am not sure why I do this. Maybe because my limited contact with my earthly father growing up I can now better relate to a “friend in Jesus” than a cosmic Father, even if he is the Abba Father. I wonder how many others are like me, trying to sneak in the back door of the Father’s House through our buddy Jesus who promised us it would be okay.
The calling of being a father (or a mother) is of the highest importance. How can it be so neglected? And it seems unfair that a human’s neglect can point negatively to God. Yet it does.
So in light of this, I think we should either throw away the language of “God the Father” or we should re:build what a father is within this generation.
What does God the Father mean to a fatherless generation? Would it be better to change the metaphor/understanding of God or this generations perception of a father?
It wasn’t until I had kids that I really really understood the amazingness of God as our Father, our Daddy- and His love for us as his children. A love that is both tender and firm, that allows us freedom to roam while keeping us safely within an arms reach. It is a love that sometimes gives us what we don’t want, because it is what we need.
Excellent read bro! I don’t have any immediate suggestions for a rhyming Lord’s prayer, but I really like the concept. The more we make the teaching of our faith an individual exercise as opposed to a ritualistic one, the more likely our children will have a faith that actually means something to them.
Jason-
How the heck have you been????? I miss you friend. Thanks man. I agree how becoming a dad is a game changer for our understanding of God. Yet what about those children without dads? What about the grown ups who have never known a dad’s love or God’s? I am concerned for them, for the world they live in, which I happen to live in. I believe in you as a father…so father some more
Love you brother.
now i lay me down to sleep
i pray the lord my soul to keep
see me safely through the night
and wake me with the morning light
god bless…mom, dad, my dog etc
that’s what my parents taught me and until recently i never knew of these scarier versions : )
that is a much less scary version