I would like to say that mine is a family who pray fervently, but that would be a lie. Like most, we don’t speak with the Lord nearly enough. What I can say however, is that our family dinner time, (keep in mind that I said “dinner time.”) while often filled with laughter, and an occasional serious discussion, is always begun with giving thanks to Him. Ever since my kids were little, dinner has unceasingly been not only family time, but prayer time. Nothing fancy, just a common table prayer, but if one of us sits down and decides that it’s more important to eat first and thank God later, when we can find the time, there is always someone prepared, and more than willing, to correct that misconception.
Leland, my 20 month old grandson has taken to the traditional “dinner” prayer too. He dutifully interlocks his fingers as we begin to pray, occasionally babbling some incoherent sounds which makes be think that maybe he is speaking in tongues, then as we all finish with a hearty “Amen!” Leland adds his own personal touch by grinning widely and breaking into applause. We of course follow suit and begin to applaud as well and I can’t help but think that God himself is clapping also.
So it was this past Saturday morning, that our family, minus my daughter who was at work, sat down for a rare family breakfast. Never really sure how Leland will react to meal time, we decided to prepare something that he’s never been too fussy to pass up, scrambled eggs. The eggs, along with corn beef hash, toast and juice was placed on the table and everyone began to dig in. My wife, seated next to Leland and in charge of feeding him this morning, positioned a forkful of scrambled eggs in front of his mouth and waited for him to devour it. Leland grunted and turned his head away, refusing to eat. Okay, that happens sometimes, he’s starting to get older and already is attempting to exert his independence. “He probably wants to feed himself” I said. My wife placed his fork on his plate as we all watched intently. Nothing, he wouldn’t even look at it.! My son had the idea that, “Maybe he’d like to try something else” and attempted to force feed him a heaping helping of Mary Kitchen corned beef hash. Leland jerked his head away so fast that I half expected to see him spin it completely around and start spewing out pea soup like that scene in the movie the Exorcist. If that happened I was pretty sure that my breakfast was going to go uneaten.
As we all sat staring at him, (me peaking between my barely parted fingers, still worried about the Exorcist thing happening) Leland folded his hands and rested them on his high chair tray. My wife who’s never seen The Exorcist, and didn’t know what she was possibly getting herself into by speaking to him said, “Did you want to pray Leland?” I closed my fingers a little bit more and started to squeeze my eyes shut when I heard him speak one of his two best words, “YEAH!” he said. I exhaled loudly and quickly began to pray, “Come Lord Jesus be our guest, and let thy gifts to us be blessed, and may there be a goodly share, on every table everywhere. Amen”
Leland started laughing and clapping, then shoved a large forkful of eggs into his mouth, cleaned his plate, and topped breakfast off with about a half container of blueberries.
I have no idea what kind of man my grandson is going to grow up to be, but I think he’s off to a pretty good start.
Proverbs 22:6 Train a child in the way he should go, and when he is old he will not turn from it.