Here’s a little snippet I wrote for the October newsletter of Saddleback Kids Irvine South. It was fun to write, so I thought I’d share with the rest of you. Here it is . . . uncut.
“Don’t worry about anything; instead, pray about everything. Tell God what you need, and thank him for all he has done.” Philippians 4:6 (NLT)
After a long, exhausting day, I look forward to flopping onto my bed. No, really. I flop onto my bed. I think I get a good amount of airtime as I get my body horizontal and flop onto my bed. It’s my daily end-of-the-day habit. You know what my wife’s daily end-of-the-day habit is? Telling me to get back out of bed to go pray for my kids. We do this every night.
Oh, the habit doesn’t end there. I groan and moan. I yell at my kids to get off their devices and into their beds. This goes on way past their bedtime. At some point, we get there . . . the point at which we can finally pray together as a family. Sometimes just I pray. Sometimes they also pray. We pray about the day. We pray about the next day. We pray over any hurts and pains. We pray over people we know who need prayer. We pray as a family.
Again, the habit doesn’t end there. I get to flop onto my bed a second time with the peace that . . . we prayed as a family.
The Hebrew word for peace is “shalom” and it means so much more than the absence of war. It means “whole” or “complete.” Having shalom means everything is right with God and everything is right with other people.
It ain’t easy to get into a habit, but we are entering into 40 days of getting into a great habit. Let’s do it together as families. Then, we can enjoy this peace (“shalom”) as a community.
http://saddleback.com/watch/media/series/2724/40-days-of-prayer
Image source: Zimbio
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