How a Mormon Mother Teaches Her Child to Pray

By Joyce Anderson

This post, part of our month-long series about God, is by Joyce Anderson, one of the winners of our writing contest.

I’m a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Some people call us “The Mormon.” Despite what you’ve heard, what you think about Mitt Romney, or what Broadway musicals say about us, we’re pretty normal people who just want to teach our children how to be godly in an increasingly godless world.

After my first son was born, and after the shock of motherhood started to wear off, I realized that I needed to start thinking about how I was going to teach my son about God, Heaven, Jesus Christ, and all of the other things we believe. I felt overwhelmed at the task in front of me, and I really didn’t know what to do, other than pray.

I prayed for a long time and asked the Lord for help, for direction, and for a huge clue about what I was supposed to be doing. In a very quiet moment the answer came to me like a small, heavenly whisper. “Teach him to pray. Teach him how to talk to me.” But that was only part of the answer. HOW, was my next question? How do I teach a toddler to pray? I prayed for more guidance. Again, in another quiet moment, that same heavenly whisper came and suggested I use the prayer chart from my days as a missionary. Back then we had a flip chart with scripture verses, pictures, and sayings that we would use when we would teach people about our church. One of the pages in the chart had an outline for how to say a prayer. That was it. I would use that lesson to teach my son how to pray.

 Continue reading.