Prayers for Parents

A Family Prayer God made us a family. We need one another. We love one another. We forgive one another. We work together. We play together. We worship together. Together we use God’s word. Together we grow in Christ. Together we love all people. We serve our God. Together we hope for Heaven. These are our hopes and ideas. Help us to attain them, O God, through Jesus Christ our Lord. ~ Author Unknown ~

A Parent’s Prayer Father, make me a better parent. Help me to understand my children, to listen patiently to what they have to say and to understand all their questions kindly. Keep me from interrupting them, talking back to them and contradicting them. Make me as courteous to them as I would have them be to me. Give me the courage to confess my sins against my children and ask their forgiveness when I know that I have done wrong. May I not vainly hurt the feelings of my children. Forbid that I should laugh at their mistakes, or resort to shame and ridicule as punishment. Let me not tempt a child to lie and steal. So guide me hour by hour that I may demonstrate by all I say and do that honesty produces happiness. Reduce, I pray, the meanness in me. May I cease to nag; and when I am out of sorts, help me, Oh Lord, to hold my tongue. Blind me to the little errors of my children and help me to see the good things they do. Give me a ready word for honest praise. Help me to treat my children as those of there own age but let me not exact of them judgments and conventions of adults. Allow me not to rob them of the opportunity to wait upon themselves, to think, to choose, and to make their own decisions. Forbid that I should ever punish them for my selfish satisfaction. May I grant them all their wishes that are reasonable and have the courage always to withhold a privilege that I know will do them harm. Make me so fair and just, so considerate and companionable to my children that they will have genuine esteem for me. Fit me to be loved and imitated by my children. Oh God, do give me calm, and poise and self-control. Amen. ~ Author Unknown ~