I was recently talking with a close friend who is a children’s pastor. She explores a lot of questions with kids and families and has found that prayer is a recurring theme. Parents and leaders are asking, “How do we teach people, especially children, to pray?”
We are certainly not the first to seek wisdom in this area of spiritual development. In Luke 11, we see that Jesus’ closest friends and followers need guidance in prayer. Verse 1 says, “One day Jesus was praying in a certain place. When he finished, one of his disciples said to him, ‘Lord, teach us to pray, just as John taught his disciples.’” Author Richard Rohr describes our human desire to pray as learning “how to be present to presence.”
How we teach prayer matters. Some people believe only pastors have permission to pray. Others think they have to speak specific, holy words. One person said they didn’t pray for years because they were told God is angry if we admit fear or doubt. Thankfully, there are grandparents, parents, church staff and spiritual leaders who live healthy prayer lives and model a variety of ways of communicating with God. I spoke with a few of these people about how they are engaging with this question.
As a trained spiritual director, Chandelle Claassen, of North Newton, Kansas, recognizes we have a tendency to approach prayer with “some fear and pressure to get ‘it’ right.” Instead of stressing over details, Claassen believes “prayer happens when the conversation between me and Jesus has no restrictions of time, space, method, delivery and so forth, but rather becomes my posture and thoughts within my relationship [with him].” She teaches others to start simple: “Begin with the invitation to slow down, sit and imagine God’s presence with you—the banner of love over you and within you. Jesus delights in you and loves you.”
There are grandparents, parents, church staff and spiritual leaders who live healthy prayer lives and model a variety of ways of communicating with God.
Sandy Crawford facilitates a weekly FaceTime prayer group at CrossTimbers Church in Edmond, Oklahoma. “Our prayer muscles are weak,” she says, and we often feel inadequate when talking to God. Years ago, Crawford was taught to “seek God’s face before we seek his hand” and she still models how to “start with a sacrifice of praise” prior to sharing needs and desires. One way Crawford teaches people to talk to God is to “pray with your Bible, especially the Psalms” and use the sacred words to give voice to our own feelings and desires.
Pastor Brittney Howard teaches children at Prodigal Church in Fresno, California, that “Jesus wants to talk and listen to them.” She and her group of volunteers have a great responsibility of leading kids in prayer every week and learn from each other as they “feel Jesus’ heart in people’s prayers.” Howard wants her own children and those in her community to know they can bring whatever is on their mind and understand there is “no editing of what to pray to God about.” She encourages us all to recognize and lean into the “beautiful mosaic of different ways to pray.”
In times when we are looking for someone to help us pray, we can turn to Jesus’ reply to his disciples in Luke 11 as an example. “He said to them, ‘When you pray, say: Father, hallowed be your name, your kingdom come. Give us each day our daily bread. Forgive us our sins, for we also forgive everyone who sins against us. And lead us not into temptation’” (v.2-4). Amen.
Caitlin Friesen is a native of Fresno, California, and a 2023 graduate of Fresno Pacific Biblical Seminary. She has a passion for Jesus and a heart for children, both of which has been put to use as a backpacking guide, camp counselor and as associate pastor of children and family ministries at North Fresno Church. In September 2017, she and her husband, Ben, moved to Topeka, Kansas, where Ben serves as lead pastor at Cornerstone Community Church.
Prayer is the most important thing , it is a way of discussing with God