The Boy's Prayer by Roderick S. Owen

Pacific Press Publishing Association · Mountain View, California · May 11, 1915

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 42, No. 19.

The Boy's Prayer

By Roderick S. Owen

Above the side of his little bed, I see the top of his curly head. He's kneeling there for his evening prayer To the Father above, whose name is Love. The prayer is broken, the words are few, Seem scarcely begun till the prayer is through. Then into his bed, with a bounding leap, And with arms outstretched, and my boy's asleep. And I asked myself, as I wondering sat, “Will the God of heaven hear a prayer like that?”

So I silently walked to the side of his bed, And I lovingly looked at that curly head, Sleeping there after his prayer, Without one thought of care; And to myself I said:

“His prayer did not end at the side of his bed, For the confiding sleep embracing him there Is the sweet aftermath of his short, terse prayer. He meant what he said, and he said what he meant, And his heart was filled with sweet content.”

Then I thought of myself as I kneel to pray By the side of my bed at the close of the day— How the lack of faith with my own request Makes me go to bed with a sad unrest, And toss and turn the long hours through As the day pass by in the night's review. O, the things I did or left undone Since the early light of the morning sun! O, the choices I made, in having my way— How they crossed and recrossed the right path of the day!

Then the future comes trooping before me to keep My spirit from grasping my God-given sleep. While still I am wondering, the sweet words are given, “Except as a child, ye cannot reach heaven.” Then, looking to God, I offer one prayer: “Lord, help me to pray like my boy sleeping there.”