An unprepared waiting upon God, if it be a stated occasion of worship, is most likely to be a fruitless waiting. If the minister should not go unprepared, neither should the people. If the leader of a prayer-meeting needs to think beforehand, so do the led. If the head of a family should make the best Scripture selections for devotional reading, so should the rest of the family make some preparation for this “sweet hour of prayer.” It may be set down as an axiom in regard to all religious services that an impromptu participation is a dismal, dreary, perfunctory performance, instead of a “sweet” hour.
God gave us our brains to use, first in worshiping Him, and then in business and every-day life. We reverse the order. We know that we must take our brains to the counting-room or school. The trouble with a great many dull hours of family worship is that we think brains are not needed at the family altar. Nothing is planned. We rush in and rush out. We miss the joy. We would miss our appetite for a breakfast that had as little planning. How may family worship be so planned as to make it a joy to all the household,—something to which the children will look eagerly forward, and that will have a profound influence on their lives?
I know of one household in which the children hated the morning prayers, and made every excuse to absent themselves. The shrewd mother said to herself, after the third time refusing Susie permission to study her geography instead of coming to prayers:
“We are missing the mark, some way. James, are you ready to admit that a man who can succeed as a bank cashier has not wit enough to lead a ten-minute devotional exercise so that it is not a positive infliction to his children?”
James was not ready for that humiliation. When he came home to luncheon, he suggested thoughtfully, “Why not have a little program for each morning? I have to do that for our directors’ meetings; I guess we can do it for the Lord.”
“That’s a fine beginning, James,” she said, with a sparkle in her eye. “But why not make the children the majority membership of the program committee?”
The children’s eyes opened wide at the proposition, but they entered into it with eagerness. The first program read like this:
Program of the Thatcher family’s morning prayers.
All enter sitting-room promptly at 7 A.M.
All sit with bowed heads while Marie plays soft chords.
Singing, “I Love to Tell the Story.”
Reciting John 3:1-17, a verse each, three times around.
Prayer by Papa Thatcher, all joining in the Lord’s Prayer.
Singing, “When I Survey the Wondrous Cross,”
Repeating in concert the twenty-third Psalm.
The children each had a part in making the program, and looked forward eagerly to its execution. It gave a new dignity to family worship and a new charm. When they tired a little of one order of exercises, Mrs. Thatcher was quick to suggest some change. Sometimes they sang hymns, and had no other prayers. Sometimes Susie or Marie printed a list of the special objects of prayer, and it was pinned to the wall. Sometimes they read from the little book of “Daily Portions.”
Childhood likes little changes, and there are so many roads leading to devotion, that it is a pity that the “sweet hour of prayer” should not be always “sweet” to the dear children, when a little thinking will make it so.—New York Observer.
