Parents are their children’s first and best teachers. God expects parents to teach their children how to lead godly lives.
Deuteronomy 11:19 (VOICE)
Teach these things to your children. Talk about them when you’re sitting together in your home and when you’re walking together down the road. Make them the last thing you talk about before you go to bed and the first thing you talk about the next morning.
Lord God, teach parents to teach children, in Jesus’ name.
Matthew 19:14 (ESV)
Jesus said, “Let the little children come to me
and do not hinder them.”
Let’s pray for school teachers, administrators and staff (I count myself among them: I work part-time in a high school):
Lord, may we never be stumbling blooks to our students. May we always be stepping stones.
Romans 8:26 (MEV)
Likewise, the Spirit helps us in our weaknesses,
for we do not know what to pray for as we ought,
but the Spirit Himself intercedes for us
with groanings too deep for words.
Help us, Holy Spirit.
We have no words.
I memorized this verse decades ago.
2 Timothy 2:11 (KJ21)
Study to show thyself approved unto God.
It’s good advice for students of all ages: study, not to get a good grade, or earn a scholarship, or please your parents, or pass the class. Study to get God’s nod of approval.
What does God’s approval look like? I envision him saying, “Good job! You’re putting your mind to work the way I intended from the get-go.”
Thank you, Lord, for equipping our students with good minds. May they use those minds in ways that please and honor you.
The school year is coming to an end. This week, we’ll search Scripture to find good and godly words to pray over the schools dear to our hearts.
The Bible offers this prayer for the city of Jerusalem:
Psalm 122:7 (ERV)
May there be peace within your walls.
May there be safety in your great buildings.
Peace and safety — good and godly words.
I work in a school. When I pull into my parking space in the morning, I pray:
May there be peace within these walls,
Lord, and safety in this building.
Ephesians 3:17-18 (NIV)
I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power, together with all the Lord’s holy people, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ.
Pray for deep roots.
Pray from deep roots.
Ezekiel 11:19 (NLT)
I will remove the hearts of stone
from their bodies and I will give
them tender hearts.
Yep, I admit it. I can be hard-hearted. Stone faced. Stiff-necked. Self righteous.
It’s hard to pray when my heart is hard. I need help.
Have at it, Lord. Chip away my hard edges.
Break up my stony attitude. Give me a
tender heart, in Jesus’ name.
Do your prayers feel half-hearted?
This word from God might explain why.
Revelation 2:4 (NLT)
I have this complaint against you.
You don’t love me or each other
as you did at first!
Let us love.
Mark 12:30 (NIV)
Love the Lord your God
with all your heart and
with all your soul and
with all your mind and
with all your strength.
[also Deuteronomy 6:5]
Whole-hearted prayer is filled with love for God.
