Be the Prompt to Pray

As her children became teens and adults, Monica McConkey came to realize the importance of encouraging them to pray on their own.

While it is a blessing when our teens and adult children want to talk about their concerns and choices, it is becoming increasingly clear that I can’t easily jump in and fix everything. I don’t have ready-to-go advice. I’m the kind of person who is more likely to think of the best answer, hours after mulling it over.

I know I need the Holy Spirit to help me with the right words, especially in the moment, and sometimes I’m too flustered to ask for His Help until well after the conversation. He knows my heart, and He usually comes through to guide my words, and I just thank Him in retrospect.

A phone or Facetime call can come in at any moment and although they may have been wrestling with something for a while, it can be news to me.

I know that sometimes all they need is a listening ear. Even if I could come up with a solution or an approach to try, right there in the moment, it just might not be what they need.

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It can feel awkward at first, but we can ask to pray with them, then and there. And if we stumble when we pray spontaneously, we’re just proving to them that prayer doesn’t have to be perfect, while we encourage them to practice spontaneous prayer on their own, as well.

At a minimum, we can ask if they have prayed about their situation and encourage them to continue to lift up the concerns weighing on their hearts, in prayer.

The best advice I’ll ever have is to “take it to prayer.”

I know I need these everyday prompts to pray as much as anyone, but I just realized one of my most important roles in the faith formation of my kids:

Sometimes I need to BE the Prompt to PRAY; the reminder to get others to pray.

The Lord is just waiting for us to come to Him.

Although He already knows our hearts, we are better able to receive His Grace through the exercise of prayer: stretching our capacity to receive Him!

Click to tweet:
We definitely need to continue to pray for our kids, but we can also BE the Prompt to Pray! #catholicmom

We can be so preoccupied with our own routine or schedule, that we can easily forget to bring up our own concerns in prayer. If we can use reminders or prompts to pray, so can our adult kids!

We definitely need to continue to pray for our kids, but we can also BE the Prompt to Pray!

Remind your loved ones to pray for themselves … and draw closer to Jesus!

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