A Prayer Closet is a special place for kids to meet with God. I remember that, as a child, I needed to escape the chaos of my house and hid away to talk to God. Here are a few tips on how to create a fun and cozy place where your kids can meet with God.
Step 1: Clean out space in the closet.
This is the hardest part, but it is so rewarding! We donated the majority of Mack’s toys, and saved our favorites for Nick. Of course, a closet is ideal, but a small corner area or even part of a wall will work.
Step 2: Help your kids choose a theme verse.
Here is our verse:
I will climb up to my watchtower
and stand at my guardpost. There I will wait to see what the Lord says and how he will answer my complaint.
–Habakkuk 2:1 (NLT)
We love these verses, because Habakkuk went to a special place to talk to God and to wait to see what God would say. It’s important to teach kids to wait and listen for God’s voice.
Step 3: Write out the verse on paper and use some painter’s tape (this stuff is magic) to adhere it to the wall.
Scripture is powerful! It will help kids remember their focus as they spend time with God in their special place.
Step 4: Hang a map to remind your kids to pray over the nations.
Add pictures of missionaries you support to the map.
If you aren’t connected with any missionaries, that’s OK! You can use the map by itself and add pictures of friends or even Bible characters to get started.
We love this map from Wycliffe, which has fun graphics and characters for kids.
Kate and Mack (the parrot) are characters in Wycliffe’s curriculum that helps kids learn about people around the world that do not have access to God’s Word in their heart languages. A coordinating book highlights different people groups.
There’s also a wonderful, free prayer map from Every Home for Christ. It has fun, child-like characters and a plan to pray for every nation in 31 days.
It only took a few minutes to print out pictures of our friends working hard for Jesus around the world. I let Mack choose which pictures he wanted to add and saved some others for my own prayer space.
Having their own Prayer Closet is a great opportunity to teach your kids that these people around the world are real. We get to be a part of what God is doing through them when we pray for them, which is amazing!
Step 5: Create a place for your kids to write and see their prayers.
I used some old paper and wrote out the following categories:
Praise
Thanks
Requests (Me, Others)
Confess
Surrender
These categories are inspired from my book, Psalm Prayers for Kids, which teaches kids how to use the Psalms to pray the attributes of God.
Then I got some sticky notes, and we added the prayers to them. They are super simple, and this is something that you can do with your kids to help them get started.
For example, in the praise section we wrote, “You are kind,” “You are gracious,” and “You are loving.”
6. Bring in a few props.
Your kids will want their Bibles, a journal, and a few prayer journals or devotionals.
Younger kids may like to have a favorite stuffed animal to “pray” with them.
We added our books, Psalm Prayers for Kids and Psalm Prayers for the Nations, which are both great resources for kids to learn how to pray Scripture.
We also added a beanbag for Mack to rest and feel comfortable.
That’s it! Easy peasy, people!
I hope this will help y’all create some wonderful spaces and enable your kids to grow closer to God.
Here are a few extra tips:
· Keep it simple and bring your kids into the process! I had this elaborate idea to draw a watch tower on the wall, but Mack told me he didn’t want that. I could have forced it, but that would have been silly. This is his space, after all. He is perfectly content with his simple space without any fancy additions.
· If you don’t have a whole wall, it is totally possible to create something similar in a smaller space.
· Arabah Joy has a great tutorial on how to make a “War Room” with a tri-fold poster board that works in any space.
· Be sure to explain prayer to your kids. What is it? Why do we do it? Here’s a quick summary: Prayer is talking to God. The Bible says that God bends down to listen to our prayers, and that He loves it when we talk to Him. God made us, and He loves us so very much. We are making a special place where you can feel comfortable and talk to God, but He hears us when we talk to Him, every time we talk to Him. We could talk to Him in the bathtub or in the car, and He would hear us there too.
· Also, please keep in mind that your kids may not be super enthusiastic about this idea at first. That's ok!! For each one of these smiling pictures, I can show you a picture of at least one child crying or not cooperating. I probably have a few pictures of myself upset too! Ha! Perfect isn't realistic, so just go ahead and adjust your expectations. We are planting seeds in our children, which is very important; but only God can make them grow. (1 Corinthians 3:6)
I would love to see pictures of your Prayer Closets!
Blessings,
Sarah
Links:
Comments