When our family gets together, one of our favorite traditions is a time of blessing and prayer. This dates back to when our children were young—and it still carries on today.
When one of our three children exemplified a positive attitude, did his or her best in school, played well in a game, helped someone, or demonstrated another Christ-like quality, we honored that child. I put a special plate called “The Red Plate” at his or her seat for dinner. After dinner we each blessed that individual by sharing three things we appreciated about him or her.
Today our children are married and living in other states. They are starting their own Red Plate traditions with their families. But no one wants to miss out on our years-long tradition when we are together, so The Red Plate lives on for birthdays, graduations, or anniversaries.
Often people don’t hear words of affirmation or blessing from their family members. This is an excellent way to build blessing into the fabric of our family. We keep the focus on internal qualities such as generosity, loyalty, integrity, joy, wisdom, or hard work. We avoid comments relating to “externals” such as a person’s hairstyle or clothing.
After everyone shares, we take prayer requests from the celebrated family member. Often the prayer requests center around decisions, jobs, personal struggles, finances, marriage, unsaved friends, or a request for God’s favor. Each individual or husband/wife team receives a prayer request. Then we gather around The Red Plate recipient(s) and lay hands on them. Each family member prays out loud for one of the requests.
As a family, the blessings we’ve experienced from praying together are enormous. Praying as a family does these things:
- Creates spiritual “oneness” and a bond. As family members we bring prayer requests to God together. We’re praying for the same results. We are unified in prayer.
- Increases our intimacy with God and each other. Our family knows each other’s hopes and challenges. For weeks or months, we continue to pray for each other even when we’re not together. We ask about those prayer requests and stay connected spiritually.
- Allows us to experience God’s answers to our prayers. As a family we’ve celebrated answered prayers while demonstrating faith and trust in God when His response isn’t the one we originally desired.
- Establishes a foundation for spiritually training the next generation. Our desire is that as our family witnesses the power of prayer, we grow closer to each other and to Jesus Christ.
HEIDI MITCHELL and her husband Brad are the founders of Build Your Marriage.
