After hearing about the Kitchen Table Project, a group of mums and dads decided to meet together once a month to pray for their children and their schools. This is how one mum feels it has impacted her and her family:

A few months ago I was on the school playground collecting my children from school, when another mum approached me and asked me if I would like to meet together regularly to pray for our children and their schools. She said that she’d asked a number of other parents to meet at her house the following Friday, for an hour after the school run.

I’d love to say that I immediately jumped at the chance, but I didn’t. To be honest, it was a little daunting – I didn’t know all the other parents and as a busy mum working part-time, Friday morning is a precious time to catch up on all the chores. But I did want to pray for my children and because I don’t always find that easy to do, I thought this might help me. I agreed to go along and I’m so glad I did. That single hour, once a month, has really supported me and impacted our family life in so many ways.

It has not only helped me to be more intentional in praying for my children with the group and on my own, but it has allowed me to build relationships with other mums and dads from different churches across our city. Being able to listen to other parents’ highs and lows and to share ideas with each other has really helped me to realise that I am not the only one to find parenting challenging at times.

And it hasn’t just helped me to pray for my children. It has also encouraged me to pray with my children in ways that they find fun and enjoyable. Many mums and dads bring their pre-school children along, and as we have prayed openly in front of them, while they play and sometimes join in, I’ve been challenged to make my prayer life more visible to my children too.

Recently, it happened to be that we were due to meet to pray in the school holidays. Rather than rearrange, we decided to bring our older children along to pray for their school. It really was the most incredible time.

We wanted to make the time really interactive and to find ways to engage all of our children, from toddlers to pre-teens. So we grabbed a load of toys and craft materials and began – letting the older children take the lead. Together, we built the school out of building blocks. Then we made teachers out of Play Doh and as the children placed each one inside the school, they prayed for them. They prayed their teachers would feel rested in the holidays with their families and that God would keep them safe and help them to learn new things to teach.

Then we used simple paper cut-outs of boys and girls to represent their friends. Some of the older children wrote their friends names and simple prayers on them, while the younger children simply enjoyed colouring them in. Then we placed them in the school with the teachers and prayed for each one.

Finally, the children thought about the things they’d like to see in their school and wrote and drew them on Post-It notes, which they stuck to the outside of the school. Some of the things they wanted to see were good friendships, joy, fun and the opportunity to tell their friends about Jesus. It really was a powerful time and allowed us as parents not only to see some of our children’s internal prayers written and drawn, but it allowed us the opportunity to pray with them in an amazingly fun way. One of the four-year-olds asked her mum if she could come to pray with us every time because it was so much fun and a 10-year-old told her dad that she didn’t realise prayer could be so much more than just talking out loud or in her head.

And this all started by one mum being brave enough to ask other parents to come alongside her and pray. As parents, it really does help to know that we are in this together!