The Power Of A Praying Parent (2014) - Plot & Excerpts
My feelings about this book are all over the place. While reading it, it's like you're a 49er panning for small tidbits of gold though murky, sandy water. I went into this book expecting it to be a lot like an Elizabeth George book, straightforward Christian guidance in prayer for your children. This book had some of that; there were nuggets of truth in there that I appreciated, but there were other times when my eyebrows almost made it to my hairline. Each chapter is about an area in which you can pray for your child. There are 31 chapters in this book and each chapter is only a few pages, so after each introductory blurb, there is a prayer and some Scripture for support. The prayers are nice and I could see myself perhaps referring to them at times during my son's life (he's not quite 2). However, reading the prayers was a major chore because Ms. Omartian felt the need to be politically correct and every time she would say something like, "Lord, please protect my son" she would feel the need to put "(daughter)" right next to it. So there was a lot of, he (she) him (her) son (daughter) going on. And not only this, but the political correctness stretched even further in the fact that she switched the pronouns around each prayer, so if masculine went first in the last chapter, feminine would go first in the present one. This really irritated me. There should never be that much unnecessary punctuation. Another editing issue: a lot of the chapters could have been condensed into one, since the topics and even the prayers, seemed to run together or were exactly the same.Also, there were times when the author made it sound like bad things in life only happened to other people's kids because their parents didn't prayerfully intercede for them. So, if there is a child out there who got hurt in a car accident, well, it's just a shame that your parents didn't think to pray for your protection. There was a lot of , "If you don't pray for your kids, x,y, and z horrible calamity will befall them". I also felt like Ms. Omartian was tooting her own horn a little bit. There were things that happened to her kids that could have been a lot worse, but they weren't because (guess why) she prayed for her kids. I felt like she was giving her prayer skills a pat on the back rather than letting God take all the glory. She also, apparently, wrote a song for a Christian singer and made an exercise video. There were also a few moments while reading this where I got kind of a Carrie's mom, "Go to your closet and pray" kind of vibe. (I'm sure that she would probably say I should never have watched Carrie and now I need to go and pray in my son's room so he doesn't have nightmares because of his mom's high school obsession with B horror flicks). I'm sorry, but I don't believe that the simple presence of a video game in my child's room would make him have sudden onset night terrors. (I also felt like her looking through his room while he wasn't there was an invasion of his privacy, but that never gets mentioned at all).If you choose to read this book, read it with a grain of salt and take whatever you find helpful for yourself from its pages. You may come to conclude after reading it that you are already a praying parent; many of these topics are general enough for most parents. With 2 teenage girls and a 10 year old boy at my house, problems and struggles abound. This book helps me feel better about their struggles and helping them work through them with the power of prayer."This beautiful edition gives parents a framework for praying for their children regularly. Packed with insights and specific prayers, parents will be comforted as they trust God for their children's safety, friends, decisions, and marriages."
What do You think about The Power Of A Praying Parent (2014)?
Love these prayers. They helped me to pray for things I hadn't dared to for my children. :-)
—Niaax5
Love the Scripture-based prayers ... the intro chapters, not so much.
—Trish
good book for ideas of how to pray daily for children
—hello_ohaha
Excellent book. Recommend to any new parent
—Rowlay
