Prayer Sticks
As we continue through the Lenten season, we’ll continue to focus on prayer and mindfulness activities to help your family draw closer to each other and to the mystery of Easter. This week, incorporate a simple yet lovely new practice into your family’s prayer time: prayer sticks.
If your family doesn’t already set aside time to pray together, this is a great opportunity to start. You can choose where and when it happens, but try to be consistent once you’ve begun. Once family prayer becomes part of your lives, prayer sticks can help you think beyond your own needs and blessings in a tangible, sustainable, ever-expanding way.
All you need is a bunch of popsicle/craft sticks and two containers – jars, buckets, flower pots – whatever you have is fine. If you need craft sticks, contact us and we can provide you some from the Sunday School classroom’s vast supply!
On each stick, write the name of a person or a need. Try to open your hearts and expand your idea of the people and issues that are in need of and deserving of your prayers. You might include:
Each member of your family
Extended family and friends
Folks from church – those you see each week, or those we pray for during our community prayer time
Community, national, and world leaders
Groups of people in need – kids in foster care, people without homes, those who are lonely, people living in conflict zones like Ukraine
Issues that affect the world, like deforestation, gun violence, or cruelty to animals
Put the sticks in one of the containers with the writing at the bottom. Then have each person draw a stick each time you pray together. They’ll pray for that person or group or issue, then move the stick to the other container.
When you go through all the sticks, start over! You can even pull sticks from the “done” container and send up your thanks to God for hearing and answering your prayers. Feel free to add sticks whenever you’d like and watch this activity grow along with your family: as your little ones grow and their perspective widens, your prayer sticks will follow right along.
You can read more about prayer sticks at ibelieve.com. And please share your family’s prayers with us on Facebook, Twitter, or Instagram!
