A Powerful, Accidental Prayer

This morning, for the first time in weeks, I devoted some time to the Word. As I was finishing, I closed my Bible and something fell out. When I reached down to pick it up, I recognized it as the bookmark given to me on Mother's Day by my church. On it was a list of ways to pray for my children and for myself as their mother. One prayer hit me particularly hard:

And today, Lord, remind me to take the time to understand my children's perspectives before I speak. Remind me to be more playful with them.

You see, I call myself a Stay At Home Mom (SAHM), but in reality, recently, I've been more of a Stay At Home Housekeeper (SAH...H?). I do the laundry and dishes; I make and then clean up lunch; I cart the kids to and from different activities. But I don't play with them.

So that was my prayer this morning. Completely by accident, too. If that bookmark hadn't fallen out of my Bible, I would have merely prayed for the ability to accomplish more today than I did yesterday - to get the laundry off the couch!

And, apparently, the Lord had been waiting for this. Let me first explain that the past week and a half has been a very exhausting, frustrating time as Olivia and I adjust from vacation back into normalcy. In many ways, I feel as though we are starting from scratch with discipline and obedience. We have had more fights than smiles. However, today I had a fantastic time with Olivia. We played with blocks, she fed me dinner (over, and over, and over again, too), we counted, we colored, and she hugged me. Those who know Olivia know that she doesn't give those out freely.

And so I was blessed through a powerful, accidental prayer.