A father kneels by his son's bed every night and prays. He never kicks a ball with him in the yard. By fifteen, the boy dreads the knock on his door.

Another father builds Lego towers with his daughter every Saturday. He never prays with her. She grows up with a fun dad and no sense that God hears her.

Both fathers love their children. Each one did half the job.

Christian parenting needs two things: play with them, and pray with them. One without the other will not work.

When a parent prays but never plays, the child hears a list of demands. Prayer starts to feel like a report card. As the child grows older, that feeling can turn into anger. Paul warns fathers about this.

"And you, fathers, do not provoke your children to wrath, but bring them up in the training and admonition of the Lord." Ephesians 6:4 (NKJV)

Paul puts the warning before the training. A provoked child stops listening, and then the training has nowhere to land.

When a parent plays but never prays, the child gets a friend and a warm home. The child also gets no reason to think about God. Nobody decides to raise a child for the world. It happens by default when the prayer is missing.

God has no problem with play. Zechariah describes the restored Jerusalem this way:

"The streets of the city shall be full of boys and girls playing in its streets." Zechariah 8:5 (NKJV)

In God's picture of a blessed city, children play in the streets.

So do both. Get on the floor for twenty minutes of the game they pick. Then pray with them before bed, in short sentences, about the things they told you during the game. The game gives you a way into their world. The prayer brings God into it.

Play shows them you are for them. Prayer shows them God is for them.