Lesson 6: A Personal God Changes Your Prayers

A recent homework assignment was given to third graders that asked them to explain God. Following is the actual essay from an eight-year old boy.

 "One of God's main jobs is making people. He makes them to replace the ones that die, so there will be enough people to take care of things on earth. He does not make grownups, just babies. I think because they are smaller and easier to make. That way He does not have to take up His valuable time teaching them to talk and walk. He can just leave that to mothers and fathers.

 God's second most important job is listening to prayers. An awful lot of this goes on since some people, like preachers and things, pray at times besides bedtime. God does not have time to listen to the radio or TV because of this. Because He hears everything, there must be a terrible lot of noise in His ears, unless He has thought of a way to turn it off.

 God sees everything and hears everything and is everywhere, which keeps Him busy. So you should not go wasting His time by going over your Mom and Dad's head asking for something they said you could not have.

Atheists are people who do not believe in God. I do not think there are any in our town. At least there are not any who come to our Church.

Jesus is God's Son. He used to do all the hard work like walking on water and performing miracles and trying to teach the people who did not want to learn about God. They finally got tired of Him preaching to them and they crucified Him. But He was good and kind, like His Father, and He told His Father that they did not know what they were doing and to forgive them and God said okay.


 His Dad, God, appreciated everything that He had done and all His hard work on earth so He told Him He did not have to go out on the road anymore. He could stay in heaven. So He did. You can pray anytime you want, and they are sure to help you because they got it worked out so one of them is on duty all the time.

You should always go to Church on Sunday because it makes God happy and if there is anybody you want to make happy, it is God. Do not skip church to do something you think will be more fun like going to the beach. This is wrong. And besides the sun does not come out at the beach until noon anyway.

If you do not believe in God, besides being an atheist, you will be very lonely because your parents cannot go everywhere with you, like to camp, but God can. It is good to know He is around you when you are scared in the dark, or when you cannot swim and you get thrown into real deep water by big kids.

But...you should not just always think of what God can do for you. I figure God put me here and He can take me back anytime He pleases.

And that is why I believe in God."

* How would you explain God to an eight-year-old you know?