The Street Boy's Prayer
Illustration★★A little street boy was brought into a mission in a slum district in New York City. A slum district is the part of the city where very poor people live. The children have no place to play but in the street.
Someone saw this little boy playing there and took him to the mission. One of the missionaries tried to teach him how to pray. He never had prayed. She began to teach him to say, “Now I lay me down to sleep.”
He learned it all until he came to, “I pray the Lord my soul to keep.” Every time she repeated that to him, he would say, “I pray the Lord my clothes to keep.” She could not make him say it in any other way. Every time he would say, “I pray the Lord my clothes to keep.”
The missionary finally said, “Why do you not use the words I tell you? Why do you keep saying, ‘clothes’ instead of ‘soul,’ as I ask you to?” He replied, “Why, so my clothes won’t be pawned. Sometimes papa and mamma haven’t any money and they want some beer or liquor to drink and they put our clothes in the pawn shop and get some money, and we have to stay in the house till some time when they get some money and get back our clothes.”
Question 1 Expand this illustration. In rewriting it give the details that will make the incident more real and easier understood for the children. Write it so that the story will have a stronger appeal for them because they will understand it better. Question 2 What lesson or lessons would you draw from the incident (1) to tell to younger children, (2) to tell to older children?
The following five illustrations are complete stories, all ready for telling to children.
The point
A slum boy substitutes 'clothes' for 'soul' in his bedtime prayer, revealing his family's desperate poverty and pawned belongings.