Chapter V continued.

Heaven and Hell were not the only concepts that my father taught.He also taught us that "Prayer" was "talking to God",and he taught us two different prayers.The first was a prayer we were to say before going to sleep,it was simple and easily remembered even for small kids.It was very familiar to most people at the time,and a good many included it in their religious rituals.Back then we would say it every night."Now I lay me down to sleep..." And it went on to mention dying before waking up.and God taking your soul.I never thought much about it at the time,but later I came to think of it as a prayer that could cause anxiety in children,so I never passed it along.This would be especially possible if your comprehension of Hell was keener that that of Heaven.But really,I don't recall ever being bothered by it back then.

Along with The Bedtime Prayer,we were taught The Lord's Prayer in it's entirety.This one part of scripture was either something my father knew well,or felt was very vital,or both,because he went through it line by line explaining what it meant."Daily bread" meant "Food and water"."Trespasses"were all the wrong things we did to others,or,all the wrong things they did to us.To "Forgive" meant "To forget",subject of course to certain conditions,and "Evil"was something bad like sickness,or an accident,or bad people who hurt or even killed other people."The Power And The Glory" was something that belonged to God,things that,translated from my father's telling meant roughly that God could do anything.

Forgiveness was a concept that was especially meaningful to my father.When he explained The Lord's Prayer to us,he would stress the part about forgiving trespasses.How he explained the concept was,again, very basic,but essentially complete.We should try very hard never to wrong others,but at times we would,and they,likewise,would do us wrong.When we hurt someone,we were called upon to be sorry for having done so,and to ask them to forgive us.And  we must also forgive anyone who had done us wrong,and who was sorry and asked to be forgiven.The only part that he seemed to have left out was the part about God forgiving us for the wrongs we'd done to Him.