One of the burdens of every generation is to teach the next generation good manners. Parents, grandparents, aunts, uncles, teachers, and baby-sitters all join forces to help children learn to be polite, to do things like use a napkin at the table, hold doors open for others, and say ‘excuse me’ when appropriate. But perhaps the most foundational and obvious example of good manners is children learning to say ‘please’ when asking for something and ‘thank you’ when receiving it. ‘Please’ and ‘thank you’—two relatively small gestures that can make a big difference.

Our heavenly Father wants us, his spiritual children, to develop good manners as we grow-up in Christ. As we mature, by his power, God desires us to develop habits of communication with him that are proper, worshipful, and edifying. In fact, learning to say ‘please’ when asking for something and ‘thank you’ when receiving it may be at the top of his list.