Giving Momma Reasons to Pray

I hit the road outta high school with a guitar in my hand

I fell in love with the sound of a honky tonk band

Daddy looked me in the eye, said "

Son you're gonna throw your life away

You're just givin' mama reasons to pray"

I fell in love with a barmaid, I guess you live and learn

Oh, how I felt the whiskey burn

And all the while I was thinkin', "This ain't how I was raised"

But I kept givin' mama reasons to pray

Mama always believed in me

She knew the kind of man that I could be

But every time I'd get on track, the devil made me stray

And I'd be givin' mama reasons to pray

I held my mama's dyin' hand on a Tuesday afternoon

It was the coldest day that we ever had in June

She pulled me close and she whispered, the last thing I heard her say

Was "Son, stop givin' mama reasons to pray"

Mama always believed in me

She knew the kind of man that I could be

But every time I'd get on track, the devil made me stray

And I'd be givin' mama reasons to pray

Oh, I'm not givin' mama reasons to pray