The term, "family worship" is being used a lot lately. I'm glad for that. I regularly hear of local churches (including my own) that are strongly encouraging moms and dads to lead their families in worship. This is, of course, nothing new. You can look at James Alexander's work, Thoughts on Family Worship, first published in 1847. Moreover Don Whitney in his booklet, Family Worship: In the Bible, in History, and in Your Home, argues that Christian families have always alloted time to Christian evangelism and discipleship within the home.
This should be no surprise to us since we have biblical evidence that God's people have always been instructed to raise up their children in the ways of the Lord. Consider Deuteronomy 6:6-7, "And these words that I command you today shall be on your heart. You shall teach them diligently to your children, and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, and when you walk by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise."
That passage in particular leads me to address one concern I have about the growing interest in family worship in the church today: We must not think of family worship as something that we can merely schedule in our homes. Though it is important, wise, and helpful to gather the family together sometime during the day for prayer, bible reading, singing, and biblical conversation, true family worship extends beyond that time and into the warp and woof of a family's entire life. That appears to be the point of Deuteronomy 6:6-7.
So avoid thinking of family worship as an event. Think of it instead as a lifestyle. Family worship is the deliberate, consistent, and careful evangelizing and discipling of the family.
To say it is "deliberate" is to say that family worship does not happen accidentally. It requires planning, preparation, and intentionality. This is especially true of those times that you may schedule. What will the family read together? What prayer requests will you work through? What particular questions might members of the family have that need to be addressed? All that requires deliberate preparation.
To say family worship is "consistent" implies that mom and/or dad are always working on it. They are making plans and executing them. Children are formed more by patterns than they are by points. One point in time, one conversation, can be really helpful. But many points form a pattern and are more likely to have a long-lasting effect. Having a consistent, scheduled time of family worship is great. But consistently taking advantage of every opportunity to turn conversations to the Lord is even better.
To say family worship is "careful" is to say that theology matters (1 Tim. 4:16). Kids need solid answers from parents who are careful to look for those answers in Scripture, good Christian books, and from friends and even pastors at church. But kids need more than parents who are careful to shower them with good theology, they also need parents who are careful to shower them with love (1 John 4:7-12). We don't create a culture of family worship in our home simply to raise excellent kids who will be good models in the neighborhood, we do so because we love God and we love our kids--and one way we show our love for them is by carefully pointing them to Christ. Think of it this way: our kids need good theology but they also need warm hugs.
The reason we are deliberate, consistent, and careful is because we want to see our children evangelized and discipled. Our kids may or may not be Christians. Time will tell. In the meantime we should be sharing the gospel with them every day. The youngest child can truly repent and believe. It may be hard to discern if their repentance is genuine, but praise God that it is our job to faithfully share the gospel with them again and again and to repeatedly call them to repentance and faith. Salvation belongs to the Lord. Every child is different, every circumstance is unique, but I think it is a good rule of thumb to pursue baptism for a professing believer when he or she is at or on the cusp of adulthood.
Furthermore, we want to create a discipling culture in our home where it is normal and natural to talk about the Lord. This includes modeling for our family a rightly prioritized life. When it comes to the gatherings at church, would your kids see in your attitude that meeting with the church body is something you have to do or something you get to do? When it comes to hospitality, is your home merely a place of refuge from work, or is it a place of ministry for the sake of others? When it comes to your own interaction with family (parents, grandparents) do your children see you honoring them? Consider that how you treat your parents is a key indicator of how your children will one day treat you! Finally, what is the culture of your home? Again, is it normal and natural to talk about Jesus?
I am so thankful for what I see as a renewed emphasis being placed upon family ministry in the church and family worship in the home. Nonetheless, I pray that we never boil it down to ten minutes on the couch after dinner. May family worship in our homes be that, but may it be so much more. May it be the deliberate, consistent, and careful evangelizing and discipling of the family.
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