Family worship time ideas

The writers of the Westminster Confession of Faith really loved to worship God. They wrote: “God is to be worshiped everywhere, in spirit and in truth; as, in private families daily, and in secret, each one by himself; so, more solemnly, in the public assemblies.” (WCF 21.6) Of those three spheres of worship (worshiping God privately, worshiping God with our families, and worshiping God publicly) the idea of a family worship time is the most challenging one for many people today.

The family worship time in our home could certainly be improved. But let me tell you what we do, in case you are looking for some ideas about how to start.... (By the way, I basically follow the same pattern that my dad did in our home when I was a kid. I say this so you will not think that this is a ‘pastor thing’. My dad was a mechanical engineer.)

After supper we take a few minutes to read from the Bible or from a book about the Christian life. We talk about it for a minute or two (or maybe 15 seconds). Then we pray.

As I said, there is a lot of room for improvement here. But I find that, when it comes to spiritual disciplines, it’s better to be consistent than brilliant. With the hectic busy-ness of modern life, this short time together as a family seems to be all we can do.

As the ages of our children have grown over the years, the material we use for family devotions has changed. Here are some books I would recommend:

“Training Hearts, Teaching Minds - Family Devotions Based on the Shorter Catechism” by Starr Meade (P&R Publishing) This book is well-written for a wide age range (probably good from 2nd grade through high school.) It gives a week of short readings to explain each question of the Westminster Shorter Catechism. (Note: Since there are 107 questions in the Shorter Catechism, you can use this for over two years without ever having to worry once about what to say in your family devotions and without having to spend money on another book!)

Another resource we all love is the “Hero Tales” Series by Dave & Neta Jackson (Overcomer Books). These give short biographical stories about great Christians from church history. The books are really well written. Unfortunately, they are not cheap and in our house we go through them pretty quickly.

Last night we finished reading through 1 & 2 Samuel in our family devotions. I think we were all glad to see it end. I think all the bloodshed and illicit sex and weird names were starting to get on our nerves.

Tonight I plan for us to start reading through Richard Wurmbrand’s autobiography. He was a pastor who faced arrest and torture behind the Iron Curtain. We’ll see how it goes.

I would love to hear from others about what you do in your family worship time.