Family Worship

Mondays at Mercy Home are admin days. As you may imagine, running a children’s home, primary school, and a church require a lot of admin, which we are usually behind on. So every Monday, we dedicate most of the day to getting caught up on our admin duties. Last Monday around 2pm, while I was working at my desk, my 6 year-old Reed interrupted me to ask, “Are we doing Bible study tonight?” A couple hours later, my 7 year-old Aspen also interrupted my work to ask, “Are we doing Bible study tonight?” What a great feeling for a father! What a great problem to have, to be interrupted during some mundane admin tasks to be asked anxiously by your children if that day is a family worship day. We have made a commitment as a family to have family worship every day with the exception of Sundays, as we have two worship services on Sundays at church. So the rest of the week, we have a time of family worship for the entire Mercy Home family, then about an hour later, we have a Bys family worship.

Regretfully, this is not something we have always made a priority in my nearly 30 years of being a father. But I can assure you that I have never regretted a single minute that we have worshipped together at home as a family. Let me give you a couple reasons why:

1. Scripture requires family worship. God requires heads of households to lead their families to serve Him.

   “And if it is evil in your eyes to serve the Lord, choose this day whom you will serve, whether the gods your fathers served in the region beyond the River, or the gods of the Amorites in whose land you dwell. But as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord.” (Joshua 24:15)

   Just listen to the example of Cornelius:

   It was said of him that he was “a devout man who feared God with all his household, gave alms generously to the people, and prayed continually to God.” (Acts 10:2)

   What Christian father or mother doesn’t desire to fear God with all their family? What an incredible blessing. But I think there can be little doubt that for it to happen, the head of household must make bringing their children up “in the discipline and instruction of the Lord “ (Eph. 6:4) a top priority.

2. Our families need to hear the Gospel preached every day. I love how Jerry Bridges, in several of his books, has written about the importance of the daily practice of preaching the Gospel to yourself. He has said, “When you set yourself to seriously pursue holiness, you will begin to realize what an awful sinner you are. And if you are not firmly rooted in the gospel and have not learned to preach it to yourself every day, you will soon become discouraged and will slack off in your pursuit of holiness.” I like this summary he has given of what it means to put preaching the Gospel to yourself in practice: “To preach the gospel to yourself, then, means that you continually face up to your own sinfulness and then flee to Jesus through faith in His shed blood and righteous life. It means that you appropriate, again by faith, the fact that Jesus fully satisfied the law of God, that He is your propitiation, and that God’s holy wrath is no longer directed toward you.”

   If it is important for the adults of the family to preach the Gospel to themselves every day, then certainly it is important to preach the Gospel to the rest of your family every day. The Gospel is “the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes” (Rom. 1:16) The preaching of the Gospel, together with the work of the Holy Spirit, is the usual means God uses to save sinners.

For those who may find it helpful, here are a few practical tips to family worship. First, plan a regular time that will work for your family’s schedule, and do everything in your power to not allow things to derail your plan. It can be easy to allow excuses to get in the way, so resolve now not to let them. Second, when you fail, and skip a day, a week, a month, or whatever, forget about it and press on. Most of us allow life to get the best of us, or go through seasons that throw us for a loop. Don’t give in to guilt, but rather start afresh. Third, remember your family wants to worship together. Even if at first it seems like they don’t. Fourth, remember that you are the head of the household, and that children are to “obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right. ‘Honor your father and mother’ (this is the first commandment with a promise)” (Eph. 6:1-2). Even if at first, your children think they don’t want a time of daily family worship, you’re the parent, it’s up to you to do what is best for your family.

If you are looking for some good resources for family worship, I recommend Little Pilgrim's Theology. This is what we use for our Mercy Home family worship. I also recommend A Guide to Family Worship. This is what we use for our Bys family worship. It has a Scripture reading, hymn, catechism, reading from the Second London Confession of Faith, and prayer for each day of the month. What we love about both these resources is that not only are they doctrinally sound, but everything is done and ready for you to use, no prep time needed!