We are nearly finished with two months worth of daily family worship. How are things going? I hope that whatever your answer—whether you have been faithfully gathering daily as a family, or it's been hit or miss—you have been blessed by the practice. If you haven’t decided to join us in this practice, I hope you will soon!

Remember, the goal is to take just a few minutes each day to gather as a family, pray, and read a short passage of Scripture. 

While there is plenty of biblical basis for this practice, if I had to narrow it down to one passage of Scripture, it would be Deuteronomy 6:4–9:

“Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God, the LORD is one.You shall love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might. 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. You shall bind them as a sign on your hand, and they shall be as frontlets between your eyes. You shall write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates.”

The principle we find at work in this passage is one of daily pointing our households to Christ. Corporate worship is one day out of every seven, but our faith is not reserved for Sundays. Do you see in the above passage how God connected this habitual conversation about Christ to our love of God? We don’t talk about Jesus in our homes merely because we have been commanded to. It isn’t even the fact that there are blessings associated with this practice. We talk about Jesus Christ (and indeed, the Triune God) because he is our Beloved. 

Among military families, when a parent is deployed and leaves small children behind, it is not unusual for the spouse who is left behind to engage in intentional discussion about the deployed family member. The children are shown pictures and reminded of what the deployed family member is like and how much he or she loves them. There are reminders of the child’s duty toward the parent—to pray and to send care packages. There is discussion about that day when the loved one will return and how much hope and anticipation is wrapped up in that day.

Our daily gathering as a family to pray, read God’s Word, and even discuss what the reading has taught us about God and our duty toward God are all ways that we encourage one another and build one another up. We remind one another that Christ is coming again and of our duty toward this One we love because he has first loved us.

I hope you are joyfully embracing this practice—not so you can comfort yourself that another spiritual box has been checked and not so Pastor Nathan or Pastor Matt can comfort or congratulate themselves that they have a wonderful congregation that does all the right things—but because you love God and you enjoy being in his presence in prayer and the Word. I know some days involve less joy than others, and there can be challenges for sure. But it is all so very worth it!

Your fellow servant of Christ,
Pastor Matt