Family worship is a biblical concept that flows from God’s call for parents to pass on the truth of the Gospel to the next generation (Discussion of the first chapter of Don Whitney’s book, Family Worship).
Intro
The “Gospel Shaped Home Podcast” is a family discipleship resource from Providence Baptist Church in Raleigh, North Carolina. It aims to equip you and your family to be on mission with God, to the end of the street and the ends of the earth.
Andy Owens
Thank you for joining us on this new podcast. I’m Andy Owens, the pastor of Family Discipleship, and I am with our very own Daniel Savage. Daniel, welcome.
Daniel Savage
Thank you, brother. It’s good to be here.
Andy
Glad you’re here, man. So, we’re going to, on this inaugural episode, we’re going to dive into chapter one of Donald Whitney’s helpful little book with a simple title, Family Worship. But before we do, I just wanted to ask you, Daniel, quickly, to tell me about your family and do you guys practice family worship?
Daniel
Yes. My family is my wife and I, Amy. We have three kids. They are 11, 9, and 7. They’re fifth, third, and first grade, so we’re sort of spanning elementary school right now, and we practice family worship. It has certainly looked different over the years and has taken different forms, but now that all three kids are in school, we’ve fallen into a rhythm where we do it in the morning. So, as the kids are eating breakfast around the breakfast table, getting ready for school, we’ll come down, eat breakfast, and while they’re eating breakfast, I’ll read some scripture and-
Andy
That’s because you eat breakfast at 5 AM, right?
Daniel
I do. I do eat breakfast at 5 AM.
Andy
Just thought our listeners would want to know that.
Daniel
Or before.
Andy
As soon as he wakes up, he eats a bowl of oatmeal.
Daniel
It’s essential. So we do that around the table. I read a brief passage of scripture, something out of what I read that morning and then ask them usually one simple question like, what does this teach us about God? And we talk about that and apply it and then pray together, and then they go on their way. Keep getting ready for school. What about you? What do you guys do?
Andy
Yeah. So, Erica and I, we have four kids. They are 5, 8, almost 11, and 12. We’ve done various things through the years. It’s kind of long been our goal to have family worship time every day. Rare have been the weeks that we’ve actually had family worship time every day. We do ours in the evenings, typically after dinner. Sometimes we do sermon discussion guide or we’ve gone through seasons of doing the Providence Reading Plan, with just whatever passage we’re on that day, we’ll do that. We’ve used other booklets, kind of family devotional guides, some that walked through portions of scripture, some that are more like key beliefs, Christian beliefs.
I think it’s just worth saying that our family worship times don’t always go smoothly. Right? Sometimes I get frustrated. Sometimes I get impatient. Sometimes I just don’t initiate. I don’t lead like I should. I think it’s important for our families to hear that and to hear that none of us get it right all the time. Right? For instance, have you ever not had family worship, or have you ever gotten angry at your kids during family worship?
Daniel
The answer to both of those questions is yes.
Andy
I knew you would say that.
Daniel
We have failed many times. We probably actually over the years failed to have it more times than we’ve succeeded. There’s been seasons when it was really difficult, where our kids were younger, or they were just in different phases, and they go to sleep at different times. There’s all sorts of factors that make this difficult. So there’s been seasons where we had a terrible record of how often we were doing it.
I think early on though, I was encouraged somewhere along the way, and I can’t remember where, but just to keep trying and when you fail, start again. If you go a week, or a month, without doing it, it doesn’t matter, just start again.
Andy
That’s right.
Daniel
And that’s really served us well, where we’ve picked up again, over and over again, even though there’s been days and weeks and seasons where we failed. We just kept at it, and now we’re seeing a measure of fruit from that.
Andy
That’s great. Praise the Lord.
Daniel
Yeah.
Andy
Okay. So, in chapter one, what Doctor Whitney does is he basically makes a case that, from beginning to end, the Bible assumes that fathers specifically, parents in general, will teach their children God’s truth. They will pass on the truth of God to the next generation, and he makes the case that the main avenue through which that happens is family worship. Right? Something that looks like the family sitting down to read the Bible together, to pray together, and to sing together.
So, one of the key passages is Deuteronomy 6:4-7. Daniel, you want to read it?
Daniel
I’m going to read it. Deuteronomy 6, starting in verse 4.
“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.”
So that’s a familiar passage, and I think a lot of people will read that and think, oh well, teaching my kids is just something that’s supposed to happen intermittently and when the opportunities arise.
What do you think about that, Andy? Is that what the passage is teaching?
Andy
Well, it certainly is teaching that parents can teach anytime. Unplanned opportunities are significant opportunities. Right? As you go, as you’re riding down the road and you come upon a topic, or you see something.
Daniel
Or when one kid steals a toy from another kid.
Andy
Those are prime opportunities to teach about God being generous and gracious and, yes, so, there’s lots of as-you-go moments, but the phrase, “You shall teach them diligently,” to your children, I think, at minimum, implies that we should have some sort of intentional, systematic plan for teaching our kids. And Doctor Whitney’s point is family worship is the best way for that to happen.
So, yes, it should happen all the time, but should also happen at set consistent times.
Daniel
Mm-hmm (affirmative). That’s good.
Andy
So, there’s several other key passages. Psalm 78:1-8 are some really key verses talking about fathers teaching the glorious deeds of the Lord to the next generation so that they should set their hope in God.
Ephesians 6, actually, this is worth noting, in Ephesians 5, before Paul tells fathers to train their children, he tells husbands to love their wives as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her so that he might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word.
And though I don’t want to spend too much time on this, I think it’s worth stating that though we often talk about the kids and the next generation, there’s also reality that husbands and wives can and should worship God together. Right? Would you agree?
Daniel
Yeah, absolutely. I think praying together, trying to read the word together, those are things that you don’t have to wait until you have kids to do. Those are things that-
Andy
You don’t have to stop doing once your kids leave the home.
Daniel
That’s right. Yeah. Those are things that can regularly encourage your faith and draw the two of you closer together.
Andy
That’s right. So, but the key text is Ephesians 6:4, Fathers, bring your children up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord. Right?
So, there’s this idea of regular training and regular nourishment or instruction and there’s a great quote by JC Ryle in his little booklet, The Duties of Parents, where he talks about children being like a narrow-necked vessel that you’re trying to pour some sort of liquid into. Right? You can’t pour it fast, or you’ll spill most of it. You have to pour it slow, drop by drop.
Or children are like a garden, right? We don’t go out and water the plants in our garden with a five-gallon bucket. We don’t dump a bunch of water on it at one time and say, “All right, there’s enough water for the next two weeks.” We, little by little, drop by drop, gentle watering is what makes plants grow.
How are kids like that? And how his family worship like that, Daniel?
Daniel
Well, I think that sort of thinking is the way we ought to be thinking about training our kids. That you don’t have to have this one dynamic conversation to teach your kids everything there is to know about God or even the gospel. As we’re trying to give our kids the gospel, family worship is the place to do that because it’s regular and intermittent and it gives you the opportunity to give the gospel in pieces and drips and drops and they don’t have the pressure of comprehending it all at one time, and you don’t have the pressure of explaining it all at one time.
The gospel is glorious and vast, and to be regularly dripping it into their lives is the way to give it to them.
Andy
Yeah. So that’s a good place to end this conversation is just how does the gospel, the good news of God’s saving grace and Jesus, come into this conversation and you’ve just said it’s a way to family worship as an opportunity to not in one big moment just dump the gospel on our kids but let them soak in the good news of God’s love and Christ day after day.
It’s also a really good way for us who believe, for husbands and wives and kids who’ve come to faith, to remember and meditate on the gospel, to celebrate it together in our homes, right? We are united in the faith and in the knowledge of the son of God.
As Paul says in Ephesians four, he tells Timothy in II Timothy 2 to remember Jesus Christ, offspring of David, risen from the dead, according to my gospel. And family worship is a great way for us to come together to celebrate what God has done in the gospel.
Daniel
Yeah. The last thing I’d add is the gospel is a healing balm in and a remedy for the aching hearts of dads and parents who have failed in this.
So there’s so much grace for us that our acceptance before God is not based on our performance in this one area but there is grace. And that grace not only gives us a balm for the past, but it gives us motivation to press into the future with boldness, to try to lead our families in this way.
Andy
That’s right. So if you’ve never led your family or you haven’t been leading your family lately, remember the gospel, take heart and teach your family the gospel, right?
Daniel
Press on.
Andy
Yeah. That’s great. Well, thank you guys for listening. We really hope this little conversation will help you show one another, your kids, and help you all delight in the greatness and worth of our God by worshiping him together.
So hope to see you next time. Thanks guys.
Outro
Thanks for listening to this episode of the “Gospel Shaped Home Podcast” produced by Providence Baptist Church of Raleigh, North Carolina. For more information and resources from Providence, visit us online at pray.org. If you enjoyed today’s episode, please consider subscribing and leaving a review on Apple Podcasts.