Family Worship

I tried something new tonight.

And it was awesome. In fact, I want it to be a new Young family tradition.

It's called "family worship."

It's a concept that was introduced to me by our pastor, Michael Felkins. He leads his "family worship" several times a week with his wife, teenage daughters, and 10-year-old boy.

Maybe you've heard of it before, but it was basically new to me. The idea is beautifully simple: worship God with your family. Crazy, right? Worship the Lord regularly, together, in your home (yes, you can worship outside of the church sanctuary), with no pastor, no worship leader, off-pitch voices and all. Exactly how this fleshes out will differ from family to family, but the concept doesn't change a bit.

 Here's how it looked for us tonight: We started with a worship song (tonight was "Praise You, Lord" by Anthem Band). Then we read Mark 1 out loud (we'll read another chapter of Mark every time we have "family worship"). After reading the chapter, we simply discussed any questions we had about the passage and what we learned from what we read. Finally, we closed by praying. I grabbed a copy of the Powerline, a weekly prayer bulletin our church puts out. Sam and I each prayed from something in the Powerline, as well as something not in the Powerline (I prayed for those impacted by natural disaster, and Sam prayed that our baby would follow the Lord).

I wanted to start "family worship" well before we have our baby for a couple of reasons: 1) It's just good for Sam and me to worship God together; 2) We can't expect to start a discipline like this once the craziness of a kid hits us. We have to get in the habit now. It might be an awkward hassle to get started, but I know it will be a rewarding discipline.

I believe the advantages of "family worship" are immeasurable. Most importantly, it glorifies God. It does this by centering my heart, Sam's heart, our marriage, our child's heart, and our family on the things of the Lord. I pray that God will give me the perseverance to continue this discipline for years to come and that He would use it to show my child how to unashamedly worship.

If you're married or want to be married, pray about what family worship might look like for you. Don't wait until you have a 5-year-old to start. Don't even wait until you have a spouse. Start now. Get in the habit. We'll learn together!

Finally, here are a couple of posts by Jason Helopoulos from "The Gospel Coalition" blog that gave me tons of theological and practical wisdom on how to lead this with my family. I positively, definitely, 10,000% encourage you to read, save, and share these two articles:

"11 Reasons to Worship with Your Family"

"The What, When, and How of Family Worship"