Created for Family Worship: Why?

There is no better way for you and I to center our homes upon Christ than to practice regular, consistent family worship in the home. Family worship. Hearing those two words for some of us brings back delightful memories from our childhood.

For others, perhaps it makes us break out in a sweat knowing that this is an area where we haven't been consistent and maybe the entire concept is new to you. Well, this is what we'll be learning about today and seeking to help and encourage you, whatever your reaction to those two words is. I'm Nathan W Bingham and this is the Friday edition of Renewing Your Mind as we conclude a few days featuring messages from Jason Holopoulos' brand new teaching series, Created for Worship.

Today is also the final day to request the complete 11 message series at renewingyourmind.org with a donation of any amount. So what is family worship and why would a Christian do it? Even how would we do it?

These are just some of the questions we'll answer today. Here's Reverend Holopoulos. We're going to transition here and we've looked at corporate worship underneath that sphere of all of life being worship, corporate worship. What I want to look at together here over these next minutes is family worship together.

It is, oh, something I'm passionate about because I've seen such incredible benefits from it. And it's something that the evangelical church, at least in the last couple hundred years, has lost sight of and has lost the practice of. And there's great detriment, I think, to our spiritual lives and to our life together as churches because of it.

And so I want to talk about that here with you over these next minutes together. Family worship. It may be a new concept to some of you. You probably can put things together and figure out what it means. But it just means gathering together with those that are in your house. Maybe it's mom, dad, and they're 2.5 kids. Or maybe it's mom and dad and one child. Or maybe it is you and your roommates.

Or maybe it is a husband and wife and Uncle Bob who lives in the attic. Whoever it is in that home, just gathering together for a few minutes, hopefully daily, to read the Word, to pray, and maybe even dare to sing together just for a few minutes each day. It has a wonderful effect upon our Christian lives. It has a wonderful effect upon the home. I want to challenge you as to why you should consider doing this and why it should be part of your daily practice in your home, even if it's something you haven't done and you're on the older end of the spectrum. Or if you're on the younger end of the spectrum and you live in a room with roommates, you can think, I'm not quite sure how they would feel about this.

I want to encourage you that this is a good thing to do. Two primary reasons why. One, we want to center our homes upon Christ. We want to center our homes upon Christ. I think this is something we think we are doing much more than we actually are when we're not practicing consistent, regular, family worship. We think, well, we're a Christian home. We are both Christians, and we love Christ. But that doesn't necessarily make it a Christian home. Two bankers living together doesn't make it a bank.

It's the commerce that goes on inside of the place that makes it a bank. And what is Christian above all else? It is to worship Christ, to center upon Christ. And there is no better way for you and I to center our homes upon Christ than to practice regular, consistent, family worship in the home.

We are to be, as Jonathan Edwards once said, a little church in our families, a little church. And what are churches filled of? They are filled with worship. It's a joy, it's a delight for the Christian to worship, and it should be a joy and a delight for the Christian family to gather together for worship. It's just a natural expression of living a life of worship to God.

We are seeking to do it everywhere we are, and we're at home a lot. And these are the people that we desperately love in this world, and we want to center our life together upon Christ. And family worship is the best way, I think, to do that. The second is, is it helps to pass on the faith.

I say this especially to you grandparents and to you parents in the room. There is nothing that more ably does this than family worship. Now, it's not a silver bullet that does it, but what we are doing is we're continually putting our family, especially our children, in the way of the means of grace. God works by His means, as we've discussed over the series. He works by His word, He works by prayer, and so we're just putting our family members in the way of the means of grace. This is one of the best ways to pass on the faith. When I think of passing on the faith, I think of Psalm 78 and Asaph's Psalm there. It is a wonderful Psalm. I just want to look at these verses with you here together and his focus and kind of think through this together, and how does family worship do this? What are we doing in family worship as we practice together?

And I think it's accomplishing what Asaph has in mind here in Psalm 78. He begins, and he says this, he says, "'Give ear, O my people, to my teaching. Incline your ears to the words of my mouth.

I will open my mouth in a parable. I will utter dark sayings from of old, things that we've heard and known, that our fathers have told us.'" What is it that he's beginning with? Well, he's beginning with, we want to preserve something. What is it that he wants to preserve? He wants to preserve what he has been told, what his fathers have told him, and what is it that his fathers have told him? He's going to go on and say, what they have told us is who God is and the mighty wonders that He has done. And then Asaph, for the rest of the Psalm, is going to recount God's did this and God did this and God did this.

What is he doing? He's trying to say it's important that we preserve history. And you say, well, I didn't like history in high school and bored out of my head in junior high with history. But as a Christian, we love history in this way as we think about it redemptively. He's saying, look, God has been at work and it is our God. And we want to recount all of these things that He has done. We want to preserve that. But he doesn't just want to preserve it. Notice what he goes on to say in verses four and five. We will not hide them from their children, but tell to the coming generation the glorious deeds of the Lord and His might and the wonders that He has done.

That he's saying, we don't want to just preserve it. We want to proclaim it. We want to proclaim this truth.

We want them to know these stories so that they know these stories are true. When you read the pages of Scripture, do you read it as true? Do you know that there really was a flood that Noah built an ark for? That David really did slay Goliath? That Daniel really did emerge from the lion's den? That Peter really did walk on the water? That Lazarus really was raised from the grave? That Christ Jesus truly was crucified? That he really did die? That he really was buried?

That he really was raised on the third day? See, we're proclaiming that. That's Asaph's concern. Let's preserve this truth and let's proclaim it.

Why? Well, that's what he goes on to the next, right? That we might pass it on. He says in verse five and six, he established a testimony in Jacob and appointed a law in Israel, which he commanded our fathers to teach to their children that the next generation might know them, the children yet unborn and arise and tell them to their children. And here's the key, so that they should set their hope in God and not forget the works of God, but keep his commandments. And that they should not be like their fathers, a stubborn and rebellious generation, a generation whose heart was not steadfast, whose spirit was not faithful to God. Isn't that the great hope that we have for our children and our grandchildren? That they would do this, that they would set their hope in God and not forget the works of God, but keep his commandments, that they would love him, that they would adore him, that they would serve him. We have to proclaim, we have to preserve this history and then proclaim it so that then they see themselves in the best sense of the word as actors in this story. We're actors in this great story.

Do you think of it that way? Remember the first church I served in North Carolina, I was over children and youth ministries, and there was a Sunday I went down to the five-year-old classroom, and there was a dear woman that taught that class for 40 years, and she was in her late 70s as she was teaching that class, continuing to teach it. Kids adored her. And I remember all the kids were sitting on the floor, and she asked the kids, she said, do you know the story of Eli and Samuel? And a little boy in the class raised his hand. His name was Sam. And Sam said, I know the story.

And her name was Miss Scarwood, and Miss Scarwood said, you know that story? He said, I do. And then he started to tell it. And I said, no, I don't.

I do. And then he started to tell it. And he told it for like 10 minutes. You know, the passage where Samuel is laying down, and Eli is in the other room sleeping, and Samuel hears, Samuel, Samuel. And he gets up and runs to Eli. Did you call me?

No. Goes and lays down. Samuel, Samuel. And he told the whole story for 10 minutes. And we were all enthralled, five-year-old. And Miss Scarwood said to him, she said, how do you know that story so well? And he said, it's about me.

Now, a little bit of a disconnect. But in another way, that's how you and I are to see the Scriptures. This is a story about me. It's a story about God sending his Son into this world to die for a sinner like me. This whole story is about redeeming me and redeeming you for his glory and his praise.

Do you see yourself as an actor in that story? And as we're teaching our children this, we're helping them to see that, look, you're part of this story. Believe in this God. It's your faith in this Christ. It's one of the best ways to pass on the faith is to practice family worship. It just consistently and constantly puts the story before our children.

They just keep encountering the grace of God in the Word. And as we pray with them, I know it sounds scary. It is scary to start something like this. If you are a husband and wife that have been married for 50 years and you're haven't done this, it's scary to think about it. It's scary to think about it with young children. It's scary to think about it with roommates. And yet it is the best way to center your home upon Christ, and it's the best way to put all of those that you are linked in life with just in the way of God's means of grace.

I think it's something we think we're doing a lot more of than we actually are when we don't just consistently have something like this. Let's talk about the what of family worship. What does it look like to practice family worship? Well, it just means gathering together to read, to pray, and to sing. That's all it is.

It's very, very simple. It's just gathering together a few minutes. We're just going to read the Scriptures.

We're just going to pray a short prayer, and we're going to dare to sing together just for a few minutes. It can take all of seven minutes. If you want to be an overachiever, you can go for 12 minutes, but it doesn't have to be long. It doesn't have to be in-depth. It doesn't have to be long.

It doesn't have to be in-depth. Say, well, this feels like you've added a weight. You've put something else upon me that, oh, this feels like legalism. No, it's not legalism. It's no more legalism than it is to go to corporate worship each week or for you to practice your private devotions day in and day out. It's a means of grace.

God ministers to you and I by His Word and prayer. And so we're just putting ourselves in the way of it. It's not meant to be a burden. I think what often happens is we will start up family worship. Maybe like me, where I was an overzealous young husband, I had some concept that we were supposed to do something like this.

And, you know, jumped in and we were going, if we're going to do it, we're going to do it. And scared the living bejeebers out of my wife. And it just turned into a train wreck early in marriage.

A lot of husbands, they get convinced that we should do this. And they think we're going to read through the whole book of Leviticus tonight. And then you're going to tell me how it affected you. No, don't start there. It's just slow. It's just simple.

Just read a little bit. You pray a little bit and you dare to sing a little bit. And listen, you miss a night. You miss two nights.

You miss three nights. You all of a sudden realize that you've missed a week. You're not restarting up the wheel.

This isn't some great kind of work. You're not restarting the engine. It's just you realize that you pick it right back up. It's a means of grace. It's a means of grace. And how God ministers to us and allows us to minister to those that are in our home with us together. It was a night that my family was gathered in worship. My son allows me to tell this story. And this is where it really pressed home to me just how a practicing family worship consistently and can open up doors that otherwise probably wouldn't be there.

We were sitting together as a family on a night, and my son was probably seven years old or so, eight years old maybe. And we were doing the account of the transfiguration. We're just reading through that passage. And as we read about Peter and James and John being on the mount with Christ as he was in his glory, I made a comment about, oh, won't it be wonderful when we are in heaven and we're looking upon the glory of Christ in heaven?

Something we'll talk about here and down the road together in this series together. And I was just talking about that. And I closed, and my son said, Dad, he said, if I'm in heaven, will I see Christ's glory? And I didn't miss it.

It was that two-letter word at the beginning of that question. And I said, son, what do you mean by if you are in heaven? And there was silence. It felt like silence that lasted forever, but it was probably only a minute.

And we all sat there. And he said, Dad, I don't know if I will be in heaven. Dad, I don't know if I will be in heaven. I said, son, why don't you know if you will be in heaven?

And again, felt like silence forever as we waited. He said, Dad, I have such mad thoughts and bad thoughts about people. I said, oh, son, don't you know that Christ's blood that was shed upon that cross, that it's sufficient to cover over all your bad thoughts and all your mad thoughts? Next morning, I was getting ready to go and work, and I was getting dressed. I was in our bedroom. We had this little hallway that goes to our bathroom, and my wife was getting ready in the bathroom. At the time, she homeschooled our two children, and Ethan came running into the room. And at the time, the iPad was the greatest invention ever in the history of mankind in his mind, and the games on it were the best thing ever. And I heard him go into the bathroom and asked my wife if he could play a game that morning on the iPad. And my wife is a rock. And she said, not until we've done school, and if you've done well in school. And I heard him. He's a little lawyer, still a little lawyer, and he began to plead with her in the bathroom.

Mom, can I please just play one game on the iPad before we go to school and start school? She is a rock, and she didn't budge. And she told them no, not until school was over. And he turned out of the bathroom, and he came storming down that hole. And I watched him as he came storming down the hole, and he just had tears running down his face.

And I knew my son well enough to know that this wasn't angry this time. There was something else going on, and so I sat on the bed, and I called him over to myself, and I picked him up, and I put him on my knee, and he laid his head on my shoulder. And I said, son, are you having mad thoughts and bad thoughts about your mother?

And he just started weeping. And he said, oh, yes, Dad. I said, do you remember what we talked about in family worship last night? Yes, Dad.

Christ's blood is more than sufficient to cover over all your mad thoughts and all your bad thoughts. Yes, Dad. Do you want to pray about that together? Yes, Dad. I think, could that moment have occurred apart from family worship?

Maybe. But I know it occurred because I was so afraid of the fact that I was going to die. But I know it occurred because we practiced family worship. I had insight into his heart that I didn't have before.

I understood my son in new ways that I didn't know before, just because we were consistently putting ourselves in the way of the Word of God. Now, look, at my house, it's a great week if we make it four nights a week. That's a good week. It's a fabulous week if we make it five or six nights a week. It's a bad week if it's one or two nights a week. If we don't beat ourselves up, it's, oh, it's a new week.

Let's try and do better this week. Just putting ourselves in the way of God's means of grace. Just taking a little time to read the Word, to pray the Word, and dare to sing. We are just putting ourselves in the way of God's means of grace. What a helpful way to simply describe family worship.

That was Jason Holopolis on this Friday edition of Renewing Your Mind. Today is the final day that we're featuring this brand new series. So if you'd like to go deeper, even on the topic of family worship with more how-to suggestions, request this 11-message series with your donation of any amount at renewingyourmind.org. The digital study guide will also help you reflect on each message and retain more of what you learned.

This offer ends at midnight, so visit renewingyourmind.org or call us at 800-435-4343. It's Reformation Month at Ligonier as we remember the work of the Lord during the Protestant Reformation and how God used Martin Luther in October of 1517 and the years that followed. So leading up to Reformation Day on October 31st, R.C. Sproul will introduce us to Luther and how his bold stand should encourage each of us to stand firm in our day. That's beginning Monday here on Renewing Your Mind. you