Two Tips #2
4 Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God, the LORD is one. 5 You shall love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might. 6 And these words that I command you today shall be on your heart. 7 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. 8 You shall bind them as a sign on your hand, and they shall be as frontlets between your eyes. 9 You shall write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates. –Deuteronomy 6:4-9
Leading our families in worship can be intimidating. But the reward is worth the effort. Deuteronomy 6:4-9 connects the way we teach our children to our own love for God. It also instructs us to weave our teaching into our lives, so that it infuses whatever we’re doing, whether we’re sitting, walking, or lying down. The instruction to write God’s instructions on doorposts and gates is an encouragement to be intentional about reminding ourselves and our families of God’s instructions. Each month, we provide you with two tips for developing your personal and family discipleship from dads who, like you, are taking on the challenge of investing spiritually in their families.
Tip #1 for Personal Devotion
Follow a Bible reading plan
As the saying goes, failing to plan is planning to fail. That can be just as true for our personal devotions as in other areas of our lives. Among the many helpful resources provided by Ligonier Ministries is a roundup of Bible reading plans. The time commitments vary from a single psalm a day to multiple chapters from across the Bible. If you haven’t done a Bible reading plan before, this plan, which goes through the gospel of Matthew with comments from renowned theologian R.C. Sproul, would be a great place to start.
Tip #2 for Family Discipleship
Do a weekly one-on-one breakfast with your kids
I carve out 10–20 minutes a week for a one-on-one breakfast with both of my kids once a week. In it, we go through the New City Catechism. Here is a short video. This is super easy and can be as much or as little as you want it to be. I will write the catechisms on a notecard, and our kids memorize them pretty easily.
Do: Keep this one-on-one time. The regularity of the time is just as important as the time itself. Even if you can only find time for this once a month, it will make a huge impact on your kids. It's amazing what questions my kids come up with when they don’t have a sibling in the room. These 1:1 moments are a really great way to have deeper conversations about worldview issues. Also, focus on the catechisms; they are a powerful way of conveying biblical truths.
Don’t: Don’t feel like you have to do everything in each lesson. You can't. It will be overwhelming. Make it your own, and keep it to ten minutes or so. I made the mistake of trying to do everything and it failed miserably.
