Deuteronomy 34 presents us with a picture of Moses as a tired parent. He has just preached his heart out to God’s children. It’s the end of a long day, and a long life and ministry. The Lord takes him up on Mount Nebo and shows him the promised land that he spent his days preparing the children of Israel to inhabit (and which Moses himself won’t enter). And on that mountain, Moses dies.
With that (depressing) scene in mind, let’s talk about family worship.
Moses speaks to parents on the plains of Moab. His wisdom plays well in our modern households today. Parents who know and worship God naturally want to help their children know and worship God. It’s part of having found great treasure: You naturally want to share it with the people you love most.
Yet leading family worship can be a trial. Some of our most discouraging moments parenting our children are tied to our most sincere attempts to love and serve them by gathering for family worship. When our plans and expectations meet our children’s squirminess and silliness (which they’re accustomed to do), we lose heart. Then there are those times when we’re tired of trying and coming up short, or we’re exhausted at the end of a long day, and the thought of getting organized for family worship time on a Thursday night feels like a burden, not a blessing.
In my experience, family worship tends to get stuck in two equal and opposite ditches, both of which were familiar to Moses. If we’re able to recognize them, we can find perspective and strength to persevere in this worthwhile task.
Where We Get Stuck
On one side of the road, the ditch is when parents imagine family worship as a seminary seminar over supper. While we may not attach that specific label to family worship, it does get after what we want. We long to help our children find depth of knowledge and formation of character through a robust time of Bible reading and reflection. But it takes just a little silly business or grandstanding from our kids and things fall apart.
Family worship tends to get stuck in two equal and opposite ditches, both of which were familiar to Moses.
I like to think most Christian parents know something of the following: The parent-professor throws his or her hands up in frustration, the lecture goes off-script, the little learners get the wrong message, and it feels like we’re all further from God for trying to draw near to him.
On the other side, the ditch we fall into is the approach of all spontaneity with no formality. We keep family worship “organic.” We talk about God when it naturally comes up. This ditch is often a consequence of the first. Families don’t start to organize anything for family worship because the imagined bar is too high.
If the first family meeting risks the error of the faith being something forced on the child, this version of discipleship-by-osmosis risks teaching the child that the faith is of little urgency or consequence. At least the first meeting demonstrates intentionality; this one implicitly teaches that talking about God isn’t that big of a deal.
The ditch of ambition loves depth, and the organic ditch loves authenticity. I’ve gotten stuck in both across different seasons of life, family, ministry, and work. But as we’ll see, Deuteronomy commands both halves at once: fixed words on the heart and as-you-go occasions—when you sit, walk, lie down, and rise. Form married to freedom.
Moses offers tired parents today the piece we’re missing. The family that quits family worship and the family that never starts make opposite mistakes about the same command.
Wisdom from a Tired Parent
Sometimes we get to the end of a day and feel like we’re crumpled, wrung out, and ready to be left alone. Moses had been through a lot. In the course of his life, he survived being hidden in a basket on the Nile River, 40 years as a shepherd in Midian, leading the Israelites out of slavery through the parting of the Red Sea, and guiding the people through 40 years of wandering in the wilderness while dealing with their constant rebellion. That’s a long life.
In his parting message to God’s children, he speaks as one offering wisdom from a nearly unbelievable range of experiences. His attention naturally goes to parents, and he helps them keep it simple:
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. (Deut. 6:4–9)
Moses emphasizes a structured form of freedom with discipleship. He teaches the importance of the rhythm of repetition and instruction for the whole of life. His words aren’t aimed only at teaching what’s true but at forming them to love what’s true.
His words aren’t aimed only at teaching what’s true but at forming them to love what’s true.
Moses’s words are simple instructions for how to get the conversations about God started with your children. And, beautifully, it’s all grace to them.
In Deuteronomy 6:10–12, Israel is told to eat before they’re told to teach. The very land Israel lives in is all gift from God. Family worship is also receiving before it’s ever producing. Most reflections on Deuteronomy 6 are law-shaped, but grace is our abundant supply. The Son of God, Jesus Christ, kept the Shema—the harvest is secured in him; we sow received seed.
This emphasis on training children in truth is later picked up by the apostle Paul near the end of Romans: “Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind” (Rom. 12:2). Paul’s warns that the world will fit you into its mold unless you’re remade in Truth. Paul cautions against being conformed, passively shaped by the culture we live in.
In Colossians, Paul presses the same point in a different way: “See to it that no one takes you captive by philosophy and empty deceit” (Col. 2:8). Family worship isn’t just a form of discipleship in what’s true but a specific form of counter-discipleship where we set up what’s true over against what’s false. My friend Trevin Wax and I just published a children’s catechism that seeks to carry on this great tradition into a new generation.
Start the Conversation
Moses preached the greatest sermon on parenting and never got to parent in the promised land. His words go where he cannot. Family worship is handing on what you yourself cannot carry. One day we too will give our final instructions to our own children. Let’s be sure gospel conversations are part of the legacy they’ll remember us by.
We have a 13-year-old and a 10-year-old that God has entrusted to us, and we strive to emphasize both formality and freedom. On the formal side, we pray over them before school drop-off. We memorize Scripture as a family by rehearsing it in the morning and evening. The key for us in this season is walking through The Gospel Way Catechism for Kids. Spontaneously, we try to have conversations about God while we’re waiting in traffic, debriefing the day, fixing dinner, and tidying up at night. We intentionally pick the music while we drive to help focus us on who God is and what God does. We sing badly but we go for it together while weaving through the after-school errands. We try to live out the advice first given to parents in Moab while navigating life in modern America.
Parents, don’t give up. Trust the Lord and find ways to diligently teach your children while you sit, walk, go to sleep, and rise.
The Gospel Coalition