FAMILY WORSHIP | AdventAI

Pacific Press Publishing Company · Mountain View, California · Mar 28, 1906

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 32, No. 13.

FAMILY WORSHIP.

It matters not what societies and organizations there may be for the nurture and development of Christian life, there is nothing to take the place of the Christian home, and there is nothing in the home to take the place of family worship. Other things being equal, there is most of piety and strong character to be expected from that home in which God’s Word is read daily and prayer offered to God by the united household. Out of such homes go men and women to walk reverently and obediently before God, to do His will, and to serve Him in their generation.

If family worship were carried on in every home of a congregation, the church would be stronger and more hopeful, even without prayer-meeting, Sabbath-school, or Christian Endeavor, than it would be with these last three, but without family worship. This may seem a very sweeping statement, but if one will stop to consider what is involved, he will scarcely care to question it. The Bible would be read aloud in the presence of the members of all these families, including the children, every day, and prayer would be engaged in which would, necessarily, be much more personal than is possible in most public services. The house would be distinctly religious in its atmosphere, and children would be brought under religious influence as they would under no other circumstances.

But it would not be necessary to forego all the other services to which reference has been made. They would be all the more appreciated and the better sustained by reason of the influences of all these family altars, as would be all the other public services of the sanctuary. A community can be no better than its homes, and a church often lacks spirituality because its homes are deficient in divine grace. Where parents lead their children to serve God, the pastor can lead the community to follow Him.

But however good and pious the pastor may be, he is sure to be weak if the parents are not upholding his hands by piety at home, as Aaron and Hur upheld the hands of Moses.

If the people of this age want a revival, let them commence working for it and praying for it at home, with their children gathered about them in the exercises of family prayer. God blessed the house of Obed-edom while the Ark of the Covenant abode under their roof, and He will still bless the homes where He is loved and honored, as He can not bless “the families that call not upon His name.” The Jewish fathers were to hold the Passover service in their homes, and they were to explain to their children what they meant by the service, and out of that fact grew up the whole nation that was knit together as one great homogeneous people. If fathers would often explain to their children what is meant by the great services and sacraments of our evangelical faith, there would be more to follow Jesus Christ as the Lamb of God, who taketh away the sin of the world.

Many fathers excuse themselves from holding family worship by saying they are so hurried that they do not have time. There is certainly some time during the whole twenty-four hours of each day, when the entire family could be gathered together for five or ten minutes. Presumably it is just before breakfast or just after the evening meal. Let all assemble gravely for a little time. Let a passage of Scripture be read aloud by the father, or by the family alternately, or in unison, and then, kneeling down, let a short prayer be addressed to God, thanking Him for His mercies, and beseeching Him to continue protection, forgiveness, guidance, and grace, closing, if desirable, with the Lord’s Prayer in unison.

Such scenes as this, depicted, as we find it, in Burns’ “Cotter’s Saturday Night,” made Scotland great as a God-fearing people, or occurred because her people were to have been God-fearing. We must make a new effort to establish, or to reestablish, family worship in all our families. We can not afford to do without it in one single Christian home.—Herald and Presbyter.