One of the most precious parts of our parenting journey has been worshipping in church together with our children. To be honest, there were many years of training our children to sit in church that didn’t feel “precious.” But it has proved worth the investment… tenfold!
The “goal” of bringing our children into worship is not that they would fully understand everything that happens but that worshipping God with their family and the church family at large would become a part of the rhythm of their lives. Worshipping together as a family can make an impression on our children’s lives in countless ways beyond the content of the sermon.
As parents, we communicate value to our children in the experiences we choose to share with them. There are activities we participate in individually, or times we “divide and conquer” for the sake of survival! But the things we jealously guard to participate in together as a family communicates, “this really matters” to our children. What could be more valuable than a shared experience of worshipping God together?
At our church, the preschool and children’s ministry happens during the church hour. Therefore, in order to worship together as a family, we made it a part of our family rhythm to attend 2 service blocks – we volunteer in children’s ministry during one service, and attend worship together during another service. Double the family shared experiences! We serve together AND worship together!
We try to see family worship as not just attending church together but rather a part of the discipleship of our children we have been called to. As parents, we don’t get the “luxury” of unhindered worship without our children there to distract us. It’s not our private quiet time – it’s corporate worship!
We try to be intentional in involving our children in the worship service with us. They are required to participate in the songs and prayers. They each have a bible and journal and take notes during the sermon. We have created a tradition of ice-cream sundaes when we get home from church – and over ice-cream we all get out our journals and share what we learned. We have had many rich conversations during this time.
We have learned that it takes time to train, and most of what is gained by children joining parents in church is gleaned over time – we’ve had to have a long term perspective. We are preparing them for what we hope will be a life-time of church participation.
The benefits of worshipping together as a family are numerous, but I’ll share some of our favorites:
• Opens doors for conversations about spiritual topics.
• Children witnessing their parents singing praise to the Lord, praying, and listening to the teaching of God’s word.
• Children becoming familiar with the leadership of the church – the pastor, elders, worship leaders, and missionaries.
• Children learning the worship songs their parents sing.
• Discipleship opportunities for how to pay attention, engage and take notes in church.
• Children hearing testimonies of changed lives.
• The Gospel witness in observing communion and baptism.
• Seeing the church as multi-generational, not just their peers.
As for the concern about children being exposed to adult themes by being in church, we honestly welcome it. Our kids are going to be exposed to these things at some point, and how much better to be first introduced to them in the context of church and family instead of media, peers, or popular culture. We have had to do some explaining and answering questions, but were always glad to do so, and it has been a springboard for good conversations. By engaging our kids in these sensitive topics, we are communicating to them that they can come to us with these kinds of questions, and that the church is not afraid to address these issues either. In some ways, having the church introduce adult themes serves us as parents with an opportunity to engage with our children about sensitive topics in a natural way.
Our prayer is that observing and participating with us in corporate worship will have a life-long impact on our children, and will be a part of the kindling God uses to light of fire of genuine worship in their hearts.
{Here are a few practical notes on training children to participate in “big church.”}