Family Devotional Time

Over the past few weeks at home I have been looking for ways to implement more Bible time into our daily schedule. Usually our family does a nightly devo at bedtime with the children where we read a section out of a children’s Bible and then review the story with them with questions and songs. Daily family devotionals are so important to your family. If family devotionals are not a part of your schedule, I encourage you to use this time at home to begin implementing Bible time. For our family, bedtime seems to be the best time for our kids to listen and enjoy a Bible story, however you may find another time fits your schedule better. Here are some tips to make Bible time an enjoyable moment for the entire family:
1. Structure the devotional. How do you want to do your devotional each day. Is there memorization? Can you teach the story in an age-appropriate manner? Having a loose plan will make the devotional run smoothly, but also know being too rigid can lead to frustration.
2. Use a family devotional book as your guide. This will eliminate some of the stress of trying to plan everything you need to say. Family Bible study does not have to be difficult. Any time spent talking about God with your kids will be well worth your time. Make it fun.
3. Create silly methods for teaching. Use toys in the kid’s bedroom to act out the Bible lesson. Make funny voices for the characters in the lesson. Incorporate object lessons. Make it personal and make it your own.
4. End the Bible lesson with one main point and a prayer. This is the time we summarize the story into one key takeaway for our kiddos. Then we ask them what they are thankful for and what they want to give praise for. Their answers are always sweet, and we rotate who says the prayer.
“ we will tell the next generation the praiseworthy deeds of the Lord, his power, and the wonders he has done. So the next generation would know them, even the children yet to be born, and they in turn would tell their children.” Psalm 78: 4, 6.