When an unbeliever enters a church where the word of God is being clearly proclaimed and where there is decent and orderly worship being offered, “he will fall down on his face and worship God, declaring that God is certainly among you.” In the same way, when family worship is faithfully practiced in the home it will promote a sense of God’s presence in that house.

Having considered the decline of family worship (Part 1) and some biblical support for its practice (Part 2), we look now at some positive benefits, which in turn supply another argument for its restoration. As Paul instructs us in 1 Corinthians 10:31, “Whether we eat, drink, or whatever we do, we’re to do all to the glory of God.” However, we need not view God’s glory and our benefit as mutually exclusive. I believe there are a number of benefits and blessings that result from the practice of family worship. Even if there were no passages of Scripture to support the practice directly or indirectly, the potential of these blessings would certainly commend it.
The Eternal Good of Each Family Member
When the apostle Paul wants Christians to know that he’s concerned for their eternal welfare, he often uses the analogy of a parent’s love for a child.
But we proved to be gentle among you, as a nursing mother tenderly cares for her own children. Having so fond an affection for you, we were well-pleased to impart to you not only the gospel of God but also our own lives, because you had become very dear to us…. You are witnesses, and so is God, how devoutly and uprightly and blamelessly we behaved toward you believers; just as you know how we were exhorting and encouraging and imploring each one of you as a father would his own children (1 Thess. 2:7-11).
My children, with whom I am again in labor until Christ is formed in you (Gal. 4:19).
Paul longed for the spiritual good of his spiritual children. And he knew that he could best promote their eternal welfare by faithfully preaching to them the gospel of Christ. In the same way, parents, one of the best ways that you can promote the salvation of your children is to teach and preach the gospel to them. To take some time on a regular basis and instruct them in the word of God, just as Paul did his spiritual children.
Someone may object, “Life is too busy for family worship. We have too many irons in the fire and not enough time for family altar.”
My answer: You need to seriously consider what you may “give-up” in order to make time for family worship. Once again, the apostle Paul is a good parental example. As a loving spiritual father, Paul was willing to endure much hardship and to give up many Christian liberties so that he might do what was necessary to secure the salvation of his children! Note his example:
What then is my reward? That, when I preach the gospel, I may offer the gospel without charge, so as not to make full use of my right in the gospel. For though I am free from all men, I have made myself a slave to all, so that I may win more…. To the weak I became weak, that I might win the weak; I have become all things to all men, so that I may by all means save some (1 Cor. 9:18-19, 22).
Fathers and mothers, how far are you willing to go in order to secure the salvation of your children? Are you willing to give up some of your liberties and hobbies in order to insure that family worship is practiced in your home? Are you willing to make family worship a priority over television viewing? Are you willing to give greater priority to the spiritual training of your children than to golf, or shopping, or yard work, or sewing?
The mark of a godly parent is a commitment to make personal rights and convenience subservient to the salvation of the child’s soul. Mom and Dad, are you truly committed to seek the eternal good of your child’s soul? If so, how then can you deprive them of the benefit and advantage of family worship?
I conclude this point with the appeal of Philip Doddridge. In a sermon entitled, “The Important Subject of Family Religion,” he appeals to parents:
Let me entreat you, then, my dear friend, to look on your children the very next time you see them, and ask your own heart how you can answer to God and to them that you deprive them of such advantages as [family worship] …. For what is prosperity in life without the knowledge, fear, and love of God?… It is, with respect to the eternal world, the greatest cruelty to your children to neglect giving them those advantages [of family worship] which no other attentions in education, exclusive of these, can afford; and it is impossible that you would ever be able to give them any other equivalent.
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This case provides a teachable moment for prospective students and their parents as they consider enrolling at a public educational institution in a day and age where Christian beliefs are more counter-cultural than ever.

Maggie DeJong, in her third year of a master’s program for art therapy counseling at Southern Illinois University (SIU), was shocked recently to receive official emails from the school’s administration ordering her to have “no contact” with three other graduate students in her program, either on or off campus.
What was this Christian student guilty of? What would prompt the university to issue the educational equivalent of a restraining order against her?
According to her attorneys with Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF), the only thing DeJong was told in emails from the university is that “upon information and belief that interactions between yourself [and the other students] would not be welcome or appropriate at this time.”
DeJong was given no prior notice of the complaints against her nor was she given an opportunity to defend herself against whatever accusations have been lodged against her.
In an interview with The Daily Citizen, Tyson Langhofer, ADF Senior Counsel and Director of the Center for Academic Freedom, told us that Maggie has been singled out at times by her professors and fellow students for criticism of her Christian beliefs, even telling her that her beliefs are wrong, insensitive and contrary to the values of the program in which she is enrolled.
For example, Langhofer said, Maggie at one point was texting back and forth with another student who asked her about her beliefs. Maggie informed her that her personal beliefs are grounded in objective truth by the gospel of Jesus Christ. The conversation was friendly and conversational. Yet Maggie’s exact text ended up on a piece of art in a common area at the school entitled “The crushing weight of micro-aggressions.”
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Surgery unshackled me from my body’s urges, but the destruction of my gonads introduced a different type of bondage. From the day of my surgery, I became a medical patient and will remain one for the rest of my life. I must choose between the risks of taking exogenous estrogen, which include venous thromboembolism and stroke, or the risks of taking nothing, which includes degeneration of bone health. In either case, my risk of dementia is higher, a side effect of eschewing testosterone.

When I was 19, I had surgery for sex reassignment, or what is now called gender affirmation surgery. The callow young man who was obsessed with transitioning to womanhood could not have imagined reaching middle age. But now I’m closer to 50, keeping a watchful eye on my 401(k), and dieting and exercising in the hope that I’ll have a healthy retirement.
In terms of my priorities and interests today, that younger incarnation of myself might as well have been a different person — yet that was the person who committed me to a lifetime set apart from my peers.
There is much debate today about transgender treatment, especially for young people. Others might feel differently about their choices, but I know now that I wasn’t old enough to make that decision. Given the strong cultural forces today casting a benign light on these matters, I thought it might be helpful for young people, and their parents, to hear what I wish I had known.
I once believed that I would be more successful finding love as a woman than as a man, but in truth, few straight men are interested in having a physical relationship with a person who was born the same sex as them. In high school, when I experienced crushes on my male classmates, I believed that the only way those feelings could be requited was if I altered my body.
It turned out that several of those crushes were also gay. If I had confessed my interest, what might have developed? Alas, the rampant homophobia in my school during the AIDS crisis smothered any such notions. Today, I have resigned myself to never finding a partner. That’s tough to admit, but it’s the healthiest thing I can do.
As a teenager, I was repelled by the thought of having biological children, but in my vision of the adult future, I imagined marrying a man and adopting a child. It was easy to sacrifice my ability to reproduce in pursuit of fulfilling my dream. Years later, I was surprised by the pangs I felt as my friends and younger sister started families of their own.
The sacrifices I made seemed irrelevant to the teenager I was: someone with gender dysphoria, yes, but also anxiety and depression. The most severe cause of dread came from my own body. I was not prepared for puberty, nor for the strong sexual drive typical for my age and sex.
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