Influence of Family Worship on Individual Piety (1)

From the moment when we first repeat the Lord’s Prayer, saying “Our Father,” we are taught that our religion is social. It not only influences others, but is exercised and enjoyed in common with others. What a monstrous thing it would be, for a man to spend a life-time in the midst of fellow beings, without ever feeling or acting towards them in a religious capacity! We can scarcely conceive of true light as so hidden under a bushel… Where the Spirit of God really operates on a soul, He brings it into fellowship with other renewed souls, and renders it a center of radiance to all around.

If this is true of the great body of men, it is more eminently true of the family-group. In religion “it is not good for man to be alone.” The experience of the heart is the grand thing, and this is best promoted in the secrecy of the closet: yet it must not, and cannot, abide in the closet or the heart; but will be like “the ointment of the right hand, which bewrayeth itself”; like the alabaster box of fragrance, that filleth all the house. Love, which is the great manifestation of grace, is too communicative in its nature to be always pent up. The electric current will pervade all whose hands are joined in the domestic circle. They will feel together, read God’s Word together, sing together, and pray together: and it is indispensable, that there should be some established mode of cherishing and evincing this fellowship of experience.

While we should all beware of that species of religion which has no privacy, and which lives only on the excitements and sympathies of social ordinances, we should not, therefore, overlook the legitimate influence of united prayer and praise. Single coals die out; when drawn together, they break into a flame. If the closet worship is more solemn and lowly, the family worship may be more elevated and affectionate. Especially where the head of the family is one who grows in grace and Christian knowledge, he will by his very presence lift up the hearts of his household. The child and the guest, will be carried up to higher advances of devout feeling, by one who has so far outstripped them in the flight.

Where the head of the family is one who grows in grace and Christian knowledge, he will by his very presence lift up the hearts of his household.

Summon a family to the worship of God, at stated hours, and you summon each one to a seriousness of reflection, of which he might have been wholly robbed, by the hurry of the day’s business. He who perhaps neglects all private perusal of the Scriptures, is constrained to hear a portion read by one whom he reveres. He who prays but formally, or prays not at all, in his chamber, finds himself in this sacred hour kneeling among a reverent company, and is prompted by the ardent words of supplication to lift up his heart unto the Lord.

There is no member of a household whose individual piety is of such importance to all the rest, as the father or head; and there is no one whose soul is so directly influenced by the exercise of domestic worship. Where the head of a family is lukewarm or worldly, he will send the chill through the whole house; and if any happy exception occur, and one and another surpass him in faithfulness, it will be in spite of his evil example. He who ought, by his instructions and life, to afford a perpetual incitement to his inferiors and his juniors, is made to feel, in case of such delinquency, that they must look elsewhere for guidance, even if they do not weep in secret places over his neglects. Where the head of the family is a man of faith, of affection, and of zeal, consecrating all his works and life to Christ, it is very rare to find all his household otherwise minded. Now one of the chief means of promoting such individual graces in the head, is this his daily exercise of devotion with the members. It is more to him, than to others. It is he who presides and directs in it; who selects and delivers the precious word; and who leads the common supplication, confession, and praise. To him, it is equal to an additional act of personal devotion, in the day; but it is more. It is an act of devotion, in which his affection and duty to his house are particularly brought before his mind; and in which he stands in the place, and pleads the cause, of all that he holds dearest upon earth. No one need wonder, then, that we place family prayer among the most important means of reviving and maintaining the piety of him who conducts it….

Observation shows that families which have no household worship, are at a low ebb in spiritual things; that families where it is performed in a cold, sluggish, negligent, or hurried way, are little affected by it, and little affected by any means of grace; and that families where God is worshipped, every morning and evening, by all the inmates of the house in a solemn and affectionate service, are blessed with increase of piety and happiness. Every individual is blessed. Each one receives a portion of the heavenly food. ?

Dr. James W. Alexander (1804-1859), eldest son of the renowned Archibald Alexander, wrote many volumes on practical Christian themes, including Plain Words to a Young Communicant (1854) and Thoughts on Preaching (1864). This article is drawn from his Thoughts on Family Worship (1847).

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