Devotional / Family Worship; December 16, 2025

What is family worship? (Click the arrow to the left)

As Christians, particularly Christian men, we are responsible to lead our households with strength and resolve in the ways of Christ. Leading our families in devotions and family worship is one way to lead our families, raising our children in the nurture and admonition of the Lord, Jesus Christ (cf. Deuteronomy 6:7; Ephesians 6:4).

In my house, we do morning and evenings. In the morning after we eat breakfast together, we all have our quiet times. We read our Bibles seperately and journal what we see. In the evenings before bed, we talk about what we saw in our morning Bible reading, I share my insight from my own devotional time, we ask questions from the New City Catechism, we sing a couple worship songs together, and then we pray as a family. Family worship doesn’t have to look like this. It may look different for every household, but I want to invite you to join me in leading our families well. Every weekday on this blog, I want to provide a guide for fathers to lead their families in some form of family worship. If your household doesn’t have a father, I believe the responsibility falls to the mother. Design a routine that works for your family, but be intentional about leading in the only way that matters instead of getting too caught up with the affairs of this world. Every Christian man is the pastor of his home. I believe the most important thing we can do for our children is (1) lead them in the home and (2) be faithful to the church as a family. As the family goes, so goes the nation. Our job as pastors to our family matters.

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Zechariah 9:9-17

9 Rejoice greatly, O daughter of Zion! 

Shout in triumph, O daughter of Jerusalem! 

Behold, your king is coming to you; 

He is ^cjust and endowed with salvation, 

Humble, and mounted on a donkey, 

Even on a colt, the foal of a donkey. 

10 I will cut off the chariot from Ephraim 

And the horse from Jerusalem; 

And the bow of war will be cut off. 

And He will speak peace to the nations; 

And His dominion will be from sea to sea, 

And from the River to the ends of the earth. 

11 As for you also, because of the blood of My covenant with you, 

I have set your prisoners free from the waterless pit. 

12 Return to the ^astronghold, O prisoners who have the hope; 

This very day I am declaring that I will restore double to you. 

13 For I will bend Judah as My bow, 

I will fill the bow with Ephraim. 

And I will stir up your sons, O Zion, against your sons, O Greece; 

And I will make you like a warrior’s sword. 

14 Then the Lord will appear over them, 

And His arrow will go forth like lightning; 

And the Lord God will blow the trumpet, 

And will march in the storm winds of the south. 

15 The Lord of hosts will defend them. 

And they will devour and trample on the sling stones; 

And they will drink and be boisterous as with wine; 

And they will be filled like a sacrificial basin, 

Drenched like the corners of the altar. 

16 And the Lord their God will save them in that day 

As the flock of His people; 

For they are as the stones of a crown, 

Sparkling in His land. 

17 For what ^acomeliness and beauty will be theirs! 

Grain will make the young men flourish, and new wine the virgins.

500 years before Jesus was born, Zechariah foretold a coming messiah who would bring peace to the whole earth. Such is Jesus’s promise to the whole world. The messiah would signify His reign by riding into His kingdom on a donkey, on a colt, the foal of a donkey. His reign would be such that His people would lay down their instruments of war. His dominion would extend worldwide, just like Jesus’s dominion is.

Zechariah tells us in Chapter 9 that God chose to save humanity from itself because His people are like jewels in a crown sparkling over His land. God sees His people as a great treasure. He saves us because He loves us. There doesn’t have to be another reason. As God saves His people, the earth is filled with celebration rather than war—even, according to Zechariah, being perfectly full with food and satisfied with wine because God is so good. Different people have different convictions about wine. That’s not the point here. The point is, God leads us to celebrate His goodness rather than make war on His earth. God Himself would be with His people, enjoying what looks like celebratory communion with them. Christmas is the celebration of our lives in Christ to God’s glory.

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Today’s question from the New City Catechism:

Q- What should we pray?

A- The whole Word of God directs us in what we should pray.

Ephesians 3:14-21 says,

14 For this reason I bow my knees before the Father, 

15 from whom every family in heaven and on earth derives its name, 

16 that He would grant you, according to the riches of His glory, to be strengthened with power through His Spirit in the inner man, 

17 so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith; and that you, being rooted and grounded in love, 

18 may be able to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth, 

19 and to know the love of Christ which surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled up to all the fullness of God. 

20 Now to Him who is able to do far more abundantly beyond all that we ask or think, according to the power that works within us, 

21 to Him be the glory in the church and in Christ Jesus to all generations forever and ever. Amen. 

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