“From S’mores to Scriptures: Creative Approaches to Family Devotion”

Our family of 6 is right smack dab in the “middle years” of parenting. One of the most challenging parts of this season is carving out daily time to connect with one another and intentionally grow spiritually. No one day is the same as the next with a variety of sports and music practices and church activities. 

This past summer, we discovered two resources and one fun treat that made this pocket of 15-20 minutes (wherever we could fit it in each day) easier to transition into: Table Topics for Families, a sweet treat, and I Can Learn the Bible devotion.

1. Table Topics for Families (link from Amazon)

This seemingly simple box of cards contains one conversation starter per card. These topics range from sometimes silly and other times serious thoughts.

3 Benefits: 

1. Talking through these simple prompts helped us transition from whatever held our attention previously to engage in meaningful conversations with one another.
2. This helped our boys learn what it looks like to pose questions and learn to listen to everyone’s ideas rather than only trying to make our voice be heard. 
3. These “One card a day” prompts provided a much needed soft start into our time as a family giving us all a chance to laugh and make shared memories together

2. Sweet Treat-Dace Kids’ favorite = Oven S’mores

One of my favorite Bible teachers, Kristi McLelland, shared a priority for Jewish rabbis is to teach children the importance of savoring God’s word. The rabbis have children taste honey and then physically put honey on the pages of scripture and then dip their finger once more onto the page and taste it. They emphasized that God’s word is meant to be fully enjoyed. 

So, after putting on my thinking hat, I brainstormed what this might look like for our family. Only one of our kids likes honey, so I took some creative liberties and thought, what if I start serving desserts during family Bible study? Maybe it will help grow stronger sensory triggers and create this deep soul connection that exploring God’s word is the sweetest part of the day? I don’t think this is actually a proven spiritual thing and I am mindful not to let them fill up on sweets during other parts of the day. However I do know that when we eat icecream or Smore’s during Bible study time, there were fewer distractions and/or fussing with one another and we were more “all in” for the conversation and readings. I have to admit-they probably take after me with their Mama’s sweet tooth.

One this icy January day, I surprised the kids with Oven S’mores for family Bible Study and sweet treat time. Ethan was especially a big fan!

3. I Can Learn the Bible: The Joshua Code by Holly Hawkins Shivers

Finding a Bible study with content that can reach the age ranges of our children can be challenging. Our youngest is just now learning to read and our oldest is in middle school. Something that I appreciate about how Holly Hawkins Shivers wrote I Can Learn the Bible: The Joshua Code is there is a depth in the topics than can be applied to each our kids’ ages. (There is also an adult version of the book, too, written by Holly’s Dad.)

Each day’s devotion can be broken up into several parts, so that each child can take ownership for leading out a section a day.

These devotions include:

•  a focus verse
• a few headings and paragraphs to help unpack the ideas and applications of the verse
• a guided prayer
• a statement that you say together as a family at the end. 

With these different sections, our youngest likes to say the beginning verse with me, phrase by phrase for his siblings. Our older three kids take turns reading aloud the lesson and prayer. Then our youngest leads the family in this daily ending sentence: 

God’s word is for me, and to me, it is in me, and working through me, and just like His love, it goes on and on forever. 

As we process each day’s devotion, our kids each share their experiences while seeing how they can learn from one another and not just from their parents. More than anything, I appreciate this resource, because Holly helps us focus on key passages throughout the Bible that build our faith and give us a strong foundation to look at our lives through a biblical mindset.

These simple yet profound truths are nestling deep down in their hearts. All from these small pockets of 15-20 minutes. These moments may seem inconsequential in the grand scheme of things. However, without realizing they have memorized this daily ending sentence and recite these timeless truths from memory without prompting. 

With this rhythm in place, we can more easily give our full (well mostly full–we are talking about kids!) attention during this sacred and simple 15-20 minutes together. 

Families, I would love to learn what resources, routines, or rhythms have you found to make these moments matter with your children? What would you recommend we try next?