Thursday, February 12, 2009

Our not so perfect devotional time

I wanted to write about our family devotional time. First, I wanted to give you a glimpse at how it goes for us. It will be reassuring to hear- I hope. We have a real family. Not a perfect family. Here goes the dialogue...

Mike: Kids come to the table! It’s time for our family devotional.

Mitzi: Ethan take the Lego’s off the table.

Rebecca: I want to sit by mommy.

Mitzi: It’s ok just sit across from me this morning.

Mike: (Opens our verse box) Alright, who remembers our verse for this week? (He looks around. No one is jumping to say it).

Anderson: No one can serve two masters. (He always knows the verse. He has an amazing memory)

Mike: You’re right Anderson.

Sarah: Where is our bubble maker?

Mitzi: Sweetie, We’ll talk about that later.

Mike: Can anyone remember our question this week?

No response.

Mike: Who can tell me why we have the Holy Spirit? (This is one of the questions from the catechism we use)

Ethan: To Help us.

Mitzi: Yes, he helps us throughout our lives.

Rebecca: Sam is biting my feet.

Mitzi: Take her to my room. Sarah sit up.

We wait until Rebecca comes back to the table.

Mike: Shares some more thoughts on the Holy Spirit.

Sarah: Can we sing a song?

Mike: Yeah, what do you want to sing?

Sarah: Deep and Wide

Mike: Go ahead Sarah and start us.

All: We all break out singing Deep and Wide.

Mike: Ok. Who do we want to pray for today? (Mike suggest s a family in our church)

Rebecca: I don’t want to go first.

Ethan: Anderson, go ahead?

Eventually, we all pray for some family friends.

Distractions are a part of the devotional time but we don’t let them stop us. This is a typical day and these are real responses and questions. Some days are smooth and other days…not so much.

1 comments:

The Roses said...

It's good to realize that others deal with the same things we deal with. We desire wonderful devotional times, but our expectations have to be somewhat low-key. Then we are pleasantly surprised when things go smoothly.