What then is the first key to a Christian family's spiritual health? Though you may not have anticipated our answer, we are quite sure that we are right. The key is not new. It is not novel. It will not reveal long hidden mysteries, disclose any secret formulas, provide any new techniques, or require lengthy or costly counseling.

What is it? Simply, the first and primary key to your family's spiritual health is a commitment to the weekly public worship services of the church. The most important single commitment you have to make to ensure your family's spiritual well-being is to regular, consistent attendance at public worship.

Sound far-fetched? I'll say it even stronger. I have yet to meet a person for whom it could not be said that all of their problems, personal, marital, familial, or vocational would not be solved by such a commitment. I do not believe that the person for whom this is not true exists. By saying so, I do not minimize the seriousness of the problems that people face. Rather I maximize our confidence in the power of the gospel. So I'll say it again: we do not know of anyone of whom it could not be said, if only they were in worship week in and week out, fifty two weeks a year, year after year, their problems would be basically solved.

That public worship is not generally recognized as playing this central role in spiritual development demonstrates the degree to which modern individualism has rotted the core out of our commitment to Christ. How is it, after all, that we receive the benefits of the death of Christ? How is His grace communicated to us? Does it just drop out of heaven? Or are there means? Yes, there are means. What are they? The Shorter Catechism identifies the primary means as follows:

Q. What are the outward and ordinary means whereby Christ communicateth to us the benefits of redemption?

A. The outward and ordinary means whereby Christ communicateth to us the benefits of redemption are, his ordinances, especially the Word, sacraments, and prayer; all which are made effectual to the elect for salvation (Q. 88).

The three primary means are the word ("especially the preaching of the Word," says Shorter Catechism #89), the sacraments, and prayer. Now ask yourself, where are these three primary means normally operative? Where is the word preached? Where are the sacraments administered? And as for prayer, yes one can pray in one's closet, but don't forget the special promise of Jesus concerning prayers offered where "two or three have gathered in My name," no doubt, given the context of church discipline in Matthew 18, a reference to organized public worship (Matt 18:15–20). Jesus said, ‘Again I say to you, that if two of you agree on earth about anything that they may ask, it shall be done for them by My Father who is in heaven...” (Matthew18:19). There is a unique efficacy in such public prayers.

When we gather in public worship, we are ushered into the presence of Christ. He is in our midst (Mt l8:20). We do in worship what we were created to do—offer to God intelligent praise. We become more truly human at that point than at any other of human existence. Just as a child is more aware of his identity as a son in the presence of his father, or as a husband is aware of his identity as provider and protector in the presence of his wife, so we are most aware of who we are and what we were created to do as human beings at that point at which we bow in worship before our Creator and Redeemer. We are humbled as we offer to Him our praise and adoration. We are cleansed as we confess our sins. We are built up, torn down, and rebuilt again as we submit to instruction by His word (Eph 4:11ff). We are fed and united to the whole body of Christ by the sacraments. Through the bread and cup we enjoy koinonia with Christ and one another (l Cor 10:16). We access His strength through "all prayer and petition" (Eph 6:18), and are thereby enabled to fight the spiritual battles of life.

The public worship services of the church are our life-line. There we are both purged and fed. There we make soul-saving contact with Christ through His word, sacraments, prayer, and the fellowship of His people. That contact, over the long haul, will change us. It will make us into the kind of people who are able to solve our own problems with the strength that the gospel provides.

The opposite view, that we can prosper spiritually on our own, apart from the public ordinances of the church and the public gatherings of the saints is foolhardy. No, it's worse than that. It is worldliness—worldly individualism, worldly pride, worldly self-sufficiency.

The metaphor of the church as a “body” is employed by the New Testament to represent both our union with Christ and mutual dependence. “The eye cannot say to the hand, ‘I have no need of you’” (1 Cor 12:21). We need each other. “We who are many, are one body in Christ, and individually members of one another” (Rom 12:5). We need each other’s gifts (see Eph 4:11–16; 1 Cor 12¬–14; Rom 12). We need each other’s graces (as in the many “one anothers” found throughout the New Testament, such as love one another, be kind to one another, bear one another’s burdens, etc). We need each other’s fellowship. So we are warned, “Let us consider how to stimulate one another to love and good deeds, not forsaking our own assembling together...” The writer to the Hebrews sees the public assembly as the primary place in which the mutual stimulation to “love and good deeds” takes place. He writes, “not forsaking our own assembling together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another; and all the more, as you see the day drawing near” (Hebrews 10:25).

How does this commitment to public worship relate to the family’s spiritual well being? The effect upon parents is clear enough. Spiritually nourished parents make for better families. But the “family pew” has more in mind than sanctifying the parents. When your children are brought with you into public worship, they too are sanctified. Your children, from their earliest years will be ushered along with you into the presence of God. They will be brought under the means of grace, and will experience the fellowship of God's people week after week as they mature through childhood. Beyond this, they will sit by you Sunday after Sunday, watching you publicly humble yourself before God and submit to His Word. Among their earliest and warmest memories will be those of holding their parents' hands during church, sitting close to their sides, following along in the hymnal, placing money in the offering plate, and bowing their heads in prayer. Do not underestimate the cumulative effect of this witness upon covenant children. No doubt it is considerable, even incalculable.

The key to your own and your family's spiritual health is remarkably simple. Though there is considerable hype to the contrary, it involves no pilgrimages to sacred places. It requires no week long or weekend retreats, seminars, or special programs. It depends on no special techniques or novel methodologies. You won't have to spend yet another night out. You won't need to add more meetings to an already frantic schedule. The key is to be found in the regular, ordinary, weekly worship services of the church. It is not a glamorous key, but it is the key nonetheless.

Rev. Terry Johnson is the Senior Pastor at Independent Presbyterian Church in Savannah, Georgia.

This article is taken from "The Family Worship Book: A Resource Book for Family Devotions" by Terry Johnson (ISBN 978-1-85792401-5) which is published by Christian Focus Publications (www.christianfocus.com) and is used here with their kind permission.