When my oldest daughter was about to turn 6, she endured a season of feeling great burdens for people who don’t know Jesus. She prayed for them often. She wept. She brought Jesus into conversations. On occasion, she would wake in the night from sadness for unbelieving friends and family members. She spoke of becoming a missionary when she grew up so she could tell more people about Jesus.

My wife and I did all we could to foster such missionary zeal. We’d be delighted to see one or more of our children dedicate their lives to full-time Christian service, whether at home or abroad. So we spoke about this calling with our daughter. We gave her missionary biographies. We prayed fervently with her. Our church even invited her to join the Missions Committee.

And one day, out of the blue, she asks me an innocent question that cuts me deeply. “Papa, how can I tell people about Jesus when I grow up, unless you first read the whole Bible to me?”

The Quandary

I’m embarrassed to say it, but it’s true: It had never occurred to me to simply read the Bible to my kids. We fill our home with things read. We read fiction and non-fiction. We listen to audiobooks during rest time and in the car. We read at the dinner table. We read independently and together, silently and out loud. We read and read and read. But, before my daughter’s question, our reading rarely included the Bible.

To be sure, we tried our hand at family devotions. I wasn’t as consistent as I wanted to be, but we still did it a few times each week. Such devotions involved a few short Bible verses, a passage from a wonderful children’s devotional, a few good questions, and prayer.

But if we were going to sit and just read something, it wouldn’t be the Bible. It couldn’t be the Bible, right? Children aren’t ready for that. Instead, we’d read The Chronicles of Narnia, or The Penderwicks, or the latest wonder from N.D. Wilson. Maybe The Jesus Storybook Bible. But not actually The Holy Bible. No way.

Yet my daughter’s question cut me to the quick. The shocking realization rocked my world: You can read the Bible to your kids. I can read the Bible to my kids.

So, on her 6th birthday, my daughter received my solemn promise, with the Lord’s help, to read her the entire Bible by her 18th birthday. She just turned 8 a few weeks ago, and so far we’re on track to fulfill that promise.

Jan Rowley, Creative Commons

How We Do It

I have more than one child, so as family patriarch, I made the call to include all the children in our Bible reading time. To help you picture the context, my children are now 10, 10, 8, 6, 2, and 10 months. Sometimes we exempt the baby from Bible reading time if she needs to be fed. And sometimes the toddler is still finishing her nap. Beyond that, however, nobody gets an excused absence.

To make time for family Bible reading, we actually had to drop out of a Bible club, where four of my children attended and I taught a class. The club was great, and everybody was learning and growing in Christ. But we decided to place higher priority, this one night a week, on our own family Bible reading.

So we gather Sunday evenings for an hour. The children get notified 60 and 30 minutes prior to Bible reading time, so they have enough warning to finish up whatever they may be doing. At 10 minutes before, we ask them to begin the transition by using the bathroom and bringing to the living room whatever they want to have with them during Bible reading time.

The children can have books, toys, games, legos, coloring books, painting supplies, dolls, matchbox cars, chess sets. Whatever. Just nothing electronic. They can do anything they want during Bible reading time, as long as 1) it is silent, and 2) it can be done without leaving the living room.

Then they sit, play, and listen while I read for about an hour.

We began with Genesis 1 and have gone straight through. Occasionally, I’ll stop to clarify something or to take a question. This way, we’ve discussed covenants, circumcision, uncleanness, prostitution, dreams, altars, ancient dating customs, the best ways to kill Philistines, and what it means for a woman to be violated. We’ve befriended Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Joseph, Moses, Aaron, Joshua, Deborah, Barak, Gideon, Samson, and David. We’ve read long lists of names. We’ve jeered Saul. We’ve mourned for Absalom, our son, our son; if only we had died instead of him. We’ve climbed on the coffee table to picture Goliath’s scornful mocking and his brutal fall. And we’ve joined the tribes of Israel in shouting “Amen” after each covenantal curse (Deut 27:14-26).

Of course, the Pentateuch was a challenge. But the children are used to enough rituals, rules, and procedures that it was probably harder for me than it was for them. We’re just about to finish 2 Samuel. And yes, we’ve hit some dark content. But, as we allow the Scripture to drive our spiritual discussions, the children have been more than mature enough to handle the subject matter. I can’t yet comment on how we got through the Psalms or Prophets.

Before we start a new book, we always watch The Bible Project’s overview video of that book, and this proves to be a highlight for the children. They refer to the videos as we then work our way through the book.

Conclusion

Of course, you don’t have to do it the same way I do. But I hope to encourage you with a simple proposition: You can read the Bible to your kids. You don’t need a perfect schedule, or a perfect set of devotions from an expert. Your children can handle it, as long as you are enthusiastic about it. Who knows how God might use his knowable word in your family?

This post was first published in 2017. At the links, you can also find my reflections at the mid point and completion of our family Bible reading adventure.

Just a few days ago, we hit a major milestone for our family: We completed reading the entire Bible aloud. I promised my daughter, on her 6th birthday, that we would do this by her 18th birthday. And it took much less time than I expected: A few months from now, she will turn 11. We have plenty of time to do it again.

You can read more about why and how we did this in two previous posts (here and here). But here is a summary:

• Once per week, we spent 45-60 minutes reading out loud. We would occasionally stop for questions, but mostly just kept reading.
• The children were not required to sit still and listen. They could do anything they wanted during the time, as long as 1) it didn’t involve anything noisy or electronic, and 2) it didn’t require them to leave the living room. Matchbox cars, legos, board game bits, comic books, chess sets, sketch pads, and art supplies all got liberal use during family Bible reading time.
• Bible reading was followed immediately by dinner together, when we might discuss some portion of the text we read. Then we were off to evening activities.
• We would miss 5-10 weeks per year on account of traveling or extraordinary activities. But we made a habit of treating Sunday afternoon Bible reading time as nonnegotiable.
• I began reading the ESV, but I switched to the CSB somewhere late in the Pentateuch or early in the OT historical books.
• I read the OT in canonical order. I read the NT according to four tracks. The children took turns selecting a gospel, and then I would read that gospel and all additional NT books associated with it. Then the next child would choose another gospel, and so on. We had fun offering the fourth child a “choice” between Mark and Mark.

What’s Next?

We’re going to take a break from sustained reading aloud. For at least the next year, I plan to repurpose the time to teach the children an overview of each book of the Bible. We’ll cover a book each week, and I want to provide them with notes on the author, audience, occasion, structure, and main point of each book.

I trust this series of overviews will give them something they can refer to as their own Bible study matures. And it will give us some much-needed variety in our family routine.

But once we get through all of the books, I expect to go back to extended reading time. I think I’ll mix it up by using a chronological reading order.

How Did it Go?

I believe these 5 years of extended Bible reading have been great for our family. They have opened a multitude of discussion topics, as we sought to process whatever biblical material was before us. This led us naturally into conversations about love and romance, suffering and persecution, evil and judgment, morality and theology, church and family life.

I couldn’t make a systematic curriculum out of the topics that came up in discussion, but I can’t overstate the value of having our topics for conversation be driven by whatever questions the kids had about what we were reading. Instead of me asking them all the questions—as used to be the case in our prior family devotions—they were asking me questions. Sometimes, I would ask a few comprehension questions to make sure they could follow what was happening in the text. But normally, if they didn’t have any questions, we would simply continue forward.

Final Reflections

Here are some thoughts, now that I’ve completed the experience:

1. Find whatever motivates you to get your children simmering in the Scriptures. For years, I tried doing daily family devotions, with a published guide and everything. And if that works for you, do it. But it didn’t work for us. I was never excited about reading only a few verses at a time, and then asking a series of questions provided by someone who had never met my children. And with my motivation low, it was very difficult to build a disciplined habit. But once we started simply reading for lengthy stretches, I couldn’t wait for it to come each week.
2. Don’t underestimate what your children can handle. My oldest (twins) are now 13, and my youngest is 3. All six children participated in family Bible reading time. And all, I believe, have come to enjoy it and benefit from it. (As I’ve mentioned before, though, I don’t mean to paint too homely and rosy of a picture. I’m sure almost all of them would select playtime at a friend’s house, or a movie night, instead of family Bible reading if given the choice.) Because I respect them enough to hear and respond to all Scripture (including lists of names, lengthy prophetic poems, codes of ritual instructions, and narratives of unsavory behavior), they have grown in their own respect for Scripture and for its relevance to what they face in life.
3. While daily dipping has a place, so does periodic immersion. Though we haven’t had daily family devotions, we still train our children to spend personal time in the Scripture every day. Many of them prefer to listen to an audio Bible while doing chores or drawing picture; a few prefer to read the Bible with their own eyes. Whatever the format, these daily dips into Scripture are shaping their loves and their thinking. And our weekly, hour-long reading sessions have taken their exposure to the Lord’s Word to a whole new level. Those lengthier immersions have done much to make us feel like this is our story. These are our people. This is our God and our Messiah, and we are his flock.

To be clear: I’m not trying to persuade you to do what we have done. I just know the guilt and demotivation I felt from the expectation for family Bible instruction to take a certain shape. I was delighted to discover a creative alternative. Perhaps you’ll discover something else entirely that works best for your family.

Do whatever it takes to be in the Word with your kids. If you don’t, someone or something else will fill the gap and captivate their hearts.

And there arose another generation after them who did not know the Lord or the work that he had done for Israel. 

And the people of Israel did what was evil in the sight of the Lord and served the Baals. And they abandoned the Lord, the God of their fathers, who had brought them out of the land of Egypt. They went after other gods… And they provoked the Lord to anger. They abandoned the Lord and served the Baals and the Ashtaroth. So the anger of the Lord was kindled against Israel, and he gave them over to plunderers, who plundered them. And he sold them into the hand of their surrounding enemies… And they were in terrible distress.

Judges 2:10-15

Blessed is everyone who fears the Lord,
who walks in his ways! 
You shall eat the fruit of the labor of your hands; 
you shall be blessed, and it shall be well with you. 

Your wife will be like a fruitful vine 
within your house; 
your children will be like olive shoots 
around your table. 
Behold, thus shall the man be blessed 
who fears the Lord. 

The Lord bless you from Zion! 
May you see the prosperity of Jerusalem 
all the days of your life! 
May you see your children’s children! 
Peace be upon Israel!

Psalm 128:1-6

I wrote last year about my commitment to my daughter to read her the entire Bible before her 18th birthday. This promise morphed into a weekly family Bible-reading extravaganza, where we spend 45 to 60 minutes simply reading the Scripture and letting the children ask any questions they have. I’m now writing with an update.

Jan Rowley, Creative Commons

• We’ve been working on this for a little over 3 years, so it’s become part of our ingrained family routine.
• 45 to 60 minutes may sound like a long time, but it goes quickly when the children get to play during the reading (my original post describes how we do it).
• We don’t actually do it every week. If anyone is traveling, we skip it. But I would estimate that we miss only 1 or 2 weeks each quarter.
• Going through the Bible in canonical order, we’re now in the middle of Jeremiah.
• All the names in 1 Chronicles 1-9 were rough, and the kids were the least engaged for that section. But I spread those chapters over 2 sittings so it wasn’t too painful for them all at once. And they’re able to bear the occasional “boring” section when they get to play with whatever they want. They’re not required to just sit and listen.
• Proverbs 10-29 was also rough. When the topic changes every verse, it’s hard to listen to a lengthy reading!
• Surprises:
  • They loved the Psalms. Even though there are many of them, most of them are short. And the children really followed along with the mood of each poem.
  • They also loved Job. The drama engaged them, as the characters took turns making their speeches.
  • My sons loved Isaiah, though they’re not sure why. One of them could explain his love only by saying, “It was really interesting.” Jeremiah has not been as interesting for them.
  • While I’m sure none of the children would choose Bible reading time over, say, going to the local pool, I get almost no complaints from them about doing it. The only exception is when we’re in a dry spot (usually a list of names): After 30 minutes, I might start getting questions about how much longer we’ll be reading.
  • Almost every week, though, most of the children are sad when I stop. They keep asking for “another chapter!”
  • It doesn’t take nearly as long to read the Bible out loud as I thought it would. I’m surprised that we’re in Jeremiah already. At this pace, we’ll finish long before my daughter’s 18th birthday. We might even get through the Bible twice.
• I’m now using the CSB Reader’s Bible. I love the CSB translation, and the children follow it well. And a reader’s Bible gives me “permission” to keep reading and reading and reading, without any distracting verse numbers, chapter numbers, or section headings telling me that I should stop.

I hope this encourages you. You don’t need a perfect plan, a perfect curriculum, or a perfect set of family devotions. And you don’t need to do it the same way I have done it. But be encouraged: You can simply read the Bible to your kids!