Deuteronomy 11:18-21  "Therefore you shall lay up these words of mine in your heart and in your soul, and bind them as a sign on your hand, and they shall be as frontlets between your eyes. You shall teach them to your children, speaking of them when you sit in your house, when you walk by the way, when you lie down, and when you rise up. And you shall write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates, that your days and the days of your children may be multiplied in the land of which the Lord swore to your fathers to give them, like the days of the heavens above the earth.

How often do you eat together as a family?  Once a week?  Three times?  All the time?  Secular studies into the dynamic of families eating together have been exploring this enigma for the past decade.  For some reason, families who eat together seem to do better as a family in several areas.  Kids perform better at school, stay away from drugs, behave better, communicate better, and become more well-rounded people.  The difference between families who eat together and who don't are staggering, but several factors probably play a role in this.  The communication without distraction, the interaction and openness in conversation, and the joy of being together all contribute to the positive effects of sitting down for thirty minutes every evening and just eating a meal as a family.

But as Christians, we can do a lot better.  The Lord understood the value of teaching his words and his will to children and to each other in every occasion.  When you wake up, when you sit down together, when you travel together, on your doorposts, on your fingers, in your soul, in every moment you spend together, he says to speak of the things of God.  Imagine waking up and getting ready for your day as a family, and before you leave, praying together.  Imagine when you sit down to dinner talking about your day and how God blessed it, or what you want to pray about as a family.  Imagine before you go to bed sitting down and talking about a Bible verse and singing a song to the Lord.  What effects do you think it would have on your family? 

We have every reason to speak of our Savior, to hold him in our hearts and minds and share him with our family every day.  Let's bring to the table something more filling than dinner, and something more meaningful than everyday chit-chat.  Let's make God a staple in our family, so the dinner table is a place we where we never leave hungry.  

- Michael