FAMILY WORSHIP
Elder J. R. Respess (deceased)
I believed it was right to have our children present at family worship, because they could bow with us before God as his creatures, if not as regenerated believers, and I could, in their behalf, acknowledge his goodness to us as his creatures and implore a continuance of his temporal mercies upon us. In this way I read the Testament through many times to them, reading chapter after chapter in the order they came in the Testament.
It is true, no doubt, that it was at times burdensome to the children, for it was to me, but it was training us all in self-denial, order and method, and, therefore, a good thing that far if no farther. I always found it profitable to keep it up, and that it was good to resist the deadness, indolence, coldness, unfitness and unbelief that combined to make me put it off and neglect it; because these things were enemies and of Satan, and, therefore, not to be yielded to; and that in times of deadness, indolence and unbelief it was more needful to engage in this service than at any other time, more needful to strive even in prayer to God at such times instead of neglecting it.
More than once I have gained strength in morning prayer to get through the day with, when feeling in the morning that my faith would fail and that I could not hold out through the day. And I believe that if Christians would more persistently engage in prayer and family worship that it would be much better for their peace and spiritual growth.
The humility and fear and trembling of my father at family prayer is one of the most pleasant and sacred remembrances I have of him. He did not keep it up regularly, nor did he engage in it at all until he was getting somewhat advanced in years, and after being many years a member of the church, but that he did it at all is a consolation to me in my declining years. [from “The Experience of a Sinner, The Gospel Messenger, 1892-1893]