Finding Your Summer Faith Rhythms

As a child, I loved Summer break. Days without school seemed to stretch on forever. Each day is filled with new adventures: riding bikes with friends, playing in the creek, swimming at my neighbor’s pool, or just playing video games. The Summer months signified freedom from the routine of school.

As a parent, Summer break still represents freedom from the routine of school, but it doesn’t always translate to feeling relaxed anymore. Now, I have little kids that I have to find things for them to do. They get bored easily. They want to have fun. I still have to go to work. The Summer days that stretch on forever could really do me a favor and hurry up already. I need routines to help me be a better parent.

I especially wonder about faith rhythms during the Summer months. We still make it to church on a weekly basis (and my congregation might raise some eyebrows if their pastor didn’t show up to preach!). But without the help of the regular rhythms of the school year, it can be easy to take a break from the usual practices that nourish our faith on a daily basis.

So, here are four ideas you can implement this Summer to help your family’s faith rhythms.

Scripture memory

After dinner each night, try using 5 minutes to memorize Scripture together. Thankfully, our church is doing this with us, so we have extra accountability, but it’s turned out to be a fun and easy practice. We focus on one verse each week. Every night, we read the verse and have our kids repeat after us. We do this two or three times and call it a night. It may not seem like a lot, but as the days and nights go by, I’m amazed by how much I think about the passage we are memorizing. Right now, we are focused on Psalm 1. In Psalm 1, the blessed person is described as someone who meditates on God’s law day and night. Although this may seem like a simple practice, You can use it to cultivate biblical imagination in your children.

One good book

Choose one good book to read with your kids this Summer. I did this a few years ago with my daughter when we read Charlotte’s Web. Look for something in a similar vein. Wholesome, funny, deep. I’ve thought about the possibility of Little Women or even The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe. I’m also leaning towards E.B. White’s Stewart Little. I want to find a memorable book that is a little longer than most of the books we read before bed so that I can slowly read it to them over the course of a month or two. This may not strike you as a faith practice, but reading fiction develops the imagination. An active imagination is key to an active faith life. So. when you read fiction with your son or daughter, you can ask them where they see God at work in the story and how the characters are experiencing God’s grace or mercy.

Visit another Church

You can take advantage of other churches' children’s ministries. The church I pastor is small and doesn’t have a lot of kids, so we signed my daughter up for a couple of other local church’s vacation bible schools. This gives her an opportunity to use her Summer break to grow in her faith in Jesus, meet new Christian friends, and see how other Christian communities do church. I’m grateful that we have a local network of pastors who welcome kids from other churches into their summer camps. If your church has plenty of kids ministries, then try taking your kids to a different church when you go on vacation. I’m always amazed at the ways I am encouraged by connecting with other members of the body of Christ.

Hospitality

You can take advantage of the lack of routines this Summer by practicing the spiritual discipline of hospitality. Lately, my wife and I have been using our backyard fire pit as an excuse to invite neighbors and friends over. We make it simple. No dinner. Just snacks and drinks by the fire. We hang out for a couple of hours in the evening. The adults chat by the fire and the kids run around or watch a movie together. Like visiting other churches, I can’t plan for the ways God uses these fireside conversations to deepen relationships and encourage me in my faith. Just a couple of weeks ago, a couple of our elderly neighbors came over to enjoy the fire and I felt like I got to know the neighborhood in a whole new way. They have forty years on our block. They know everyone and all the changes. At one point in the conversation, Joan shared about her recently deceased neighbor and how they waved at each other through their kitchen windows every day for over thirty years. I’m jealous of that kind of long-term friendship. Those kinds of friendships start with hospitality.

Built on the Basics

Prayer and Bible reading are the basic building blocks of Christian faith practices. Summer may have your routine out of whack, but it doesn’t have to pull you away from the basics. Think about the usual times you pray or read the bible with your kids throughout the school year. My guess is it is often associated with food or sleep. So often, meals and bedtime are the key moments in a day when we can connect with our children with fewer distractions. Keep taking advantage of those moments throughout the Summer months. Your kids may not be going to bed as early as during the school year, but you are still tucking them in at night and saying good night. Take a few moments to offer a blessing over them or read a short story from a children’s bible.

Summer is a glorious time in a child’s life. As parents, we can help foster that time so that they know that the freedom we enjoy during the Summer months points to a greater freedom we find in Jesus Christ. We serve a God of rest, play, and delight, he wants us to relish in seasons of rest, and he wants us to see that our ultimate rest will always come from him. So, this Summer is an opportunity to get creative with faith practices, try something new, build on past routines, and dive deeper into the loving embrace of your Savior.