How to Start Family Devotions (Even If You've Tried Before and Quit)

Tenn-Lai Frame
Jul 7
5 min read

You've probably tried before. Maybe you bought a devotional, did it for three nights in a row, and then life got loud, and it quietly disappeared into a drawer. Maybe you've been meaning to start for months, but can't figure out the right time, the right resource, or how to get everyone on board at once. Maybe you started something beautiful and then a busy season hit, and you never quite found your way back.

Starting family devotions is one of those things that almost every Christian parent wants to do, and most have tried more than once. The starting isn't the hard part, it's the saying.

This post isn't about guilt. It's about giving you a realistic, gentle way back in. One that actually fits your family as it is right now, not the idealised version you imagine on a good day.

Why Family Devotions Keep Falling Apart

Before we talk about how to start, it's worth understanding why it's so hard to sustain. Most families don't quit because they don't care; it's because the way they started wasn't built for real life. A few of the most common reasons family devotions stall:

The format is too long or too structured — when it feels like a church service at home, kids disengage fast, and parents dread it
There's no consistent time anchoring it — without a set moment in the day, it keeps getting pushed to "later" until later becomes never
It only lives on the parents' shoulders — when kids have no ownership or role in it, it feels like something being done to them rather than with them
Perfectionism creeps in — one missed night turns into a week, which turns into "we're not devotional people" and the whole thing gets quietly abandoned
The resource doesn't fit the family — a devotional that works for a family with one six-year-old doesn't work the same way for a family with a toddler, a ten-year-old, and a teenager in the same room

Recognising what tripped you up before is actually the most useful thing you can do before you start again.

What Family Devotions Actually Need to Be

Family devotions don't need to be long, elaborate, or perfectly executed to be meaningful. What they need to be is consistent and connected. A five-minute conversation about a Bible verse at the dinner table, done four nights a week, will shape your children's faith more deeply than an occasional hour-long family Bible study done out of obligation. The goal isn't to cover as much Scripture as possible. It's to create a rhythm where your family regularly turns toward God together, where faith is something you do as a family, not just something you have.

That shift in expectations takes the pressure off you, as the parent, to lead perfectly, and it opens up space for your kids to actually engage rather than endure.

How to Start (And Actually Keep Going This Time)

Here's a simple, practical approach that works for real families with real schedules:

Pick one time and protect it — choose a moment that already exists in your day. After dinner, before bed, Sunday mornings, before the week begins. The time matters less than the consistency. Put it in your calendar if you need to. Treat it like any other non-negotiable.
Start with seven days — don't commit to forever, commit to one week. Seven days is long enough to feel the rhythm and short enough not to feel overwhelming. At the end of seven days, ask your family if they want to keep going. They almost always do.
Use a resource that does the heavy lifting for you — you don't need to prepare a lesson or have all the answers. A good family devotional provides Scripture, questions, and conversation starters. Your job is just to show up and lead the discussion.
Keep it short and leave them wanting more — fifteen to twenty minutes is plenty, especially when you're starting out. Ending while everyone is still engaged is far better than pushing through until someone checks out. Shorter volumes also mean your family finishes something together, which builds momentum for the next one.
Let go of the missed days — when life happens, and you skip a night, just pick up where you left off the next day. The families who sustain devotional rhythms long-term are the ones who treat a missed day as a missed day, not as a sign that the whole thing has failed.

What About When the Kids Don't Want To?

This comes up for almost every family, so it's worth addressing honestly. Resistance from kids, especially older ones, is normal, and it doesn't mean family devotions aren't working. A few things that help:

Don't force participation, but keep showing up — even a teenager who sits silently is absorbing more than you think. Your consistency is doing something even when their engagement isn't visible.
Ask for their input — let them choose the devotional topic for the week, or pick the verse, or decide where you sit. Ownership changes everything.
Make it a conversation, not a lecture — ask genuine questions and be willing to sit with the ones nobody can answer. Kids engage when they feel like their thoughts are actually welcome.
Pray for them out loud — hearing a parent pray for them specifically, vulnerably, and by name is one of the most powerful things a child can experience. It's hard to stay disengaged when someone is talking to God about you.

If you're ready to start, or start again — Together: A 7-Day Family Devotional Vol. 1 was designed exactly for this moment. It's intentionally short, which means your family will actually finish it. Each day gives you everything you need: Scripture, reflection, questions, and space to pray together, without requiring any preparation from you. It works across ages, which means everyone from your youngest to your oldest can engage with it at their own level. And at the end of seven days, your family will have built something real together.

Together: 7-Day Family Devotional

And if you want a free first step before you dive in, subscribe to our mailing list, and you'll get instant access to 5 Ways to Make Faith Part of Your Family's Week — a practical one-page guide to help you build faith into your everyday rhythms, no devotional required.

You're Not Starting From Zero

Every time you come back to this, every time you try again after a season of not, you're not starting from scratch. You're building on every prayer you've prayed, every conversation you've had, every moment your kids have seen you choose faith. The rhythm you're building doesn't have to be perfect. It just has to be yours.

Start this week. Seven days. That's all you need to give it.

Want simple, practical ways to bring faith into your family's everyday life? Subscribe to our mailing list, and you'll get instant access to our free guide — 5 Ways to Make Faith Part of Your Family's Week — plus subscriber-only discounts, first access to new releases, faith-filled tools and resources, encouragement and Scripture for your family, behind-the-scenes peeks at what's coming, and simple prompts to help you stay intentional in your home. Everything you need to keep showing up for your family, straight to your inbox.