Your lap is their first chapel.

This morning, I was preparing for a podcast with Aimee about AlreadyLoved when a thought landed on me:

Parents are worship leaders.

Not because we’re supposed to get our kids singing louder in the backseat.

But because one of the most important things we do as parents is the same thing I’ve spent years trying to do as a worship leader:

Facilitate encounter.

For years, I’ve told worship leaders that our job isn’t to make people worship.

We can choose the songs.
We can create the environment.
We can invite people to sing.
We can point toward Jesus.

But we cannot manufacture revelation.

Worship is ultimately a response to seeing God for yourself.

And I’m beginning to think parenting is much the same.

We can teach our children Bible stories.

We can tell them about the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. The God David sang to. The God Paul preached about.

All of that matters.

But somewhere along the way, I want the God we tell them about to become their God.

Not simply a concept they inherited from us.

Someone they know.

Someone they’ve spoken to.

Someone they’ve experienced meeting them in fear, disappointment, joy and ordinary Tuesday afternoons.

Because encounter changes things.

When someone has genuinely encountered God, you can’t easily argue that experience out of them.

They may wrestle with church.

They may question things they were taught.

They may even wander for a while.

But somewhere underneath all those questions is a memory:

I know what it was like when God became real to me.

That is what I want for my children.

And it has changed the way I think about my role as a parent.

Maybe my job isn’t merely to give them the right information about God.

Maybe I’m also creating little sanctuaries.

Bedtime.

The drive to school.

A conversation after something went wrong.

A prayer whispered when they’re scared.

A moment when they ask a question I don’t have a neat answer for.

Moments where I can come alongside them and say,

Let’s see where God is in this.

I cannot make my child encounter God.

Neither can a worship leader.

But I can keep pointing.

I can keep making room.

I can keep helping them notice.

Until, one day, I’m no longer only telling them about the God I know.

They’re telling me about the God they know.

Maybe that is one of the most beautiful things parenting can become.

Your lap is their first classroom.

Let it also be their first chapel.

See you next Friday