FOLLOW ME! LENT DEVOTIONAL FOR FAMILIES

It’s a sad irony that the years when storyteller Amy Robinson and I lived in the same city never overlapped with the years of me being a parent, as I think our family would have loved her storytelling performances.

The next best thing to being able to watch Amy, though, is surely to immerse ourselves in her fabulous new family Lent devotional, ‘Follow Me!‘.

I say ‘immerse’, but let’s get this out of the way from the start: our family has recently exploded from four to six, and the only things in which we’re immersing ourselves just right now are toys, shoes, poo and melodrama. Anything else – this wonderful resource included – merely gets a toe-dip.

HOWEVER.

That doesn’t stop me from raving about Follow Me!

Family devotion times are such a tough one to navigate, with different ages, interests and timetables to contend with. But here is a resource which accommodates all that.

>>Check out 30 Creative Lent ideas for Families<<

A flexible Lent devotional

Some of the activities were too old for my under 6s – but that simply means I can use the resource for the next few years.

Some of the activities needed a bit of preparation or forethought – but then again this offered flexibility. It gave us license to extend, or cut short, as suited us.

I love how the book is so structured, and yet offers so many open possibilities.

Structure

This is how Follow Me! works.

It starts on Ash Wednesday, and follows a different Bible story each week throughout Lent. Each day there is an activity based on that Bible story. This might be a creative retelling, some history/context, a poem, questions for ‘wondering’, a craft or a prayer.

Every Sunday there’s a ‘community day’ which encourages your kids to do something simple with others. This is designed to be done within a church community, so is perfect if you attend church on a Sunday!

Spontaneity

I just love the spontaneity this book initiates. This is the fishermen’s boat on Lake Galilee. My kids chose their own props to add to Amy’s beautiful words.

You can mix and match the activities as much as you like. Perhaps you’ll pick up the resource once a week, or every day, or whenever you all manage to come together.

Unlike many devotionals, Follow Me! will work for these different levels of time commitment.

A Lent devotional with variety

I find Lent a long time in which to engage my children’s interests in the run-up to Easter. Usually we do Shrove Tuesday, and then forget about anything Easter-related until Palm Sunday.

I like the fact that this resource manages to sustain the interest with structured Bible readings leading up to Easter. Not that we’re there yet, but I can imagine my kids sticking with this resource for the next few weeks because it’s something different and active, and there’s plenty of variety.

Follow Me! is simply a family-friendly version of what us adults appreciate through Lent: the opportunity to pause, consider Jesus’ life and ministry, and ponder what it means for own lives.

>>For another 10 Fabulous Family Devotional resources click here!<<