This past weekend my congregation kicked off the fall schedule with a focus on building faith in the home. The title for our fall focus is “Faith Acts In The Home.” This name was drawn from materials shared by Rev. Dr. Rich Melheim in his book Holding Your Family Together. In this book, he also outlines a simple and powerful tool for fellow Christians, especially families, to us in order to draw closer to each other in life and faith. This tool is called the “Faith5”. The concept is that a family or small group of Christian friends gathers together for about 15 minutes every day, preferably just before bed, to do five simple things. First, each person shares a high and a low for the day. Next, a brief passage from the Bible is read. Third, they talk about how the Bible passage relates to their highs and lows for the day. Fourth, they pray with and for each other. Finally, they bless each other with simple words of blessing and the sign of the cross on the forehead.
My family has been using this process in a loose form for many years. This last couple of weeks we’ve been doing the “Faith5” more “formally.” We’ve found it to be a GREAT blessing in bringing us close to each other and filling our heads and hearts with the comfort of Christ at the ending of the day.
In the church, we’ve been using the “Faith5” in multiple settings; men’s group, meeting devotions, staff meetings, prayer groups, youth group, catechism class and more. There was a bit of “fear and trepidation” at first, but the highs have far outweighed the lows.
I’m sharing this because it’s another example of how our families and friendships grow stronger when we put Christ FIRST. The “Faith5” is all about keeping our “thumbs up” to Jesus. And, just as I’ve used the hand with its 5 fingers as an illustration for keeping our 5 levels of relationships in the right priority, so also the 5 fingers help us keep the “Faith5” in order. The “Faith5” … a great tool for keeping our “thumbs up” to Jesus that fits like a glove on a hand.
By Kim Keegan