How we can bring Scripture to life at home

Children learn in so many different ways. No one style fits all. Some are aural, some verbal, some visual, some tactile, and most are a mixture of them all. As parents, we can try to meet these different ways of learning and help Scripture feel alive and enjoyable for them at the same time.

It can be helpful to think back to our own childhood. How were Bible stories given to us? What stayed with us, and what didn’t?

I still remember pulling out my Alive-O Catholic religion book in primary school. It wasn’t just the stories themselves, but the whole atmosphere around them. Our teacher would fight with the CD player for a while, but then the room would fill with that unmistakable Alive-O intro music and everyone’s spirits would lift. To this day, my friends and I can still launch straight into those hymns without missing a beat.

There was always great engagement around the lessons too. When we learned about the Good Samaritan, we acted out what we would do in that situation. There was plenty of discussion about who would stop and who would pass by. Those moments stayed with me far longer than simply hearing the story read aloud. And of course, there were always fun colouring pages and great spaces to draw, which let us linger with the scenes in our own way after the storytelling was done.

It reminds me that while we can certainly sit and read the great stories of the Old and New Testament to our children, we can also invite them to step inside those stories in simple, playful ways.

We might build Noah’s ark together from blocks or cushions.
We might play Daniel and the lions in the garden.
We might share food with someone in need when reading about the loaves and fishes.
We might play doctor and speak about God’s healing love.

There are many small, creative ways to bring Scripture into the home in a way children can recognise and enjoy. I also notice that when Bible stories appear naturally in our play or conversation, my children become curious about them in their own way.

My toddler said to me just today, “Does Jesus have a bum?” — and to me, that’s a win. He’s thinking about Jesus at all.

Those small moments really matter.

Alongside this kind of active play, I’ve always loved the quieter side of engagement too — the way colouring lets a child stay with a story a little longer. After we had heard a Bible story in school, those Alive-O colouring pages gave us time to absorb it in our own way. There was something peaceful about filling in the scene you had just imagined.

I began looking for simple colouring pages that included both Old and New Testament stories together, but I couldn’t find something that quite gathered them in the way I hoped. So I ended up creating a small Bible Stories colouring book for our own home use, with each page paired with a short line of Scripture.

If this might be something your family would enjoy using too, you can explore it here:
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Other simple ways to bring Scripture into your home life might include:

• baking bread together and offering a small prayer of blessing
• creating simple Stations of the Cross with drawings or crafts
• making small figures or scenes from favourite Bible stories
• retelling stories through play with dolls or figures

When children meet Scripture through story, play, sound, and creativity, it becomes something familiar and loved rather than distant or abstract. These small encounters can help them come to know the Bible not only as a book we read, but as a world we are invited into.