Family: Distinct and Committed
Notes
Transcript
Handout
The Challenge
The Challenge
The Bible has very clear standards for the family.
Those standards don’t always seem compassionate or safe.
How should Christians view the family?
Matthew 19:1-9
Matthew 19:1-9
Why does Jesus set such high standards for relationships?
Some Pharisees came to him to test him. They asked, “Is it lawful for a man to divorce his wife for any and every reason?”
The Pharisees are looking at standards as the expectations of good moral behavior. This is about judgment.
Jesus is looking at human nature—not judging people, but being honest about what humans need for flourishing.
“Haven’t you read,” he replied, “that at the beginning the Creator ‘made them male and female,’ and said, ‘For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two will become one flesh’? So they are no longer two, but one flesh. Therefore what God has joined together, let no one separate.”
We think of this happening at the wedding, when two independent people consent to a contract, and God now holds them to that behavior.
Weddings were not contracts, and they were not officiated by religious leaders.
So when does this happen? They become attached when they become one flesh.
Human beings attach to each other. That’s our nature.
Sex forms attachments.
Human beings attach to each other, and they need attachment.
Kids need attachment.
Communities need attachment.
This is where Jesus is going: God made us as barnacles, so that should be our first clue.
I tell you that anyone who divorces his wife, except for sexual immorality, and marries another woman commits adultery.”
Christians disagree about how to apply this—it’s one of the places that feels uncharitable—but at its base, Jesus is saying that divorce always leaves a mark.
I’ve heard people say, I wish I had found my second wife first.
I’ve never heard someone say, I love my wife, but I wish she was my second wife.
Broken attachments always causes damage.
It damages the couple.
It damages the kids.
It damages friends and family.
It damages the community.
But it’s important to be clear about what Jesus means by divorce.
“Why then,” they asked, “did Moses command that a man give his wife a certificate of divorce and send her away?”
Jesus replied, “Moses permitted you to divorce your wives because your hearts were hard. But it was not this way from the beginning.
If marriage is primarily a contract, then divorce is the ending of the contract.
But in this passage, they distinguish between divorce and certificate.
Divorce was “dismissal.” A dismissed wife had no citizenship.
The certificate was a protection for the woman.
Jesus is not condemning the ending of the contract. He is condemning the severing of the attachment.
We’ve held onto the legal severance as the worst sin, but it’s not a sin at all.
It is a protection against a sin, like self-defense.
Just because you aren’t divorced doesn’t mean your relationship is right.
Just because you asked for the divorce doesn’t mean you were the sinner.
The problem is the severed attachment.
The disciples say, if this is how it works, then attachments are hardly worth it. And Jesus basically says, “Yep.”
So what hope is there for us?
Ephesians 5:21-33
Ephesians 5:21-33
How does Jesus help us reach those standards?
Paul has high expectations for the church, and these expectations-combined with the prohibition of divorce—is what we’re afraid of.
But notice, how does Jesus help?
Wives, submit yourselves to your own husbands as you do to the Lord. For the husband is the head of the wife as Christ is the head of the church, his body, of which he is the Savior. Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit to their husbands in everything.
Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her to make her holy, cleansing her by the washing with water through the word, and to present her to himself as a radiant church, without stain or wrinkle or any other blemish, but holy and blameless.
Where do wives learn submission? From the church.
Where do husbands learn love? From the church.
Think about it: if you have a stable marriage, the following is probably true:
You had people model marriage and responsibility for you
You had support when you chose to get married
You’ve had support during your marriage.
It takes a community to raise a marriage.
Premarital counseling is a joke.
This is why the commands of scripture seem so uncompassionate to us: because we have taken a standard for a community and placed the full responsibility on the couple.
When we decide our positions on divorce, remarriage, gender roles, etc., they need to be connected with our understanding of the church community role.
When the church was firm on these standards, they were also more involved in relationships.
Puritan wives could bring marital problems to the elders.
When they forced couples to reunite, there was a church leader responsible for checking in on them.
The whole community was involved in keeping the peace.
A responsible position on Christian standards:
If you expect people to get married, but won’t help them start well...
If you expect struggling couples to stay together, but won’t get actively involved in supporting and sustaining them...
If you expect wives to submit to their husbands, but you won’t let the church hold that husband accountable...
If you expect women to return to their husbands, but you won’t take responsibility for her safety...
If you expect divorced people to stay unmarried, but you won’t provide them with the attachments in the church that can sustain them...
Conclusion
Conclusion
Here’s what I see when I look around: I see pieces of families.
Our culture puts families in a blender.
But remember what Jesus said:
“Truly I tell you,” Jesus replied, “no one who has left home or brothers or sisters or mother or father or children or fields for me and the gospel will fail to receive a hundred times as much in this present age: homes, brothers, sisters, mothers, children and fields—along with persecutions—and in the age to come eternal life.
I also see a family. I see us being this family to each other, making attachments.
Response:
Response:
Maybe you aren’t part of that family, and you want it. Jesus is the only perfectly secure attachment. He will never leave or forsake you, and that attachment has the power to totally transform you.
Maybe you’ve broken an attachment, and you haven’t taken responsibility for the damage it has caused. The point isn’t judgment and condemnation, the point is healing. We cannot heal if we do not acknowledge the reality of the wound.
Maybe you are feeling convicted over a broken attachment. Remember that those standards do not exist to shame those who fail—we all fail. They exist to remind us of what is possible in Christ: what is ALWAYS possible. Redemption, reconciliation, all are possible. Don’t be overwhelmed by guilt—be inspired by the power of God’s grace to transform your future.
Maybe you are looking for a family. That is what we are striving to be.
For all of us: please come to the prayer meeting tonight, where we will talk about this.
This is what God has been showing me over the past year or so: the family he is building is the main thing. We have a chance to make that main thing THE main thing, but it takes the congregation.
If you can’t, then think and pray about what role God is calling you to play in his family.
