Hope for the Family
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During my years as a youth pastor, there was a series of messages that I shared with the teenagers that I always desired to share with parents but I just never had that opportunity. Until now...
Our Starting Point is the Bible.
Our Starting Point is the Bible.
As you can tell, from the title of the message, we are going to be looking at the “family.” The way in which you look at any subject is called your “worldview.”
Worldview: The overall perspective from which one sees and interprets the world. A collection of beliefs about life and the universe held by an individual or a group.
There are basically two different worldviews that an individual can have; either a secular worldview or a Biblical worldview.
God warns us from being influenced by a secular worldview.
Beware lest any man spoil you through philosophy and vain deceit, after the tradition of men, after the rudiments of the world, and not after Christ.
A Biblical worldview begins with the mind of Christ.
Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus:
What is Christ’s mind on the subject of the family? Well, we can find it in the pages of Scripture.
All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness:
That the man of God may be perfect, throughly furnished unto all good works.
Therefore, our starting point, will be God’s Word. And, we will continually go back to God’s Word to help us better understand “Family.”
Family was created by God.
Family was created by God.
And God said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness: and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth.
So God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them.
And God blessed them, and God said unto them, Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it: and have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that moveth upon the earth.
Family is not a man-made institution. It is a God-ordained institution. Therefore, to properly understand it, we must understand it from God’s perspective. Since God created the family, He alone has the right to define what it is and how it operates.
Men (and women) were created.
Men (and women) were created.
So God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them.
Notice. That verse says, “God created...”
Contrary to what many in the world think, men and women did not evolve.
This point right here is very illustrative of the importance of our starting point - our worldview.
God created men and women.
God created men and women.
That verse also says, “…male and female created He them.”
Again, contrary to what many in the world think, you were either created as a male or as a female.
Academy Award-winner, Charlize Theron, revealed that her eldest child is transgender. According to the actress, Jackson, 7, was assigned male at birth but told Theron four years ago that she was actually a girl.
“Yes, I thought she was a boy, too,” the 43-year-old admitted to The Daily Mail. “Until she looked at me when she was three years old and said, ‘I am not a boy!'”
This too is illustrative of the importance of our starting point. It is quite likely that, if I were to have the opportunity to sit down with this actress and discuss this matter, that the conversation would not be too fruitful. Why? Because we are coming at it from a different starting point - a different worldview.
God brought Adam and Eve together in marriage creating the first family.
God brought Adam and Eve together in marriage creating the first family.
Turn to and read Genesis 2:18-25.
Jesus Christ, the Son of God, put His stamp of approval upon marriage and family.
And he answered and said unto them, Have ye not read, that he which made them at the beginning made them male and female,
And said, For this cause shall a man leave father and mother, and shall cleave to his wife: and they twain shall be one flesh?
Wherefore they are no more twain, but one flesh. What therefore God hath joined together, let not man put asunder.
God added to this first family when Cain and Abel were born.
And Adam knew Eve his wife; and she conceived, and bare Cain, and said, I have gotten a man from the Lord.
And she again bare his brother Abel. And Abel was a keeper of sheep, but Cain was a tiller of the ground.
Biblically, a family consists of a man and a woman, joined in marriage, and, should the Lord see fit, any children that are born to that family.
As God defines marriage and the family, it’s really not that complicated.
Again, this is illustrative of why it’s important to understand a person’s starting point - their worldview.
However...
Dr. Paul Amato, the president of the National Council on Family Relations, said...
At various times in my career I have returned to a perennial question: What is a family? As a researcher, I claim to study families. But if you were to ask me for a definition of family, I would probably get tongue-tied and mumble something like, "Well, there are different ways of thinking about it…."
He went on to say...
The U.S. Census Bureau defines a family in the following manner: "A family is a group of two people or more (one of whom is the householder) related by birth, marriage, or adoption and residing together."
The main limitation of this definition is that most people do not define families in this fashion.
The world has made something - marriage and the family - very complicated which, in God’s eyes, should not be that complicated.
Whereas family was created by God...
Family is being destroyed by Satan.
Family is being destroyed by Satan.
You can count on this - Satan hates you; he hates your marriage; he hates your children.
The family has been under attach since time began and continues until this present day.
One secular psychologist said...
“It seems almost everyone claims to be from a dysfunctional family.”
However, since sin entered into the world, every family has been a dysfunctional family!
Adam and Eve gave birth to the first murderer, Cain. Cain killed his brother, Abel, because he couldn’t have his own way.
Lot willingly offered his two daughters to the men of Sodom. Thanks, Dad!
Isaac and Rebekah played favorites with their sons, Jacob and Esau. Rebekah helped her son, Jacob, impersonate his brother Esau so that he could receive the family blessing from his father. That didn’t go over too well!
Jacob, the name sake of the nation of Israel, had two wives and two mistresses. (The Bible doesn’t sugar coat anything!) Talk about a dysfunctional family! As if that wasn’t bad enough, Jacob also played favorites. Joseph was his favorite. Because of jealousy and hatred, Joseph’s step brothers sold him into slavery and then lied about it to their father.
King David, a man after God’s own heart, was not perfect by any stretch of the imagination. He also had several wives. He had a son that committed incest with one of his step-sisters. He had a son that took rebellion to a whole new level. He attempted to take the kingdom from David and, in the process, lost his life.
And, just so you don’t think that those “in the ministry” have it any easier...
The high priest, Eli, had two sons, Hophni and Phineas, they are described in 1 Samuel...
Now the sons of Eli were sons of Belial; they knew not the Lord.
Wherefore the sin of the young men was very great before the Lord: for men abhorred the offering of the Lord.
Even the great prophet and judge, Samuel, had a dysfunctional family...
And it came to pass, when Samuel was old, that he made his sons judges over Israel.
Now the name of his firstborn was Joel; and the name of his second, Abiah: they were judges in Beer-sheba.
And his sons walked not in his ways, but turned aside after lucre, and took bribes, and perverted judgment.
I like how one preacher from the last century put it...
“Many a minister of a church has the same hard time [domestic crises], bearing a heavy personal cross while having to present a composed image in public.”
There is hope for the family - in Christ!
There is hope for the family - in Christ!
But Jesus beheld them, and said unto them, With men this is impossible; but with God all things are possible.
I am the vine, ye are the branches: He that abideth in me, and I in him, the same bringeth forth much fruit: for without me ye can do nothing.