XP3 Fam wk2

BOTTOM LINE

Your family doesn’t have to be perfect for God to use it.

INTRODUCTION

Q: What’s your favorite fictional TV family?

[Give students a chance to shout out their answers.]

INTERACTIVE: Perfect TV Family

I think there used to be more TV shows of Perfect TV families.

There would be the Mom and Dad and their big happy family — Dad able to fix everyone’s problems in a half hour.

One of those Shows was -GROWING PAINS

video slide

Mike would get up to some shenanigans

or one of the other siblings would have some sort of problem at school or with friends

then Mom and Dad would talk to them and poof everything was OK.

You know one of the reasons we love watching TV families — and sometimes just TV in general

IS becasue it puts us in a make believe world.

Our families are far less perfect than the ones on TV

Real families are usually a lot more messy and complicated than TV families.

A lot of times we can look at the pastor up front and think their life is perfect - we probably know its not but that doesn’t stop us from thinking it.

But heres the thing — when I was a kid there was a lot of less than perfect stuff about my family.

TENSION

I know you can relate because your family has had a few less-than-perfect moments of their own!

Maybe you feel like your family situation is a lot more messier than other people’s

Its not just that your family isn’t perfect — but your family is a BIG MESS.

Maybe there’s a lot of tension in your home. Some families slam doors,

argue a lot, or yell.

Some families have a lot going on, but never actually talk about it. but you can still sense the tension in the room.

And that tension makes your house a stressful place to live.

Or maybe you’ve discovered some things about people in your family that you wish you didn’t know. ---- Secrets that have hurt people and caused problems in your home.

For Some, the problem in your family comes from something really serious. Something like abuse, or neglect, or addiction, or abandonment.

You may feel really alone in those situations, and if you are, I want to encourage you To open up to an adult here like your Small Group Leader who can help you navigate that in a healthy way.

Or maybe your family is facing other big problems. You’re dealing with things like divorce, remarriage, a parent who left and never looked back, siblings who are always in trouble. Maybe it’s even something like illness or death. Things like that can certainly leave your family feeling less than perfect.

But remember --no family is a perfect family.

Here is the PROBLEM THOUGHT-- we think that nothing good could ever come from an imperfect family.

That God couldn’t use a family like mine BECAUSE WE ARE JACKED UP!

OR That God couldn’t use us if we come from a MESSE UP FAMILY.

But that couldn’t be further from the truth.

TRUTH

YOU KNOW WHAT I LOVE about the Bible:

most of the people in it are kind of messed up.

Their lives weren’t perfect, and a lot of their families weren’t either!

In fact, there’s one family in the Bible

That — Not only was their family totally dysfunctional I mean it was MESSED UP!! but God still did big things through them.

The story starts with a man named Abraham.

God promised Abraham a lot of descendants, and He promised to use that family in a big way. Pretty cool, right?

INTERACTIVE: Twin Rivals

Abraham had a son named Isaac who had two sons—twins named Jacob and Esau

Even though they were twins, these two guys were very different from each other.

They looked different, they acted different, they had different interests. And all these differences caused a lot of drama between the two boys.

Now, here’s where it gets crazy. Even though Jacob and Esau were twins,

Esau was born first.

Being the firstborn was a big deal.

For one, being the firstborn meant that Esau got the birthright

he would be in charge of the family wealth and property when their father Isaac died.

And second, being the firstborn meant Esau got the blessing

he’d receive the family’s future wealth and prosperity.

Since this family came from Abraham, Esau’s blessing also included all of the promises that God had made to Abraham.

Promises to make their name great, to do big things with their family, and to bless all people through this one family.

As you can imagine, Jacob, the younger twin, didn’t love his situation because as the second born, he wasn’t going to get the birthright or the blessing!

Now their mother, Rebekah, favored Jacob over Esau.

So together, Jacob and his mom came up with a plan.

First, Jacob convinced Esau to promise the birthright to him. And honestly, it didn’t take much convincing. Esau was starving, so Jacob offered him some food in exchange for his birthright.

Doesn’t seem like an even trade to me, but haven’t we all made some crazy decisions when we’re hungry?!- We will hike up a mountain if we think there is Ice cream on top.

With the birthright now his, all Jacob needed was to trick his father Isaac into giving the blessing to him instead of his brother Esau.

Now because Isaac was older and toward the end of his life, his eyesight wasn’t so great. When it came time to give Esau the family blessing, Jacob’s mom helped disguise Jacob as his brother, Esau, so that Isaac would give him Esau’s blessing.

And here’s the crazy thing . . . it worked! Isaac gave Jacob the blessing that was promised to Esau!

Of course, when Esau came in a few moments later, he had no idea what his brother Jacob had done. When their father, Isaac, realized what had happened, look at how it played out:

When Esau heard his father’s words, he burst out with a loud and bitter cry and said to his father, “Bless me—me too, my father!”

But he said, “Your brother came deceitfully and took your blessing.”

Esau said, “Isn’t he rightly named Jacob? This is the second time he has taken advantage of me: He took my birthright, and now he’s taken my blessing!” Then he asked, “Haven’t you reserved any blessing for me?”

Isaac answered Esau, “I have made him lord over you and have made all his relatives his servants, and I have sustained him with grain and new wine. So what can I possibly do for you, my son?”

Esau said to his father, “Do you have only one blessing, my father? Bless me too, my father!” Then Esau wept aloud (Genesis 27:34-38 NIV).

it only got worse from there.

Esau was so mad he planned to kill his brother!

So mom sent Jacob away

Whats my point?

You would agree that this was a pretty messed up family right?

My Point is this But in spite of all that, God still had an important future planned for them.

He had promised something great to Abraham, and a messed-up family wasn’t going to change that. Their family didn’t have to be perfect for God to use them.

You know whats neat thousands of years after this happened, the writer of a book in the Bible called Hebrews looked back on this story.

and you know what he wrote? — He wrote — about how Issac’s family his 2 boys were a mess — they were a lost cause

NO that’s not what he wrote

Instead, they wrote this:

By faith Isaac blessed Jacob and Esau in regard to their future (Hebrews 11:20 NIV).

See, Isaac did eventually pass on a blessing to Esau.

It wasn’t the same as the original blessing that Jacob stole, but it was something.

It was an act of faith. Even though there were a lot of really bad moments in their family, the very act of Isaac passing on a blessing in his family was an act of faith.

It was a way of saying, “I believe what God said about our family is true. I believe He has something good for us in the future.”

God had a plan for this imperfect family.

And even in the middle of so much pain and so many problems, they trusted Him to come through.

your family doesn’t have to be perfect for God to use it.

APPLICATION

— If God can use a messed up family all those years ago

He’ll do the same for your family today.

You don’t have to be perfect for God to use you, and your family members don’t have to be perfect for God to use them.

You don’t have to come from a perfect family to be able to do amazing things. What a relief, right?

Here’s what I want you to try:

1. Choose to believe God is working anyway.

Your family will mess up. They aren’t perfect. Your siblings will borrow your stuff without asking. Your step-mom will yell at you. Your dad will disappoint you. No matter what your fam looks like, they aren’t going to be perfect.

The next time that happens, instead of getting frustrated and shutting down, have faith that God will somehow use your family anyway. That He’s working for your good. That He’s with you in the mess of your fam.

2. Stay connected to your family. Most of us tend to want to avoid our families when things get messy.

We stay in our room, we put our ear buds in, we keep our eyes glued to the screen.

We just ignore everyone and everything.

But what instead, ----stay connected?

What if you tried to talk to your mom, or hang out with your grandpa, or forgive your siblings?

Now here’s the thing: For some staying connected to your family isn’t the best option.

In fact, it’s not an option at all. Because the stuff that makes your family imperfect is more than just frustrations or annoyances.

It’s abuse, neglect, alcohol, drugs—it’s the kind of stuff that makes staying connected to your family simply not safe.

If that’s you, I want to encourage you to instead, connect with someone who is like family.

Open up to a Small Group Leader, a teacher, a neighbor, a coach, or any trusted adult in your life who cares about you.

Connect with them about what’s happening in your home so that they can help you take the best next step. I know that may be scary, but adults like your Small Group Leader are here for that very purpose: to connect with you when you need it the most!

LANDING

Remember, your family doesn’t have to be perfect for God to use it. God uses imperfect people and families all the time.

Now, as you head to Small Group—Remember you are not the only one with an imperfect family.

Maybe the person sitting next to you has a story similar to yours.

It’s normal to feel like you’re the only one going through something, but what’s great about your Small Group is that you can connect with someone who knows how you feel. And in the process of doing that, you get a chance to learn about all the things God is doing in your lives.

As you head to group I want you to think about this question: What’s one great thing you hope God will do in your family?