The Goodness of Family

Have you ever taken someone for granted and not understood their importance until they were gone? Sometimes the good things in our lives are like background music that we don’t even know is playing. A few years ago, I was listening to a news report about how to fix some of the societal problems in depressed areas, and various solutions were offered such as better education, better healthcare, counseling, and more social services in general. I was fascinated that at no point did any of the reporters mention the word family or talk in any way about how to restore and/or strengthen families. Yet, I can show you in study after study that family breakdown precedes larger societal breakdown. Family is so fundamental to our well-being that we sometimes take it for granted and only feel its lack when we see so many people hurt by not having it.

Even Christian ministries can get so focused on doing social good and sharing the good news about Jesus that we can take family for granted. I was reading 1 Timothy 5 the other day where Paul is instructing Timothy and the church about how to take care of widows who would otherwise be destitute. In the midst of encouraging the church to this good social work, Paul makes this comment in verse 8, “But if anyone does not provide for his relatives, and especially for members of his household, he has denied the faith and is worse than an unbeliever.” The family was so central in society that Paul assumes that even non-Christians would take care of their relatives, and that the church should only have to come along and help those who have no family to take care of them.

The Bible story is a family story from the creation account of the first family to the Old Testament history which follows family lines, and into the New Testament where Christ comes to adopt people into a new eternal family. While the church should be a family, it is clear from Paul’s admonition that it does not replace the physical family. We were created to function best in families. Most men and women have a natural and God-given desire to have a mate and so should seek to get married. Marriage is one of the good things God has given us, and we should show and tell young people about its goodness. Further, kids were meant to be raised with their Dad and Mom in a secure marriage, and on average have much better outcomes when they are.

Even as we age, having family is the best social security that you can have. Just like in Paul’s day, it is still much better to have family to rely upon than an impersonal government program. The other day, I got to take a 4 generation picture with my dad, my son, and my granddaughter, and later this week, our family will celebrate my wife’s parent’s 50th anniversary. It is great being part of a legacy of faith and family that runs for generations. While none of us is perfect and our families are not perfect, our parents have given us a firm foundation upon which to continue building no matter what happens in the wider society around us.

Furthermore, families built on the solid foundation of Jesus have the physical and emotional resources to reach out in love to those in society that do not have that foundation. In my next article I want to highlight how the church can and should be a welcoming family to those who do not have that legacy of faith and family, so that their lives can be changed and solid families can be built that create new legacies.

How Kids Help Us Grow

Here is an article I wrote for the Oakland Independent in December 2016. 

Children are a gift from the Lord: they are a reward from him . . . Blessed is the man whose quiver is full of them. Psalm 127:3 & 5

Much of our focus during the Christmas season is making it a special time for kids. From buying them just the right present to going to Christmas programs, we spend lots of time and money on our kids. At various times kids may seem like blessing or a burden, but recently I have seen how God has used my kids to help me grow. Here are some of those lessons:

From the first smile on a young babies face to a preschooler bunny hopping across the stage at the Christmas program, kids bring great joy to our lives. Experiencing life with them lets us return to the carefree times of having fun without the burdens of adult life. I love to get down on a kids level and have fun with them. It puts a smile on their face and on mine.

But kids are not all smiles, hugs and bunny hops. Often they are downright naughty, and God can use this to teach us patience and perseverance. I have become convinced that it takes about 100 times of repeating some correction for a child to finally learn a new behavior or boundary. If we give up on try 90, the child suffer and so will we. They will not learn to behave the way they should and everyone else will be impacted by their wrong behavior, so for their sake and ours we need to learn to persevere.

Furthermore, in training our kids, we have to constantly be learning. Each stage of child's life requires new ways to teach them and even to communicate with them. You cannot discipline a 16 year old who can now out wrestle you in the same way you did when he was 8. Likewise each child is different, so techniques that worked so well for one child completely fail for the next. If we don't grow in wisdom as parents, we will not be successful in helping our kids live wisely.

Further, if we don't grow in love for our kids, we will not go through the hardship of training them properly. Love is desiring the best for the other person, and kids by their very dependence force us to live for someone other than ourselves. If we resent this and don't grow in love, we become a bitter and angry, which turns our kids against us. On the other hand, if we can learn to love our kids unconditionally many of our imperfections in other areas will be forgiven, and when they mess up they will learn it is safe to confess and restore the relationship.

Finally, even with the best of efforts, we need to learn to trust our kids into God's hands. As much as we may plan, we cannot control the future, ours or theirs, so we should learn to turn them over to Him. He loves them more than we do, so it is safe to release them to Him. I have already released one son to God's hand for eternity, and I know that pretty soon my other four kids are going to grow up and leave home (or at least I hope so!).  We may as well surrender them daily to Him now so that when they leave us we have already learned to trust God with them.

Now some of you reading this may not have any kids of your own or your kids are grown and you need to relearn some of these truth, so I would invite you to invest your life in kids or even adults who need mentoring. Many kids need mentors in their lives, and when we invest our lives in others, God uses them to help us grow.