Let’s talk family…Part 1

For almost all of us the word “family” holds vast amounts of emotion; for some there is great joy with the word, for others great pain.  However, for the majority of us it is pretty much a mix of the two.

Take me, for example; I grew up the youngest of 5 kids in a normal Middle American family… my dad was an alcoholic and my parents divorced when I was 5…like I said, normal.  Needless to say my childhood was a bit rocky.  Only because of a very loving and forgiving God and wife has adulthood been somewhat smoother.  I have, by the grace of God, been privileged to raise 3 somewhat normal, healthy kids who I love more than words can express.

But when I, even for a moment, stop and ponder all the emotions I have around the word family, they look something like this:  Joy, fulfillment, sorrow, longing, anger, hopelessness, guilt, shame, regret, past bitterness...just to name a few!

Now maybe you grew up in a picture-perfect family, if so, I am happy for you.  But for most of us our families are pretty broken and dysfunctional.  And whether we like to admit it or not, some of us had a little bit to do with that brokenness and dysfunction!  I have, greatly hurt and disappointed members of my family and in turn, I have been hurt and disappointed by them; especially those members that I have looked up to or been in authority under, like parents.

Now when I stop and think about my church family it’s pretty much the same. If you have been in the church for a while go ahead… go back and read the last paragraph with the church family in mind…does it read the same for you?

If you are new to the faith don’t lose hope.  You see as humans we live in a fallen world and we are all marred and stained by it.  All of us have been hurt and sinned against and if we are honest have also done the hurting and the sinning.  And it is no different in the church; it is made up of people who are fallen.

So where does that leave us?  Am I telling you that the family of God is no different?  By no means! What I am saying is that many of Jesus’ followers have done what God, many times, in the bible warns us not to do. And that is not to become like the world around us. This is a whole other subject.  But simply put, many of Jesus’ followers have mistaken that warning to mean, “Don’t look and act like the world”, and it does mean that to some degree.  But what God is really saying is, “Don’t THINK like the world around us”, don’t absorb the world’s ways of thinking. Don’t be; critical, power hungry, selfish, arrogant and don't act better than others; that is what the world does.

The Apostle Paul says that even though you might be able to do all kinds of great miracles; if you don’t have love for each other, you have and are… NOTHING!!!  True familial love is to be our constant and highest goal.

The Apostle John says about Christians, “You will know us by our love for each other…" Why does he say that?  Because it is really hard to LOVE… to be selfless, to overlook faults and to love each other unconditionally!  So if we REALLY love each other, the world will know that the power of Jesus is at work among us.

Jesus, who loved us when we were still his enemies and who died for us; his enemies, is the Gospel!  And that should be massively transformational.  Jesus calls us to form a new family, an “incarnational (Jesus in us) community” that is distinct and different.  It's to be known for its love for God and for each other. With a love so powerful, it transforms us into a new close-knit family, whose love for each other is so great that JESUS is the only possible explanation…

With this kind of love at work in our hearts, between us, in our Small Groups and Church gatherings, Jesus will become irresistible to those around us and we won’t be able to contain the flood.

The Collective

On occasion I would substitute teach for a school district near my home in Western Washington. For the most part I worked in the middle school and high school grades. I had worked with those age groups in the past and I was most comfortable with them. I actually like working with middle schoolers the most, crazy I know. I tell my wife it is because my mentality is about their level. There was this elementary school close to my home that needed a sub for P.E. and it basically consisted of letting six different classes of Kindergartners run around the gym for 45 minutes. Then all I had to do was send them back to their prospective teachers; piece of cake!

The year before this, my very first sub job was for a 5Th grade class at this same school. They ate me alive! I did make it through the day; barely. As a result of that, up until the successful kindergarten P.E. class, I had shied away from elementary school for obvious reasons of mental stability. However, fresh off the high of successfully teaching kindergartners P.E. I received a phone call from this elementary school indicating that they desperately needed a substitute teacher for kindergarten. I thought to myself; how hard can it be? They were so cute and harmless. When I was teaching P.E. they would randomly come up to me, wrap their arms around my leg, look up at me with their big eyes and say “I love you teacher, I wish you could always be our teacher” or some such similarly cute and endearing prattle.  So with this endearing memory in mind, when the call came in, I, in my weakened and self-delusional state of mind said, “Sure, I’d be glad to!

There are two things every teacher learns very early in their career (if they are to survive). First, you MUST stay at least one step ahead of the students and second; you must fool them into thinking that you are firmly in control of the class at all times! So when I excitedly arrived early to the classroom that day I looked over the teacher’s lesson plans and found them to be in some sort of Greek short hand. My confidence waned a little. I could not even understand half of what she had written and I could not locate any of the items the lesson plan referred to in the classroom. To make matters worse, all of the regular teachers were at a conference so none of the substitutes in classes around me knew any more than I did. When I found the principal and asked her for help, she gave me a look similar to the one a deer gives you when it’s in your headlights...so while she went off to try and call the teacher, little people started showing up. I knew I was in big trouble.

I won’t bore you with a detailed list of the day’s events...about how they destroyed the classroom, climbed all over the tables and filing cabinets; belly flopped off of tables into the stuffed animals, etc. . If I turned my attention away from the class for one second; when I looked back they would be dismantling furniture! But, I will share one fascinating insight I came away with. And that is what the Borg and Kindergartners have in common. “Resistance is Futile!!!” If you missed watching TV in the 90’s you may not know who the Borg are. They are a fictional race of cyborgs depicted in Star Trek, you know the ones; the collective… the race of pseudo-humans that all work in mindless unison. Like I was trying to say, the ones that reminds me of Kindergartners…