Families, Church & Discipleship (vi) Matt.19:28-30
If any brother has a wife who is not a believer and she is willing to live with him, he must not divorce her. And if a woman has a husband who is not a believer and he is willing to live with her, she must not divorce him. For the unbelieving husband has been sanctified through his wife, and the unbelieving wife has been sanctified through her believing husband. Otherwise your children would be unclean, but as it is, they are holy. But if the unbeliever leaves, let it be so. The brother or the sister is not bound in such circumstances; God has called us to live in peace....
(I Cor.7:12-15)
Still another said, “I will follow you, Lord; but first let me go back and say goodbye to my family.” Jesus replied, “No one who puts a hand to the plough and looks back is fit for service in the kingdom of God.”.
(Lk.9:61-62)
One of the most disturbing things about Jesus (and yet amongst the most natural and appropriate) is His relentless claim to absolute priority amongst all our priorities. It locks us into one of the deep paradoxes of the Christian faith. When we refuse Christ’s claim and allow other relationships, people, ambitions, or concerns to usurp His position, we find those things we have prized so highly lose their ability to satisfy. It turns out they have the capacity to fulfil only insofar as they find their place under Christ in our affections.
That is as true of family as it is of everything else. When we idolise family, believing we can never be fulfilled without one, then even if we find we are part of one it will be unable to bear the weight of expectation we have placed upon it. Children can so easily become the principal focus of a parent’s life. And parents can easily expect to be the centre of their children’s universe. As with so many things in the Christian life, balance and context needs to be in place. Families are God’s idea. Parents can have a breath-takingly sacrificial love for their children. Children should love and honour their parents. But all this undeniable ‘good’ is relativized by Christ’s prior claim on all involved. Parents are themselves first and foremost children of God; and every Christian parent longs for their children to find their identity and purpose in their common Lord.
Such ‘loss’ can feel an impossible wrench. And yet, if we dare believe Him, giving Christ His proper place will allow everything else to find their proper place. It is in losing, that we find. It is in giving, that we receive. It is in dying, that we live. Such is the way of the Kingdom. And herein lies the path of liberty. James reminds us that captivity to the ways of God is path of freedom (1:25). We may find that when we submit to His decrees, what we had once rejected as unrealistic foolishness turns out to be the very wisdom we had craved. Many saints have learned these lessons the hard way. We clutch that which is so precious to us so tightly, it cannot thrive. We let go only when we could hold on no longer. But at the very moment we felt we would lose everything, that it must slip through our fingers, we had for the first time a firmer grip than we could ever have dreamed. And we wonder why we didn’t understand, or trust, the wisdom of Christ sooner.
‘All that we have comes from you, and of your own do we give you’. Like much of our liturgy, when we don’t understand what it is supposed to do, it can glide over our tongue while we barely notice it. And yet the words carry eternal truth. Family life, with all its joys and sorrows, struggles and rewards, comes from Him. It is His and remains His even as He gives it to us. That is what Christ is calling on us to recognise. Our responsibility as parents is to structure His family according to His wisdom. Our responsibility as a Church is to ensure that we know His wisdom, and that we support each other in leaning into it. Our temptation is to dislodge this Divine economy, to disregard this Divine Wisdom.
For some Christians however, faithfulness to Christ will mean actual loss. The ‘internal’ re-ordering of priorities will have ‘external’ consequences. Family will reject and be rejected. And Jesus’ extraordinary claim is that even such ‘loss’ is gain. There is not a fundamentally different dynamic at work. The same principles apply. His claim is that in both this age and the age to come there will be a more than adequate recompense. Blessed is the Church that can be the fulfilment of Jesus’ promise. Where those who endure such loss will receive a hundred times as much in this present age (Mk.10:30). Where those who lose everything for His sake, find more than they sacrificed. And woe to the Church that will not...
Questions
What have you found most helpful and affirming about this series? ...and what has been most challenging? ... or what have you disagreed with?
What changes – if any - do you think we need to implement to help MIE grow into the structures of family and Church family life that we see in the Bible?
Read Matt.19:28-30
Can you trace the logic that leads from Jesus’ parables in vv.16-26, to what he says in these verses? Why do you think that what Jesus says in 19:21 doesn’t constitute a general principle for Christian discipleship? ...or does it?
Why is it that so few rich people will be saved (v.23-24)? Do you think this is what Jesus is teaching? How do you guard yourself against the dangers of riches?
Why do the disciples react as they do in v.25, and v.27?
Given the high priority for family in Scripture, under what circumstances would it be a legitimate option for a Christian to leave (v.29)?
What is Jesus seeking to convey about His own future, the future of the Creation, and the future of the Church in v.28?
How does our hope for our future with Christ in a renewed creation feed into the decisions we make about our discipleship here and now? How does it help when we are called on to make sacrifices for His sake?
How can we make sure that children and y.p. at MIE have that hope securely in place, and that they understand how their future hope enables their present discipleship?
How as parents, and as a Church, can we raise children and young people who will so recognise the worth of Christ that they will sacrifice all else for Him? Is that what we want for the children and y.p. growing up through MIE?
Memory Passage:
“Do not suppose that I have come to bring peace to the earth. I did not come to bring peace, but a sword. For I have come to turn ‘a man against his father, a daughter against her mother, a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law - a man’s enemies will be the members of his own household.’ Anyone who loves their father or mother more than me is not worthy of me; anyone who loves their son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me”.
Matt.10:35-37
Going Deeper:
During a recent evening service, we were reflecting on King David’s greatest desire for Solomon. Lying on his death-bed, the old king calls his son and charges him: “I am about to go the way of all the earth,” he said. “So be strong, act like a man, and observe what the Lord your God requires: Walk in obedience to him, and keep his decrees and commands, his laws and regulations, as written in the Law of Moses...”. One of our observations that evening was the tragedy of this moment. David has done desperately little to train Solomon – or any of his children - to walk in the ways of the Lord (see e.g. I Kings 1:6). Without a backdrop of discipline and instruction, David’s dying wish has a certain pathos. As he prepares to ‘go the way of all the earth’, David sees with incredible clarity what is of genuine importance, and longs for Solomon to ‘walk in obedience’ to the Lord. We know the in spite of Solomon’s love for God (I Kings 3:3), his involvement in worship, and even his evangelism, in the final analysis, he couldn’t ever walk in obedience’. In the end his compromise leads to his heart turning away from the Lord, and his spiritual heritage is squandered (I Kings 11:4-6).
What we see played out here in one family, can resonate with an entire culture. When a society no longer thinks it important to retain a knowledge of God, He hands them over to ‘a depraved mind so that they do what ought not to be done’ (Rom.1:28). Perhaps an unexpected symptom is ‘they disobey their parents’ (Rom.1:30). But then again, perhaps it isn’t so surprising after all. Children who do not learn obedience will struggle to know how to ‘keep His decrees and commands, his laws and regulations’, or even to understand why they should do so. That is bad news for the Church... and for the society built on it.
