FAMILY OF GOD

FAMILY OF GOD

Luke 8:19 – 21;   1 John 4:20

The song “The Family of God” has the following verse in it.

You will notice we say brother and sister  round here,
It's because we're a family with loved ones so near;
When one has a heartache, we all share the tears,
And rejoice in each victory in this family so dear. 
The song said we are brothers and sisters, spiritual siblings, family.

As Christians we are family you know.
God is our Father.
We are a family that has a reunion every week. We get to see each other for what we really are; and it isn't always a pleasant sight. It seldom is in our physical families either.
We each have our faults, prejudices, preferences, and strengths.
As in our physical families our church family may have disagreements.       
We each have our own way, the best way of course, of doing things. Often we just cannot understand how someone else can do them differently.
We can be thin-skinned, finding offense where there is none intended.
Some of us can be a little too strange for others. Some of us come from a totally different perspective than others.
Despite these differences and disagreements we must truly love, pray for and support each other.

I am not saying that we should condone every action in the name of love. That is not truly loving. Jesus certainly did not condone sin when He drove the money changers out of the temple, saved the woman from being stoned to death, or talked with the woman at the well. What He did do was love the people to repentance. He showed them their need to repent of their sins and then continued to shower them with love. Can we do less?

What are the major interactions of a church family?
What spiritual principles do we see operating in a successful church family?
I believe they are the same principles that operate in a successful physical family.

They are:

LOVE

PATIENCE

            FORBEARANCE

            COMPASSION
           
            UNITY

            LOVE

I put love first and last because it is the glue that holds everything together. How can we claim to have a loving relationship with God when we don't have one with our brothers and sisters? How can we say we love God, whom we haven't seen, if we don't love our fellow man, who we do see? (1 John 4:20) This makes absolutely no sense.

Church is similar to our experience when learning to do anything. We are trying to be like Christ and please God. The Bible instructs us; the ministry, instructs us (when we let them); and our study teachers instruct us (when we let them). We accept this. But when someone unexpected, or a person we consider unacceptable, or a newer person in Christ tries to help us, we back off and become offended. 

How can that person help me? Why, I’ve been a Christian much longer than they have. Look at all of the problems they have! Who are they to tell me I am wrong, acting badly, or need to repent? Who are they indeed? They might very well be God's method of speaking to us in love. God's method of bringing us a little closer to Him. God using our spiritual siblings to help us grow.

We need patience and forbearance with each other.
We need to love each other and allow each other to make mistakes. We all will make mistakes.
We must to be willing to take and give reproof and instruction in accordance with the Word of God. To do that we need to be in a right relationship with God and each other. We cannot do this if we harbor ill feelings. If we harbor offenses, real or imagined, if we refuse to deal with someone because of personal feelings. Our work for God is far above that sort of thing. 
We need to allow others, and ourselves to make mistakes and recover. To learn to be Christians.
That leads us into compassion. Understanding where the other person is coming from. Being willing to love them, in spite of, or perhaps because of, circumstances. To be willing to accept a person where they are and allow them to grow at the rate and in the areas God dictates.
                        To love the individual separate from their actions.
I was brought up in a dysfunctional home. My parents were divorced (a nasty divorce at that) and most of the family did not speak with each other. I left home and was no longer felt I had a family. I was alone, period. I became a weekend hippie (I had a straight job during the week). I wore love beads, peace medals, Neru jackets and had semi-long hair. (But I did not do drugs.) I then met a wonderful young lady, Joyce, who was a Born Again Christian. Our dates were mostly going to church meetings. In October of 1968, at a revival in Waterford, PA I gave myself to the Lord. An amazing thing happened, I GAINED A FAMILY. A family of Christians who loved me, just loved me not because of or despite my former life but because I was a Child of God.

The world does not really understand this. The world says people have to earn love.

Christ teaches us to love……… period.

The fact someone is alive, a creation of God, is enough reason to love them.
To do less is not sufficient.
This is how a loving family works.
Forgiveness and compassion are evident.
I am not saying that we will, or should, always agree.
I am saying that we are to love each other always, especially when we don't agree.
Love must not be withheld because of disagreement.

But the rules are not in question. All of the family knows the rules. All family members break some part of the rules from time to time. God has given us our boundaries. We constantly stray outside of them. God, because of His love for us and the blood of Christ, constantly forgives us. How can we do less for each other?

Now we come to unity. All of the things I have mentioned develop a sense of unity among a family. The love, patience, forbearance, and compassion build a bond that is extremely difficult to break. When a person leaves the family of believers they will be loved back much sooner than they would return because of condemnation.

A person will become a Christian and join a body of believers because of the love they see much quicker than because of the judgment they see. The love of Christ keeps a person.
We need to recognize the wages of sin, but emphasize the blessings of love. Remembering the acts of love within the spiritual family keeps us together, just as they do in the physical family.
We, as a church, have a stronger bond than the physical family has.
We have a blood bond, the blood of Jesus the Christ that cleanses us from our sins.

There are also spiritual bonds.
Bonds that last for an eternity. Bonds that transcend time and space.
We also have a bond of love. The love of the Lord Jesus the Christ, for each of us, and the love we have for each other through Christ.
These are bonds that tie us in a horizontal relationship with each other and a vertical relationship with God.
We need to realize that if the bond is broken between any member(s) of the family, we have all lost. We have lost that prayer support, love support, fellowship support, growth support.
IN ESSENTIALS                    -   UNITY.

IN NONESSENTIALS           -  LIBERTY

IN ALL THINGS                    - CHARITY

These are the words of Saint Augustine, they sound a lot like the Apostle Paul's.

The chorus of the song The Family of God is:
  I'm so glad I'm a part of the Family of God,
  I've been washed in the fountain, cleansed by His Blood!
  Joint heirs with Jesus as we travel this sod,
  For I'm part of the family,
  The Family of God
It is a great joy and comfort to be part of the family of God.

Luke 8:19 - 21  Then his mother and his brothers came to him, but they could not reach him because of the crowd. And he was told, "Your mother and your brothers are standing outside, desiring to see you."  But he answered them, "My mother and my brothers are those who hear the word of God and do it."

1John 4:20 
If anyone says, "I love God," and hates his brother, he is a liar; for he who does not love his brother whom he has seen cannot love God whom he has not seen.