The Purpose Of: Family
Most of my beliefs (political, idealogical, etc.) are pretty much in the middle of the aisle. I believe too many times culture wants to force us to one side or the other but the truth of the matter is, well the truth is oftentimes in the middle. Between the extremes as it were. The tricky part about living and believing this way is we oftentimes feel like we don’t have a place to belong ideologically or politically. I’m okay with that because I don’t believe this world is my final home so I don’t need to belong. Today’s post is going to be like that, between the extremes.
A quick introduction if you don’t know me. My wife and I have been married sixteen and half years at the time of this post. We have two beautiful children, both of them adopted. While we’re the “traditional” family in the fact that we’re husband, wife, with two kids; our son is biracial making us less traditional for the deep south. It probably goes without saying, but I’m going to say it, I love my son. He is MY SON! Nothing about him being adopted makes him any less. In fact, when you understand the legal term of adoption I could argue he’s even more my son. I know this is a long intro to a post but I believe these thing matter because of how they’ve formed my identity and my beliefs when it comes to the purpose of a family.
I think to understand the purpose of family it starts with the purpose of marriage. In this regards, I’m conservative in my beliefs. I assure you, I’ve reached this belief because I’ve taken the journey of knowing what I believe and why I believe it. I’d encourage you to be willing to do the same. I’ve found the purpose of marriage is straight out of scripture. Paul writes in Ephesians 5,
“‘Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh.’ This mystery is profound, and I am saying that it refers to Christ and the church.” (vs. 31-32, ESV)
This profound mystery is that the purpose of marriage is so that others look at it and see Christ, the bridegroom, and His bride, the church. Now, I’ll quickly admit that most churches have not been good models of this and many Christians have not modeled this in their lives and marriages. There’s a variety of reasons to why this may be true and I won’t venture into that now. A couple things before I continue. If you’re a Christian, may this is serve as a reminder to what your marriage or future marriage should look like. If you’re not a Christian, one I apologize the church has not represented this well and I also challenge and encourage you to be open to this idea. The purpose of family begins there.
From there, the family grows and so the purpose of the family grows however, it doesn’t change. The purpose of the family, much like marriage, is to point others towards Christ. Paul continues in Ephesians to talk about the roles of family members as they relate to other family members. He talks about honor, obedience, submitting, and loving. At face values these words are some that have a lot of raw emotions that could come with them but if we step back and look to understand the context, it’s about being in union with one another. Again, this unity points to Christ and to the trinity. The trinity is one that’s hard to truly comprehend or explain but it paints a picture of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit communing and existing in a perfect union of pointing to and glorifying one another.
Families have structure, rules, and guidelines. I remind me children often that there’s a reason the parents are older and have done more life. However, what if the family looked more like that union we see in the trinity? I believe the purpose of the family is to do life together pointing to and honoring one another. Living and loving in mutual submission looking to outdo one another in honor. In doing so we honor God and show love to everyone we cross paths with. I need this reminder at times and I hope this serves as that for you.
Stay the course! You have what it takes!