What Does it Mean to be a Family?

Part 2 in series.

26 November 2006

Good Morning and the blessings of our Messiah and God be with you all evermore.

In part 1 of our series we explored how important the family structure was to God ‘s plan for all mankind. One of the most significant characteristics of a family is, that it is the basic building block of God’s design for human civilization.  We learned that because of this importance, it is one of the foremost targets of destruction for our nemesis Satan.  Thus it is the institutionalization of the marriage concept and the subsequent formation of strong family bonds and traditions, created in the image of Yahweh (God), that have not only helped preserve us as believers, but has focused on us the hatred and desperation of Satan.  We also saw in God’s own words, the complete disproval of the popular notion of “original sin” being, Adam and Eve having intercourse with each other.  God specifically ordered them (Gen 1:28) to have intercourse and populate the world, thus creating a worldwide family of believers and followers of God (Yahweh) rule.  We enter into today’s sermon with a firm knowledge of two important facts.  One, a family is the product of a contractual binding or marriage between a man and a woman, in the image of God, for the purposes of fulfilling God’s (Yahweh’s) command to have sex and produce a race of men (i.e. descendents from both Adam and Eve).  Two is Satan knowing that families a the most essential element, or building block, of Yahweh’s (God’s) society or kingdom on earth, has set out from the very beginning to destroy the family structure as God (Yahweh) ordained.

Throughout scripture we see a number of references to family attributes, responsibilities, and benefits.  We also see many references of mankind being a large family under God (Yahweh).  Yet today in the western Christian world we have learned to take the importance of family for granted and have essentially turned our backs on God’s word about families.  It is no wonder that family life in the western world has deteriorated so badly.  Often today when I speak with people about the continuing deterioration of family life, they are puzzled as to how this could happen in a society based on Christian ideals and beliefs.  The answer to this question is often a very unpleasant surprise to the asker.  Many practicing Christians are not really following God’s (Yahweh’s) laws and ways.  These people are living by manmade religious dogma created by leaders of various competing religious entities whose serve their own self interest or are really false prophets and teachers sent by Satan as Yeshua warned us about 2000 years ago.  Thus everything concerning their teachings about families and true family values are designed to divide and destroy families rather then promote them, just as we see happening all around us today.

It has become the rule rather then the occasional exception for family units to be disjointed and distributed across towns, cities, and countries.  This is not the traditional family model and it is not the family system that Yahweh (God) demands of us in scripture.  Many of you listening to these words can remember when at least two or three generations of a family lived in one house, on one piece of family land.  These families had a strong central core that bonded the individuals together in to a cohesive unit that was strong and self-sufficient.  God’s (Yahweh’s) power in love was paramount and true biblical values were the basis of family life, not the false pious morality that is being portrayed by the politically correct religious smooth talkers we see on TV or read about in the news.  I can still remember growing up in a home with my grandmother and grandfather living right upstairs.  I can remember the wonderful times I shared with both of them and them teaching me Godly values when I was young, which by the way are still with me today.  Under God’s plan for families Grandparents have the time to spend with grandchildren that parents just don’t have because they are busy working to bring home money and keep the home in order.  Today the nucleus of family grandparents, parents, and children has all but been destroyed by Satan’s plan, which is to replace families with self-serving commercialism. 

Ever wonder why the holidays with your family just never really seem to fulfill you.  It is because we are being forced into a shoe that doesn’t fit.  Families are being groomed to move further in further apart both physically and emotionally and then for the sake of that almighty dollar being told to cram themselves together every few months for one day and pretend that everything is just wonderful.  We see it on TV ads all the time.  Well those ads are just what they seem.  They are pretend families, pretending to be having a good time for the camera.  Think about this for a moment.  Where would we be right now if God treat us, his family, like we are treating our families?  Would you really want to live in a world separated from God?

We have an instruction manual that teaches us how to mold our families after God’s plan; it is the scriptures given us by God.  In these writings we find many references to the attributes of a Godly family.  Lets look to Paul and Timothy’s letter to the Colossians.  In chapter 3 verses18-21 we read.  “Wives, submit yourselves unto your own husbands, as it is fit in the Lord.  Husbands, love your wives, and be not bitter against them. Children, obey your parents in all things: for this is well pleasing unto the Lord. Fathers, provoke not your children to anger, lest they be discouraged. Servants, obey in all things your masters according to the flesh; not with eyeservice, as menpleasers; but in singleness of heart, fearing God:” God ordained not only a certain structure for a family, but also outlined how those in that structure should behave.  A family is to be headed by a husband, a male who is responsible to see that the family is guided and governed righteously.  Wives are to obey the head of the family and support the education and upbringing of the children so they will walk in the ways of the Yahweh.  Children are to obey and respect their parents so that they may learn from them.  Even servants or employees are to share in family values.  Each generation must move forward and not backward in spiritual growth and worldly understanding.

Look around you.  Is this the type of family that is prevalent in today’s society?  Of course not!  Why?  Because we are living in the end times that have been prophesied of.  The end of this era is upon us and with it Satan power on earth will be magnified by the willingness of mankind to follow after his ways.  Look at what Yeshua says in Mat 24:37-39 “And as the days of Noah, so also shall the coming of the Son of Adam be.  For as they were in the days before the flood, eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day that Noah entered into the ark, and they did not know until the flood came and took them all away, so also shall the coming of the Son of Adam be”.  Doesn’t that sound like the world around us.  How many of your favorite movie stars or singers were married and divorced this year?  Family values have been reduced to a political and socialistic commodity that is up for grabs to the highest bidder.  Many women today think nothing of having a man’s baby, just to collect child support, while men date and bed woman just to chalk up another notch on their gun.  And society not only accepts this, it actually promotes and rewards this behavior with honor and prestige being bestowed on those who reach previously unheard-of proportions in their decadence.

            But there is hope for those of us who are willing to turn our backs on the depravity of this world and focus ourselves on the ways of our God Yahweh.  Because, God has chosen us, those sons of Adam, who love him to live his way in this world and evermore.  We who truly believe in him are members of one family, which is descended from Adam.  Now the Yeshua tells us in John 8:44 not all of those around us are descended of Adam, “You are the children of your father, the Devil, and you want to follow your father's desires…”   The Pharisees who practiced the religion of Pharisaism, which is a form of an ancient Babylonian heathen religion, or devil worship are the ones Yeshua is calling descendents of Satan in John 8:44.  See why there is a real spiritual and physical difference between the sons of Adam and those of Satan.  As a descendent of Adam you are part of Yahweh’s family.  You will receive an eternal inheritance of his love and grace, but there is a catch.  You must believe in what Yeshua told us when he was with us.  For he continually told us of God’s way to salvation.  When he said to believe in him, he literally meant for us to believe in what he was telling us.  Just believing that God sent him or God was in him is not enough.  We must believe in what he was telling us, all of it.  We must become like little children in the sense of being members in God’s great family and practicing those family values here on earth with our own families in order to be saved.

            As believers our families are under attack by Satan’s forces everyday and we must have strong families who put aside their differences on a moments notice to dedicate all they have to protect a family member from any outside attack.  All to often today’s families turn their backs on one of their own when the chips are down.  When a family member goes broke, gets old or sick, or gets in trouble with the law or breaks a social taboo, we are too quick to turn the other way.  Yahweh demands of us that we live by the laws and examples he has given us.   Through Yeshua we were taught the concept of divine implementation of the Law of God.  Remember the adulterous woman?  Who of us has not done some stupid or unintentional act that has hurt our families?  This is the proverb of Yeshua’s response to situation of the adulterous woman.  Rather then throwing her out of the family of God, he renewed her continuing standing as a vital and important member of God’s family of mankind.  Yeshua was showing us that we must live by the true family values handed down by God, not the social norms of his day, which did away with the law of God supplementing it with the traditions of men as practiced by the Pharisees in their false religion.

            In order to survive the coming tribulations we believers in Yahweh must rededicate the family as the most essential building block of our social and economic existence.  We must turn back the clocks to a time when generations of family members lived and worked together in a cooperative spirit of unity and family growth and security.  We must look back to the time when strong nucleus families were the backbone of our society and re-introduce in our lives the same practices and believes that our ancestors for uncounted generations lived by.  We cannot allow the me-me oriented society of the Pharisees, who Yeshua (Jesus) condemned to spread any further into our lives.

            As you go into the world this week remember Yahweh (God) is with you, and he has sent the great comforter to be with you and guide you with wisdom through all the challenges this life can bring.  In he has provided a family of supporters for you on this earth to help your life prosper in his name.  Amen