We’re already on week five of our Reset series. The first two weeks we talked about how we can reset our relationship with God the Father through His One and Only Son Jesus. Jesus is the Word of God sent to be a Light to the World. By virtue of God’s grace, poured out to us in Christ Jesus, we can find forgiveness of sin, be born again, into whole new life!
Then the last two weeks we talked about how God resets our relationship with ourselves by God’s Holy Spirit. If we would walk with the Holy Spirit, God would renew us from the inside-out. He would give us a new heart and new mind, enabling by his own Spirit to live holy, upright lives, fully conformed to Christ.
This morning and next Sunday we talk about how God resets our relationship with our families. Now by “family” we mean our familial ties—which are primarily but not always biological. God desires godly families, godly marriages, godly husbands and wives, men and women, sons and daughters, godly people who are members of Christ and one another.
Now in the Bible, we have an explanation of the origins of all the families on earth. The only couple that ever had a perfect shot at having a perfect nuclear, biological, natural family was Adam and Eve. But as we know they were the first to sin and corrupt God’s design for humanity. Ever since Adam and Eve, every family has become “dysfunctional” or “corrupted” in some way. Literally, every family has been tainted by sin.
Sometimes instead of “Family” we might speak of “Households.” The word “Family” implies that everyone has purely nuclear, biological, or natural affinity. The word “Household” acknowledges that under a roof you might have a variety of dynamics (i.e. blended families, extended families, adopted sons and daughters, foster children, relatives, etc.). You get the idea. Think of Abraham’s household. What a messy, tangled web of relationships. If you feel your family is a mess, the Bible is full of messy patched up families and relationships. There is guidance for any challenge you may face.
Now what’s really beautiful, and what we’re going to talk about next week, is how in Christ, all of us are part of greater family known as the Kingdom of God, the Household of Faith, the Body of Christ, the Church! Take Jesus for instance. He was born into the household of Joseph, but Joseph wasn’t his “natural or biological father.” Jesus was conceived supernaturally by the Holy Spirit, of Mary. We don’t know what all happened to Joseph, but we know Jesus had many other stepbrothers and presumably stepsisters. (And let’s not even mention Jesus’ genealogy as recorded by Matthew. Talk about a dysfunctional family background!)
In the gospels, Jesus’ family, including his mother, come “to take charge of him.” In Matthew 12:48-50 Jesus responds in a peculiar way saying, “Who is my mother and who are my brothers?” Stretching out his hand toward his disciples, he said, “Here are my mother and my brothers! For whoever does the will of my Father in heaven is my brother and sister and mother.” It’s beautiful and true—that within the body of Christ, we as brothers and sisters in Christ can form spiritual bonds that are profoundly deeper than any physical or biological bond. In the church, I have countless spiritual fathers and mothers, brothers and sisters, sons and daughters. We can be closer to people “in Christ” than we ever be to our own flesh and blood “outside of Christ.” It’s mysterious, it’s glorious, yet it’s true! That’s next week!
Now this morning, our topic concerns our immediate family, or household. I think you would agree that the principles of family held out in Scripture, are radically different than those held out in modern culture including many modern churches and denominations. When I began preaching almost 30 years ago, I couldn’t have imagined how radically our culture would drift on matters of gender, sexuality, marriage, and family.
In Romans 1:18-32 (a passage I’ve referenced frequently in my preaching), we see that whenever, and wherever, people jettison fundamental truths about God, everything else becomes perverted and absurd. If there is no One True Creator God. If God’s (good) divine nature and (great) power isn’t evident by what has been made. If God hasn’t spoken to us by his Spirit, by his servants, by his Holy Prophets. If God hasn’t revealed Himself by his spoken Word, the Bible. If God hasn’t come near to us, as the incarnate flesh and blood, Living Word of God, in the person Jesus Christ… then what is Truth?
When truth dies, everything becomes absurd. And we see this today. People become unable to answer the most basic questions. Is there a Creator? Has God spoken? Is the Bible true? If we get these fundamentals wrong, every other question becomes absurd. For example:
• If we’re not specially created in the image of God, what is the value of a human life? Why, we’re just expendable flesh and blood, biological mass, to be done away with (harvested) should it be expedient to some government, power, or whim of a would-be parent or family.
• If we’re not specially created in the image of God, when does life “begin” to matter? Does a life begin to matter at conception? When it has a heartbeat? When it has brain activity? When its 3 months, 6 months, 9 months old? When its life is biologically viable?
• If we’re not specially created in the image of God, what is gender? If we can’t get fundamental truth about God’s right, soon we can’t even get our own gender right. Who am I? What is a man? What is a woman? What is male? What is female? Through the brute force of science, we can obscure the line between male and female. But modern science hasn’t quite been able to erase gender. Unmoored from any moral or ethical foundation, science will continue to push harder and further than ever before.
• If we’re not specially created in the image of God, what is race or racism? In Ephesians 3:14-15 Apostle Paul says, “. . . I kneel before the Father from whom every family in heaven and on earth is named.” If that’s true, the only difference among us is skin deep, melatonin. But if we’re not of God, then it’s red against yellow against black against white against brown against olive. Race becomes “the” most defining, divisive and unerasable truth of humanity!
• If we’re not specially created in the image of God, what is sex and sexuality? What is marriage? In Ephesians 5:12 Paul says, “For it is shameful even to mention what is done by them [godless] in secret.” As it relates to sex and sexuality what is even shameful these days? What is off limits? What is across the line? Things that were shameful just a few years ago are now mainstream. Other than personal or public sensibilities—which is mostly shaped by Hollywood and entertainment culture—there is no moral or ethical principle governing us.
The old adage has proven true… If God doesn’t exist, all things become permissible!
Now when we did our Genesis series, we talked about the days of Noah. In the days of Noah, every intention of man’s heart was only evil continually. The earth was corrupt in God’s sight and filled with every kind of violence. People’s hearts were hard, their ears were dull of hearing. No one repented. No one sought God. The Bible says, “In those days everyone did whatever seemed right to him.”
Sadly “those days” are like “these last days.” In 2 Timothy 3:1-5 Paul writes Timothy, “But know this: Hard times will come in the last days. For people will be lovers of self, lovers of money, boastful, proud, demeaning, disobedient to parents, ungrateful, unholy, unloving, irreconcilable, slanderers, without self-control, brutal, without love for what is good, traitors, reckless, conceited, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God, 5 holding to the form of godliness but denying its power. Avoid these people.”
We might very well be surprised how fast and far down the slippery slope we’ve slid, but I don’t think God is at all surprised. In Matthew 13:24-28a Jesus tells this parable: 24 He presented another parable to them: “The kingdom of heaven may be compared to a man who sowed good seed in his field. 25 But while people were sleeping, his enemy came, sowed weeds among the wheat, and left. 26 When the plants sprouted and produced grain, then the weeds also appeared. 27 The landowner’s servants came to him and said, ‘Master, didn’t you sow good seed in your field? Then where did the weeds come from?’ 28 “‘An enemy did this,’ he told them.
This is the world in which we now find ourselves. Both good seed and bad seed has been sown into our culture. Both good seed and bad seed has taken very deep root. Both good seed and bad seed is bearing its fruit. The cynical, despairing side of me laments the weeds. The optimistic, hopeful side of me celebrates the good wheat.
But the question remains, what should we do about the wheat? In Matthew 13:28b, “The servants asked the Owner, ‘Do you want us to go and pull them up?’” By brute force, by just acts of violence, through socio-political-economic power and activism, should we roundup those weeds? In Matthew 13:29-30 the parable concludes, “‘No,’ he said. ‘When you pull up the weeds, you might also uproot the wheat with them. 30 Let both grow together until the harvest. At harvest time I’ll tell the reapers: Gather the weeds first and tie them in bundles to burn them, but collect the wheat in my barn.’”
At times I get frustrated with certain weeds in my yard. The worst weeds are those that present themselves as grass. When you have grassy weeds, they are impossible to kill without also killing the good grass. Years ago, I sprayed my whole yard with roundup to get a fresh start. Sure enough, a few years later, there those pesky grassy weeds came again! The worst weeds we deal with are people who seem to have an appearance of godliness, but who in their core are utterly weedy and godless.
Sorry to say it… but it’s true. There are some things only God Himself can sort out. And the complex nature of entwined Weed & Wheat is one of those things. God isn’t surprised by the present state of affairs. But this doesn’t mean there isn’t anything we can do. Because what we know is that with God all things are possible. By the blood of his Son Jesus Christ, by the sanctifying power of his Holy Spirit, through Holy Word, God can turn a weed into stalk of wheat.
These past months I’ve been pouring over the New Testament. People play this game where they the Apostle Paul against Jesus. In his letters, the Apostle Paul doesn’t mince words. Like in 2 Timothy 3! He would overtly denounce unholy things he saw being carried into the Christian Churches. But people invoke Jesus, as if Jesus were somehow more tolerant, or affirming, or perhaps oblivious of unholy things.
Case in point. In Matthew 19 the Pharisees pressed Jesus on matters of marriage and divorce. They were trying to pit Moses against Jesus. In the Law, Moses seems to permit divorce on all sorts of grounds but they wanted to know what Jesus thought. As in everything Jesus always takes people directly to the Word of God. In Matthew 19:4-6 Jesus says, “Haven’t you read,” he replied, “that he who created them in the beginning made them male and female, and he also said, ‘For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two will become one flesh’? So they are no longer two, but one flesh. Therefore, what God has joined together, let no one separate.”
This is a classic example. If you jettison the Truth of God, and the Truth of his Word, all things become permissible. Everyone does what’s right in his own eyes. But if you are a person under God’s authority your concern isn’t what seems right to you but rather what is God’s good, pleasing, and perfect will? Jesus then tells them that the only reason Moses made concessions in the law was because their hearts were hard. Matthew 19:8-9, “He told them, “Moses permitted you to divorce your wives because of the hardness of your hearts, but it was not like that from the beginning. I tell you, whoever divorces his wife, except for sexual immorality, and marries another commits adultery.”
The disciples are kind of incredulous. In Matthew 19:10, “His disciples said to him, “If the relationship of a man with his wife is like this, it’s better not to marry.” You know that is how a lot of people feel these days. They’ve given up on God’s design altogether!
But then Jesus doubles down. In Matthew 19:11, “He responds, “Not everyone can accept this saying, but only those to whom it has been given.” I think this is the fundamental issue for the Church today. God has given his Word to those who will accept it. The best way to this reset whether it’s in regard to your personal life, or spiritual life, or family life—it’s always to come back to the fundamentals, to turn to God and take him at his Word.
But the Bible is so archaic. Jesus didn’t know about modern times, modern pressures, or modern issues of gender, marriage, and sexuality. Not so fast. In Matthew 19:12 Jesus says, “For there are eunuchs who were born that way from their mother’s womb, there are eunuchs who were made by men, and there are eunuchs who have made themselves that way because of the kingdom of heaven. The one who is able to accept it should accept it.”
There are people who were born sexually ambiguous. We shouldn’t be surprised, every aspect of our flesh has fallen under the curse. It’s conceivable a person can be born a Eunuch just as easily a person could be born blind, like the man in John 9. But just because a person is born a certain way doesn’t imply divine will. The man in John 9 was born that the glory of God might be displayed in his life. God in his grace had a different design. But look what else Jesus says. Some are “made” eunuchs by men, and some make themselves that way. But none of these temporal conditions negate the Truth of God, marriage, gender, and sexuality.
At this present time, as it relates to Family, we are at a kind of crossroads. And the core issue is will we return to God, and return to his Word, that times of refreshing may come? Or will we turn away from God, away from his Word, into whatever seems right in our eyes?
I will conclude with one last word. Sometimes if there are weeds in the yard, we nuke the good and the bad with Roundup. We take a scorched earth approach and kill everything. Sometimes though we begin looking for greener, lusher, less-weedy grass across the fence. We want to abandon God’s design. Abandon the marriage covenant. Abandon the family. Abandon God’s design for gender, marriage, sexuality. The more we abandon God, abandon his design, his will, his Word… the more pain is magnified. Its Proverbs 14:12. There is a way that seems right to a person, but its end is the way to death. The invitation of Jesus is quite contrary. He keeps taking us back to our Creator. He keeps taking us back, inviting us to accept His Word. If you’re willing accept it, trust it, live into it, receive it… my commands will be life to you! Its Psalm 119:93, “I will never forget your precepts, for you have given me life through them.”