Title: The Role of the Family
Text: Genesis 2:18-24
Date: 10/14/2007
Location: Sulphur Spring Baptist Church
Introduction: Some people today are arguing that the Traditional (Nuclear) family of a Father, Mother, and children has outlived its usefulness. That it is no longer relevant in our postmodern 21st Century society.
What’s the role of the family supposed to be today?
What purpose is it supposed to fulfill?
And why does the family even exist?
The Short answer is that it was part of God’s overall plan for the human race. But I want us to take a few minutes this morning and examine this question a little closer.
I believe God established the family…
1. To provide us with the intimacy and companionship we need.
2. As a vehicle through which the earth would be populated.
3. As a vehicle through which He would educate His children.
4. To provide mutual love, support, and encouragement to men, women & children. (Col 3:18-19, Ephesians 5:21-25
5. To give order and structure to a chaotic world. Ephesians 6:1-4
Let’s begin with the first reason God established the family and that is…
1. To provide us with the intimacy and companionship we want and need.
Turn with me to Genesis 2:18
And the LORD God said, "It is not good for the man to be alone. I will make a companion who will help him."
So the LORD God formed from the soil every kind of animal and bird. He brought them to Adam to see what he would call them, and Adam chose a name for each one.
He gave names to all the livestock, birds, and wild animals. But still there was no companion suitable for him.
So the LORD God caused Adam to fall into a deep sleep. He took one of Adam’s ribs and closed up the place from which he had taken it.
Then the LORD God made a woman from the rib and brought her to Adam.
"At last!" Adam exclaimed. "She is part of my own flesh and bone! She will be called ’woman,’ because she was taken out of a man."
This explains why a man leaves his father and mother and is joined to his wife, and the two are united into one.”
Genesis 2:18-24 (NLT)
When God created Adam he was the only human being alive. God surrounded Adam with birds and animals of all kinds and gave him dominion over them. God had placed Adam in the most beautiful garden imaginable, had provided him with all of the fruits and vegetables that he could eat and had given him the responsibility of taking care of the animals. But something was still missing.
The 18th verse tells us that Adam was lonely. So God decided to create a companion and partner for him. That’s when God caused Adam to fall into a deep sleep and took one of his ribs and formed a woman from it. He then brought the woman to Adam and gave her to him.
Thus from the very beginning of creation God established the institution of marriage and the family. And notice it’s between one man and one woman, not two men or two women. Neither was this first family made up of one man and two or more women. It consisted of one man, Adam, and one woman, Eve.
God created us in His image, both male and female. Again this was all part of His plan. Men and women compliment and complete one another in many ways. God never intended for men to marry men, or women to marry women. Now I know that’s not the politically correct thing to say today, but it’s the truth.
The Apostle Paul realized this, and when he looked around him and saw how vile and wicked the people around him had become he said,
Therefore God gave them over in the sinful desires of their hearts to sexual impurity for the degrading of their bodies with one another.
They exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshiped and served created things rather than the Creator--who is forever praised. Amen.
Because of this, God gave them over to shameful lusts. Even their women exchanged natural relations for unnatural ones.
In the same way the men also abandoned natural relations with women and were inflamed with lust for one another. Men committed indecent acts with other men, and received in themselves the due penalty for their perversion.”
God created us in His image. He created us both male and female. Like Him we desire companionship and intimacy. We have a strong desire to love and be loved. Therefore He established the family to provide us with the companionship and intimacy we want and need.
II. Secondly, God established the family as his chosen vehicle through which He would populate the earth.
Now I know you don’t have to be married to have children, and I know that it’s even possible now for a woman to conceive and give birth to a child without ever having had sexual relations with a man. But neither one of those were what God intended.
Look with me at Genesis 9:1
Then God blessed Noah and his sons, saying to them, "Be fruitful and increase in number and fill the earth.
Then again in verse 7 God said, “As for you, be fruitful and increase in number; multiply on the earth and increase upon it."
Researchers are finally beginning to concede that children that live in a family that includes both parents are generally better adjusted than those who live in single parent families.
So even though it is possible to have a child out of wedlock, and even though it’s possible for Homosexual couples to adopt children, neither one of those situations are what God intended.
III. Next, God established the family to educate His children.
Turn with me to Deuteronomy 6:4-9
DT 6:4 Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God, the LORD is one.
DT 6:5 Love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength.
DT 6:6 These commandments that I give you today are to be upon your hearts.
DT 6:7 Impress them on your children. Talk about them when you sit at home and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up.
DT 6:8 Tie them as symbols on your hands and bind them on your foreheads.
DT 6:9 Write them on the doorframes of your houses and on your gates.
God has given parents the main responsibility of teaching their children about Him. The church can and should help with that process, but the main responsibility falls to the parents. Unfortunately too many parents today are refusing to accept this responsibility and are trying to abdicate it to the church. Certainly the church needs to be involved in the spiritual education of our children, but it cannot do it all.
IV. Next, God established the family to provide mutual love, support, and encouragement to men, women & children.
V. God also established the family to provide some sense of order in a chaotic world.
The Apostle Paul certainly understood both of these things and covers both in his book to the church of Ephesus. Turn with me if you will to Ephesians 5:21.
“Submit to one another out of reverence for Christ. Wives, submit to your husbands as to the Lord.
For the husband is the head of the wife as Christ is the head of the church, his body, of which he is the Savior.
Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit to their husbands in everything.
Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her to make her holy, cleansing her by the washing with water through the word,
and to present her to himself as a radiant church, without stain or wrinkle or any other blemish, but holy and blameless.
In this same way, husbands ought to love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself.
After all, no one ever hated his own body, but he feeds and cares for it, just as Christ does the church- for we are members of his body
"For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two will become one flesh."
This is a profound mystery--but I am talking about Christ and the church. However, each one of you also must love his wife as he loves himself, and the wife must respect her husband.
Children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right. "Honor your father and mother"--which is the first commandment with a promise-- "that it may go well with you and that you may enjoy long life on the earth."
Fathers, do not exasperate your children; instead, bring them up in the training and instruction of the Lord.”
That just about covers it all. As Husbands and fathers we should love and respect our wives and our children. In fact Paul says that we should love our wives in the same way that Christ loved the church. Which means that we should love her more than we do ourselves, because Christ was willing to lay down his life for the church.
Those of you who are wives should love and respect your husbands as well as your children. You should do everything within your power to create a positive, Christian atmosphere in your home. And as we said earlier, Husbands and wives should work together to train and instruct their children about the Lord.
Those of you who are children should love, respect and obey your parents. It’s one thing to say you love them, but it’s another to show them you love them by what you say and what you do. Jesus said, “If you love me you will obey what I command.” So consequently you can show your parents that you love them by obeying them. In this passage of Scripture the Apostle Paul reminded us that those children who honor and obey their parents will be blessed with a long life.
God established three institutions. The Family, The Church, and The State. All are important, but in my opinion the family is the most important of the three. Becuase you cannot have a strong church without strong families, and it is impossible to have a strong nation without strong churches.
With that in mind I want to share the following with you. It was taken from the tomb of a Bishop in Westminster Abbey 1100 A.D.: It says:
When I was young and free and my imagination had no limits I dreamed of changing the world.
As I grew older and wiser and realized the world would not change I shortened my sights somewhat and decided to change only my country: but it too seemed immovable.
As I grew into my twilight years I settled on changing only my family and those closest to me, but alas they would have none of it.
Now as I lay on my deathbed I suddenly realize that if I had only changed myself first, then by example I could perhaps have changed my family, and from their inspiration and encouragement to me I would have been better able to help my country and from there I may even have been able to change the world.
God has called us to be change agents. He wants us to change our families, our communities, our nation and our world. But unless we as individuals change for the better, we will not be able to accomplish the task He has set before us. Of course the only way we can do that is by submitting to the Lordship of Jesus Christ and allowing His Holy Spirit to do in us and with us what He wants to do.
What about you this morning, are you willing to submit to the Lordship of Jesus Christ in order to change or influence your family, your church, this nation and the world?
