Who is Your "Family"?

11/10/1999

Who is your Family? Who are your children? We have LEFT “father, mother, brother...” We have left PHYSICAL FAMILY and viewing life after physical, fleshly relationships. We’ve been granted a hundred times as many fathers, mothers and brothers! Now, our boundaries of responsibility include ALL who are connected to us by JESUS’ blood, and He determines the level of responsibility I have for specific people, rather than it being determined by temporary blood boundaries.

God has so graciously given us Salvation and Refuge and a Home to live in, where He is Lord and Master and Father over all. What a blessing that has been and continues to be!! In that household, we are meant to care for, feed, help, and encourage each other, spurring each other on to love and good works. We can spur each other each day to a consciousness of God and help each other recognize and avoid the pitfalls of sin. What a wonderful blessing! WE ARE the Household of God, all brothers and sisters with One Father over us.

We are called to take a deep responsibility for one another and to “carry each other’s burdens and so fulfill the Law of Christ.” Part of that responsibility has to do with caring deeply for each other’s children. And this goes WAY beyond baby-sitting or “watching them.” Anyone can give that! But if we are filled with God’s Spirit, we can take responsibility on a much deeper level. We can help and care by “seeing to it” that patterns of disobedience, disrespect, or wildness or selfishness or… don’t go on and on undealt with and unchanged in OTHER PEOPLE’S CHILDREN.

We must care for each other’s children on that level and GET INVOLVED to see things change. Let’s be sure the walls come down (if we have them). Walls erected by faulty thinking such as: you “dare not” talk to anyone about their children. Or you dare not make yourself vulnerable by saying something and getting involved. Rather, hand to hand, eye to eye living with each other and each other’s children on a day-to-day, consistent, prayer-filled basis. Not being afraid to help and not being unbelieving about whether things can actually change in a real way is essential.

YOU and YOUR PRAYERS and WORK can make a huge difference in your neighbor’s life. PLEASE, let’s help each other with our children! We really NEED each other to be involved on a SPIRITUAL level. We, alone, or with only a spouse, do not have what it takes. We really need the eyes, ears, courage and insight of other people. Invite others in regularly if you are one who clams up and is “afraid of being a bad parent.” Be willing to take chances and be willing to take the care necessary to do something.

We have been redeemed from the “us 4 (or 6 or 8 : ) ) and no more” way of life where all I’m willing to do in regards to assuming spiritual responsibility is within my own four walls. We even end up robbing our own children when we live that way. Let me say again, if we are HIS, then we have LEFT “father, mother...” PHYSICAL FAMILY and viewing life after physical, fleshly relationships. We’ve been granted a hundred times as many fathers, mothers and brothers! NOW, our boundaries of responsibility include ALL who are connected to us by JESUS’ blood. HE determines the level of responsibility we have for specific people, rather than it being determined by temporary blood boundaries.

“God first, physical family second, God’s House third” is a mindset that robs us and others of becoming more like Jesus! Somehow, we allow our personal level of responsibility for others to be based on physical reasoning rather than GOD’s reasoning. We need to have the same kind of hope and yearning and desire for other’s children as we do our own. Of course, there will be those closest to you in God’s household that you have direct responsibility for, while others may be woven more tightly in other relationships.

Who is my mother? Who are my brothers? And… who are my CHILDREN?? In God’s sight, other’s children are my children too. But how far are we PERSONALLY willing to get involved on a grass roots level with that “tough one”? Do I truly “carry their burden”? How far have I really been willing to go? On my knees? With my words? With help from other people? All of these are questions we must willingly ask ourselves, with the intent to change, if need be. We must really turn things around in our own hearts (and repent if necessary) in regard to viewing other people’s children after the flesh and viewing our “family units” after the flesh. There are no “boundaries” in God’s sight, based on physical ties. We wouldn’t say, “I only love on blonde haired babies to a deep, deep degree and all other babies are periphery.” So we can’t say “I only love and care for my own children on the deep kind of level—everyone else’s children I care about on some other level.” Let us care as Jesus cares!