The Church and Home: Partners and Parallels
The Christian faith is no stranger to family. After all, we walk into church to greet Brother so-and-so, and his wife, Sister so-and-so, even though we can’t trace any biological heritage to these close Christian friends. It soon becomes apparent that the Gospel has connected Christians in such a deep way that can be described only in familial terms.
When Jesus is alerted to his mother and brothers’ presence during his public teaching, , He points to His disciples and 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” (Mt. 12:49-50). The apostle Paul expands on this theme, addressing the church as a “household” or “family of God” (1 Tim. 3; 5:1-2, Titus 2:1-5). He tells believers to respect fathers and mothers in the faith and to be brothers and sisters to one another. Both John and Paul see themselves as fathers in the faith to younger believers (1 Cor. 4:16; 1 Tim. 1:2, 1 Jn. 2:14; 3:18; 5:21).[1]
Within my own denomination, a renewed focus has been placed on familial, or generational, discipleship. This is called the D6 movement, taken from Deuteronomy 6:7-9,
You shall teach them [God’s Word] diligently to your children, and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, and when you walk by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise. You shall bind them as a sign on your hand, and they shall be as frontlets between your eyes. You shall write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates.
Even in the New Testament, Paul instructs parents and children (Eph. 6:1-4). What’s vital to note, and often overlooked, is that both of these commands are given within the context of the faith community.[2] When Moses gave this command to parents, he was explaining it to a whole gathering of the Israelites. When Paul instructed the families in Ephesus, the letter was read to the entire church.
Does talking about the church being our family negate what God has planned for our nuclear families in our spiritual formation? When church becomes family, does family cease to be family? Or vice versa, when the family becomes church, does the gathering of believers become null and void? I don’t think this is the case, though imbalance can easily happen.
I’d like to double-down and propose what Christians have argued for centuries: the Christian family and the church are deeply connected in God’s redemptive plan. For the believer, the church is family and the family is church. Of course, that is not to say that the Church and family are identical and synonymous.
Actually, the church and the family are distinctly different in many ways, each accomplishing tasks that the other will not nor cannot. While these two divine institutions are partners in spiritual formation. They are also parallels; they run alongside one another. As one author notes, “This two-fold approach is the foundation for comprehensive faith-at-home ministry—ministry that coordinates the God-ordained function of the Christian household with the church’s role as a Christian’s first family.”[3] Therefore, I aim briefly to show how these two spheres are deeply knitted together and are vital in the spiritual formation of the Christian child.
Family as Church
A Brief Theology of Family
We must first understand what God intended when He created the “nuclear” family. First, we must realize that God ordained the family before the Fall. That means that the family was an institution created before sin wrecked and broke the world. What, then, did God intend that family to look like? We may fully answer that question by giving a Biblical definition of family. While it may sound overly-technical, Andreas Köstenberger’s definition is helpful: “Primarily one man and one woman united in matrimony plus natural or adopted children and, secondarily, any other persons related by blood.”[4] This definition is reinforced and rooted in the familial models of the Old and New Testaments.
Second, though was instituted before the Fall, the Christian family continues to accomplish God’s redemptive work in this world like no other institution can. It is increasingly evident that the family holds a singular position in God’s will. Consider, for a moment, what Vigen Guroian writes concerning the parent-child relationship,
In our day hyper-individualism and exaggerated notions of personal autonomy flourish culturally and have influenced law. The religious sociologist Robert Bellah calls this ontological individualism—a belief that the individual is primary and that the individual’s claims take precedence over community, which is thought to be derivative and artificial. This individualism is reflected conspicuously in current attitudes and opinions about marriage and divorce, abortion, and physician-assisted suicide, to name a few. . . . To the extent that these notions of individualism and autonomy influence contemporary thought on childhood, there is a tendency to define childhood apart from serious reflection on the meaning of parenthood. Yet a moment’s pause might lead one to recognize that there is hardly a deeper characteristic of human life than the parent-child relationship. . . . The Christian faith would have us look more closely at the fundamental parent-child nexus.[5]
Guroian notes the profound effect that parents have on their children. Aside from the husband-wife relationship, there is no relationship more influential in all of culture than the parent-child relationship.
Furthermore, rarely can any other relationship cultivate the counter-cultural values important for life than that of the parent-child. In Family-Based Youth Ministry, Mark DeVries notes, “No one has more long-term interest in the students I work with than their parents do . . . families exert unparalleled influence on the development of the children’s lives and character.”[6] This isn’t just a pragmatic statement; it’s a theological one. God intended for families to have more influence than anything else on the child.
Family Worship
What, then, is the primary way by which a family can be a “little church”? The answer: by worshipping together. This is not merely a practical solution to a significant problem. Family worship has its roots in Scripture. Abraham, Moses, Joshua, Job, Paul, and Peter all either practiced or referred to this idea of families worshipping together on their own. A strong thread runs throughout Scripture that encourages families to worship together—parents and children honoring God through adoration. Moreover, throughout history Christians have practiced family worship as an integral part of their faith.
The Free Will Baptist Church Covenant reads, “We agree faithfully to discharge our obligations in reference to the study of the Scriptures, secret prayer, family devotions, and social worship; and by self-denial, faith, and good works endeavor to “grow in grace and the knowledge of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ.”[7]
One important truth that we must remind ourselves and parents of is this: family worship doesn’t have to be complicated. As Donald Whitney plainly encourages us, “Just read, pray, and sing.”[8]
- Read: Read a passage of Scripture. For those with younger children, you may choose a storybook Bible,[9] or a smaller passage that is appropriate for their age. Simply read through the passage or story together and make a few comments on what it means. As children get older, deal with heavier or lengthier passages.
- Pray: Since you already have the Bible open to a passage, allow that to lead your prayer. Pray whatever the application might be from a given Biblical story. Further, allow family members to offer different prayer requests.
- Sing: Have a hymnbook handy, or sing memorable Christian songs. It doesn’t have to be the all eight stanzas, but sing a song worshipfully with your family. Often times, this can be the most enjoyable moment for children.
Before you know it, you’ve worshipped with your family. If you’ve read God’s truth, prayed in communion with Him, and worshipped through song, you’ve worshipped God with your family. This is easy to teach others and easy to practice yourself. Try to do this as often as possible. If you’re able to do it every day, that’s great! If not, simply try to keep a consistent schedule.
Generational Discipleship
Family discipleship is more than simply practicing family worship, though that’s vital. Family discipleship also occurs in the “informal” moments. One author notes, “Responsible youth ministry in the church, though perhaps difficult to execute, is simple to understand: it involves teaching and exhorting parents to raise their children biblically.”[10] Thought it may sound cliché, Christian living for children must be verbalized and visualized. Children must not only be taught the propositional truths of Scripture, but must also see them lived out. Look for teachable moments to show how Christian truth applies, and if you’re a ministry leader, encourage other parents to do the same. This might come in drives to school, when your child is having difficulty in organized sports, or around the dinner table. The possibilities are endless.
Though we’ve only begun to scratch the surface on the family, there’s another side to the family ministry paradigm: the Church. Next Monday, we will analyze how the church can contribute to the spiritual formation of the child in conjunction with the family.
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[1] Andreas J. Köstenberger and David W. Jones, God, Marriage, and the Family: Rebuilding the Biblical Foundation, 2nd ed. (Wheaton: Crossway, 2010), 252-53.
[2] Scottie May, et al., Children Matter: Celebrating Their Place in the Church, Family and Community (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2005), 165-66.
[3] Timothy Paul Jones and John David Trentham, eds., Practical Family Ministry: A Collection of Ideas for Your Church (Nashville: Randall House, 2015), 13.
[4] Köstenberger and Jones, God, Marriage, and the Family, 85.
[5] Vigen Guroian, “The Ecclesial Family: John Chrysostom on Parenthood and Children,” in The Child and Christian Thought, Marcia J. Bunge, ed. (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2001), 61-62.
[6] Mark DeVries, Family-Based Youth Ministry, revised and expanded (Downers Grove: Intervarsity, 2004), 61.
[7] Free Will Baptist Treatise, (Nashville: National Association of Free Will Baptists, 2008), 1.
[8] Donald S. Whitney, Family Worship (Wheaton: Crossway, 2016), 44.
[9] I highly recommend Sally Lloyd-Jones, The Jesus Story-book Bible.(Grand Rapids: ZonderKidz, 2007)
[10] Christopher Shlect, Critique of Modern Youth Ministry, 2 ed. (Moscow, ID: Canon, 2007), 17.
November 15, 2016
Thanks for this, brother. I love your emphasis on parental discipleship and unity when we live in a culture of extreme individualism.
November 18, 2016
Thanks, Cody! I think the more we can grasp the understanding that a biblical definition of family is counter-cultural, the more it will become fruitful for the Christian community..