AUDIO
 |
Archbishop Peter Jensen's Christmas Message 2011 on the centrality of Jesus to human history
|
At my local gift shop they have a “family values word cloud” picture for sale. Words like love, respect, warmth, safety, mum, dad and kids. Another one I found on the net included genealogy, bloodlines, life. It set me to thinking about how we talk about and model family in church. At my church the “models” of family that are presented from “the front” are the smiling pictures of the missionary families we support with their 3,4 or 5 children that are usually being home schooled by the not-working-outside-the-home-mother. Our two ministers have wives working in demanding roles outside the home, but rarely do we hear much about the struggle of juggling ministry, parenting, work and family life. Well, sometimes at morning tea there are snipes from stressed congregation members about how one of the ministers was unable to attend a certain meeting because they were taking their son to swimming lessons early afternoon* like “what normal working parent has the luxury to do that?”
Family life has changed out of all recognition from my growing up years in the 60’s and early 70’s when most families were intact, working mothers were rather frowned on in some circles, and after school activities were limited to playing in the street or the bush (depending on where you lived) or cubs or brownies if you were lucky. Wind the clock forward 30 years to when I was raising my own children: working mothers were much more the norm though not universal and most children were involved in a number of out of school sports and activities. Even then though there was a subtle (or not so subtle) message from Christian/church teaching that a mother’s role was in the home being the lynch pin of the Christian family.
I don’t want to argue here the rationale for working mothers, rather to accept that this is the social environment we live in, related to a mix of change in social values linked with the increasing unaffordability of housing in Australian cities (according to a recent Government report, median house prices in 84% of Sydney’s local government areas are unaffordable for workers like police and nurses).
So how do we set about thinking/speaking/preaching about individual family values as Christians? Even turning to scripture has its hermeneutical challenges as we seek to glean ideas and principles from documents written thousands of years ago when “doing life and family” was set in a completely different social milieu.
Firstly we need to recognise that just as we live in a multi-cultural society related to ethnic and social background, so too there is a wide variety of ways of doing family that are all valid and need to be accepted and affirmed. But conversely, there are ways that cannot be supported: for example the family where the parent fails to care adequately for their children or spouse because of their self-focused interest in work/sport/alcohol/friends/family of origin etc.
Some family focused websites suggest that each family draws up its own set of family values – what does this family, at this stage of its life, want to be prioritised by its members. This has the benefit of recognising that family lasts long beyond the intensely close years of child raising, and similar conversations could be had with the extended family. Having a clear set of values is useful as they can then be applied to a range of ways of “doing” family and are less prescriptive than a rule that says “we must all sit down to a meal each night”.
In my experience, some key family values are respect, cohesiveness, communication and flexibility. Balancing respect and cohesiveness allows for difference, but recognises that there is value in the family unit which needs to be tended and nurtured to allow it to continue well. Flexibility acknowledges the need for some structure in a family, but ensures that the unit can cope with change and negotiate new ways of being when there are external and internal stressors. How many families have adapted family patterns during the HSC period! It goes without saying that good communication is a pre requisite for fostering a climate of respect and cohesion, but equally, it is the time spent together and the respect and love that family members have for each other that underpin good communication.
The next challenge then is to think and work through a set of values for your church family…..
* details changed to protect identities!
You said: So how do we set about thinking/speaking/preaching about individual family values as Christians? Even turning to scripture has its hermeneutical challenges as we seek to glean ideas and principles from documents written thousands of years ago when “doing life and family†was set in a completely different social milieu.
I found this comment disturbing. Do you think God's values have changed over time? Are not God's values in Christ clear?
Family life, like all of life, is to be about living by the word of God. Every aspect of our lives ought to be brought under God’s word. And God’s word does address all of life. And so it is for church.
The knowledge of God creates our ‘values’ for family, church, ministry, what work to do (at home or earning money for....)...everything in life.
Christ’s ‘values’ are to be our values.
Our values will be seen in all our choices. Our choices are to reflect the knowledge of God. So often we create/adopt values that reflect the desires of this world rather than those of our Lord Jesus Christ.
May we all grow in the knowledge of God and may he grant us grace to live his way, for it is a way that is difficult and very different to that of this world culture.
cont...
His divine power has granted to us all things that pertain to life and godliness, through the knowledge of him who called us to his own glory and excellence, by which he has granted to us his precious and very great promises, so that through them you may become partakers of the divine nature, having escaped from the corruption that is in the world because of sinful desire.
For this very reason, make every effort to supplement your faith with virtue, and virtue with knowledge, and knowledge with self-control, and self-control with steadfastness, and steadfastness with godliness, and godliness with brotherly affection, and brotherly affection with love. For if these qualities are yours and are increasing, they keep you from being ineffective or unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. For whoever lacks these qualities is so nearsighted that he is blind, having forgotten that he was cleansed from his former sins. Therefore, brothers, be all the more diligent to make your calling and election sure, for if you practice these qualities you will never fall. For in this way there will be richly provided for you an entrance into the eternal kingdom of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ.
cont...
As a minister, can I ask how prevalent in churches is this way of thinking, in your opinion?
I've certainly seen resentment of the sort Nicky mentions. There are some ways in which our stipendary staff are insulated from various pressures that the pew-sitters face. This is doubtless a blessing, but you need to be sensitive about it.
I think if you wake up every morning and thank God for the enormous privilege of preaching the gospel for a living, then you will be fine!
The burgh is going great, great place, great church and area.
I agree with all you have said and in no way want to diminish the privelege I have. I desire to be sensitive in as many ways as I can, I want to learn, understand and be gracious and generous, especially to those who work and commute long distances.
I do feel pressure in this area though, like at times feeling like hiding when I am seen in those sorts of places through the week just in case someone gets the wrong idea and gets resentful. And I am deeply desirous to work hard, to give it my all. But then again, thats my fear of man issues. I need to please God first and be diligent in that hey?
For example, if someone can't make the prayer meeting because of his daughter's clarinet lesson, the minister want to reflect on the fact that he is not faced with such trade-offs. I think empathy on both sides is what is required.
The answer is not to value families on their 'activity' like what they do (or dont do), their flexibility or so forth, but to value a family on their convictions, and character, on what they believe, how they are implementing that and what fruit is being borne. This is where an example and model is to be found. Too often in this world, value is placed upon our activity, including work, rather than the opposite, competencies are only ever third place in the godliness heirarcy I would have thought.
How do the writers of the NT evidence this need for knowing ‘social milieu’ in order to understand the knowledge of God, say for example, in relation to family life? Doesn’t the Bible tell us very clearly for all generations what is important for everything?
You said, ‘I don’t want to argue here the rationale for working mothers, rather to accept that this is the social environment we live in’. Are you advocating a ‘social milieu’ hermeneutic rather than a gospel hermeneutic?
How do you avoid the culture becoming the interpreter of scripture rather than scripture interpreting culture?
cheers Di
. He further says . He then expands this by talking about how we must see in scripture . This emphasis of his suggests how the scriptures we read today have relevance for both then and now and into the future: which he tempers by illustrating how the new freedom in Christ was not fully actualised in the time of the early church: there were still slaves on earth in those days. This is the challenge for our preachers as they wrestle with how to interpret scripture for us week by week.
How a man is to act towards his wife is to be as Christ acts towards his people. How a woman is to act towards her husband is as she submits to Christ and as the church submits to her Lord. The more I read the Bible the more this all makes such wonderful sense.
So ‘values’ of faithfulness, submission and gospel speaking are essential in a family for any culture for any time.
‘Family values’ are to come from the knowledge of God revealed in scripture.
cont...
Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her, that he might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word, so that he might present the church to himself in splendour, without spot or wrinkle or any such thing, that she might be holy and without blemish. In the same way husbands should love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself. For no one ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it, just as Christ does the church, because we are members of his body. "Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh." This mystery is profound, and I am saying that it refers to Christ and the church. However, let each one of you love his wife as himself, and let the wife see that she respects her husband. (Ephesians 5)