Future Family Series Week 1 -Ideally Speaking

Message by:
Pastor Terry Crawford
Covenant Church
Shepherdstown, WV

You can’t choose your family.

Ephesians 6:1-2
Children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right. “Honor your father and mother”—which is the first commandment with a promise

Colossians 3:18 -21
Wives, submit yourselves to your husbands, as is fitting in the Lord. Husbands, love your wives and do not be harsh with them. Children, obey your parents in everything, for this pleases the Lord. Fathers, do not embitter your children, or they will become discouraged.

1 Peter 3:7
Husbands, in the same way be considerate as you live with your wives, and treat them with respect as the weaker partner and as heirs with you of the gracious gift of life, so that nothing will hinder your prayers.

Summary of 1st Century Family Teaching:

Husbands, love your wives and be considerate.
Wives, submit to your husbands.
Children, obey your parents.
Fathers, don’t irritate your children.

Jesus taught and pointed toward an ideal yet refused to condemn those who fell short.

Matthew 19:3-6
Some Pharisees came to him to test him. They asked, “Is it lawful for a man to divorce his wife for any and every reason?” “Haven’t you read,” he replied, “that at the beginning the Creator ‘made them male and female,’ and said, ‘For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united 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.”

All of us want a better future for our children.

Question: Are you willing to live with the tension between your reality and Jesus’ ideal?