20.3 Family Life
© 2018 Christ Revealed Bible Institute
There is no other word that best expresses the reality of any local Church filled with Christ and moving as the Church together than FAMILY. And thus, life together is family life. – In the beginning Elohim (plural) – God is Family.
Now, when we say that “life together is family life,” we are drawing from our understanding of the life of the natural family. Nonetheless, the natural family is something quite different from this family life that is Christ in His Church. The natural family becomes what God intends inside the Church, but it can never replace the Church.
The Gradient. It is my hope in this lesson to work through an extended definition of family life as it means inside life together. This lesson then becomes a series of thoughts that contribute to our understanding of God becoming part of His creation. Let’s begin with the gradient from public to private as set forth by the authors of Patterns of Home but fitted into Christ as Community.
Large assembly (the tabernacle) <> Semi-private small assembly – semi-private individual <> Small assembly (local gatherings in homes and work spaces, including individual natural families) <> Semi-private couples or individuals <> Private and personal for each individual in rest and in work.
The honor of the individual and the joy of the gathering together are two sides of the same thing. You can’t have one without also the other in like measure.
The Essence. This statement, then, “the honor of the individual and the joy of the gathering together” is the meaning and essence of love, especially as it flows back and forth inside the gradient. It is also the meaning and essence of the Ekenosis as we will see in the next session. It is also the meaning and essence of family life. In fact, we will also see how this equation is the essence and meaning of the liberty into which we set creation.
But we have discovered something in the translation of 1 John into the Jesus Secret Version. The word “ought to,” in 1 John 3:16, could just as easily be translated into “are committed to.”
A Statement of Faith. “Ought to” is obligation, something we can never fulfill in and of ourselves. “Are committed to” is a statement of faith, the faith of the Son of God inside of which we live. This commitment to one another as one Community of Christ together is the foundation of family life. It is similar to and different from commitment in the natural family.
Here is Paul’s introduction to the Ekenosis in the JSV. Therefore, if there be any encouragement inside of Christ, if any comfort of love, if any fellowship of Spirit, if any affections and compassions, fulfill my joy by being of the same mind, having the same love, being united in soul {sym-psuchos – sharing the same soul), in the same thinking (Philippians 2:1-2).
One Mind – Many Differences. How ridiculous can Paul get? Ain’t gonna’ happen, not in the natural. And attempting to be religious about “sharing the same mind” becomes a spectacle of absurdity. But what if Paul was talking about sharing the mind of Christ together, a mind each one of us already possesses?
You see, the one mind of Christ is expressed through each one of us quite differently, His Person entirely inside of and conformed with our person. And thus the multitude of our individual differences continuously come out from our sharing of the same Soul. In actuality, this distinction then enables us to understand the commitment of family.
Belonging. Since the Harvey flood here in Houston, we have given a room in our house to a young couple who lost their home. They are gracious and respectful in all ways, yet they do not share a commitment to this word of Christ our life. When I am sitting in our living room and this couple walks in the front door, they are most welcome, certainly; but when my son walks in the same door, the sense in me is entirely different. They are guests; my son BELONGS. And my son belongs because he is a Yordy, sharing with me, not only the same name, but also the same soul as well as the same history over the last twenty-seven years. Yet Paul is transferring this same belonging to the local Church.
The Commitment of Father. Every particle of my son’s belonging, however, is entirely of the natural – and wonderfully good. The belonging of Church family comes out from a different source. When I walk into the “living room” of the Community and sit down in your midst, having returned from a long journey, I am AT HOME. And the source of my belonging is always Father.
If our commitment is “Christ,” then we will still be butting heads. But when our commitment is Father, we lay down our lives for one another. There is the commitment of Christ towards all Christians; there is the commitment of natural family; but much deeper than either is the commitment of Father out from which flows family life together.
Sharing the Same Story. Family life, then, in its essence, is sharing the same soul, the same story. You are part of my story and I am part of your story and that’s just the way it is. And family life is sharing the same name, the name of Father, not on the outside of us, necessarily, but in our hearts.
Our commitment to one another inside of Christ as Community, then, is a recognition of the sharing of Hheart with Father inside each one – a commitment of Father in each one that has no regard for cost and no thought of failure. “No regard for cost and no thought of failure” is absolutely Father at Home, sharing Hheart with God. And family life coming out from here is good beyond measure.
A Pure Heart. So then, what is this family life in its daily expression? First, we love one another with a pure heart. That means that family life can happen only as we know that Jesus is purifying our hearts continuously by His very presence inside of them.
Consider a natural family in which everyone is motivated by self-gain in one form or another. No one gains anything inside such a life. Consider a natural family in which the members are motivated by kindness towards one another. Everyone is enriched; everyone gains much. This is one of the great paradoxes of reality – give – and it shall be given to you. Take – and you will never have enough.
Give and Receive. Give, and it will be given to you: good measure, pressed down, shaken together, and running over will be put into your bosom. For with the same measure that you use, it will be measured back to you (Luke 6:38). Family life in Christ Community is all about giving, and with giving, receiving abundance.
I had begun my construction career before I entered Christian community. I quickly came to hate going from one building site to the next never seeing a finished house and especially never building for the people who would live there. One of the many things I loved in community was that I built for people whom I knew and loved, and when the job was finished, I helped them move into their new place.
The Ditches. Natural family doesn’t really do that. In fact, natural families are typically far less involved in one another’s life than they might claim or imagine.
In actuality, when we say, “family life,” we very much include in that term an economic relationship. Yet the economy we consider is that of marriage, not that of parents and children. This is why Christ Community cannot be enlarged much above 75 people. A community of 200 people becomes impersonal in its economy, thus bending towards socialism, that is, a form of “forced sharing.” Again, we see these opposing “ditches” of forced sharing on the one hand and every man for himself on the other, neither one of which has anything to do with loving one another.
Private – Common. This pattern of private-common, that is, “the honor of the individual and the joy of the gathering together” in perfect balance, really is the specific framework of loving one another. As a family unit, that is, as in marriage, we share the income together and we share together the tasks of living. Yet, as in a healthy family, the individual is highly regarded. For most of the years I lived in community, my work was just part of family life. I received no wages for my labor and paid no money for the benefits I received from others. Inside of that economy, everyone just gave themselves wholeheartedly to the work because that was who we were and what we did. Yet this giving was out from our hearts; it was not required “from above.”
Human Action. “Economics” is a study of human interaction. As a study, it asks two primary questions of human action. 1. What do individual people actually do? 2. Having determined what individuals actually do, why do they make that decision and not another?
Economics is discrimination. When I married Maureen, I excluded all other possible choices of wife. Every human action comes out from a human purpose, and every human purpose is a choice of one possibility only among many. And that choice is governed by a distinction of value.
Family life is a continuous array of actions coming out from choices determined by what is valued most.
Who Gets What? Now, that formula could sound very utilitarian rather than personal. Nonetheless, they say that money or the lack of it is the biggest test of marriage love. Someone gives the community $10,000. What do you do with the money, and who decides? Who gets what? These are the big issues that will bring confrontation inside the governmental meetings of the community. This is the big issue that brings conflict in marriage. I recently made a small economic decision based entirely on my own preferences. I had to quickly back track and change that decision because it conflicted with the needs and interests of other members of my family. Such is family life.
Valuation. Loving one another is extraordinarily practical, even mundane. Loving one another happens inside the complex and continuous array of semi-competing needs, choices, and actions of many among many. And underlying that entire complexity is the concept of valuation. What do you value? What do you treasure? What do you want? – I DESIRE that those whom You have given Me should be with Me. – For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also.
If my decisions regarding value are forced upon me by “experts,” they are not from a true heart. If my decisions regarding value disregard other people, they are not from a pure heart.
Esteem One Another Better. Here is Paul’s statement of valuation. – For what is our hope, or joy, or crown of rejoicing? Is it not even you as the face of our Lord Jesus Christ inside of His presence? For you are our glory and joy (1 Thessalonians 2:19-20 – JSV).
Then, the next statement of Paul’s preceding the Ekenosis. – Do nothing according to rivalry or according to empty conceit, but in lowliness of mind {same word as Jesus – I am lowly of heart), esteem one another as better than themselves {this must be poorly worded for English if we are to keep the reciprocity of one another}, each considering not just their own things, but also the things of each other (Philippians 2:3-4).
I value your happiness <> you value my happiness.
What We Value the Most. It is this shared valuation, then, that constitutes family life inside of Christ Community. Our hearts belong to what we value the most.
But you have approached {living inside the Holy of Holies} Mount Zion, and the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem and myriads of angels. [You have approached] the festival assembly {the gathering of the Feast of Tabernacles} and the Church of the Firstborn {that is, just like Jesus, of His same kind} enrolled in the heavens (Hebrews 12:22-23). When Jesus said, “Lay up for yourself treasures in heaven,” He did not mean some day and far away in a present fantasy, He meant love one another.
Father Revealed. Natural humans value three things – material possessions – or rivalry and empty conceit (the self-exaltation that comes from accusation) or – family. Christ Community is for those who value one another above all. And the thing we value the most in one another is the Hheart each one shares with Father.
Most church and community relationships in Christian history have been based on a false valuation – that of earning a place with God by some form of crucifying, that is, exalting the flesh.
Having stepped through the cross entirely, you and I rush boldly into all the treasures that are God. And here we find the greatest treasure of all, loving one another – family life – Father revealed.