New Family Order

"For whoever does the will 

of my Father in heaven is

my brother

and sister

and mother."

Matthew 12:50

I have a friend who has no extended family beyond her father.  Her mother recently died and she was sharing with me her frustration over the years in trying to learn her family history.  She was never able to glean much from her parents aside from the bare basics.  My friend never knew her grandparents and has no aunts or uncles to turn to for information.  As a result of this void, there is a yearning within her soul to discover her roots.

As a daughter of the King, my friend has entered into an enormous network of family the likes of which she can never fathom!  She inherited all  the mothers, fathers, brothers, and sisters she could ever imagine.  Even though we are not linked by our own blood that can be traced through the ancestry of generations, we are connected by our faith in Jesus and in His redeeming blood.  These are the ones on whom my friend can focus as she learns all that we have in common.

God First

Twentieth-century pastor and writer Vance Havner said, "It is one of the ironies of the ministry that the very man who works in God's name is often hardest put to find time for God.  The parents of Jesus lost him at church, and they were not the last ones to lose him there."

When Moses descended from Mount Sinai with the tablets upon which God had inscribed the Ten Commandments, the first decree on the list was enough to condemn the Israelites as they reveled around the golden calf.  "You shall have no other gods before Me" resounded in the air like a death sentence.  

As a member of God's family, God is to be first on my list of priorities.  Most times I may not act as blatantly as the people of Israel when Aaron formed the idol out of gold and erected it for all to worship, but I can easily get mixed up.

Doing things for  God or in His name is not the same as following God and putting Him first in my life.  Jesus clearly taught that, "Not everyone who says to me, 'Lord, Lord,' will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only he who does the will of my Father who is in heaven.  Many will say to me on that day, 'Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and in your name drive out demons and perform many miracles?' Then I will tell them plainly, 'I never knew you.  Away from me, you evildoers!"  (Matthew 7:21-23)

Jesus is making it apparent that my relationship with God is more important than any thing I do for Him.  My main focus is to be to know Him better, as David did as evidenced by his words in Psalm 139:14.  He said, "Your works are wonderful, I know that full well."  David knew so much about God because He spent time with Him, pored over His Scripture like it was life itself, desired God from the depths of his soul as a deer pants for the water, and looked for evidence of His handiwork all around Him.  David truly was a man after God's own heart!

If I am to follow suit, I need to be careful to only join in with what God is already doing around me; waiting on Him to open doors, put people in place and provide necessary resources.  When I try to force things to happen, as I so often do, I am doing things in His name but He will not get the glory.  As Jesus said as recorded in John 15:5, "I am the vine; you are the branches.  If a man remains in me and I in him, he will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing."

As a part of the family of God, we share the challenge of making God above all things and desiring to walk with Him each step of the way.

Others-Focused

The advent of the garage-door opener has ruined neighborhoods.  Okay, maybe that's placing too much blame on an electronic gadget, but I have to admit, it hasn't helped to bring us closer together.  Instead, it has made it all to easy for weary workers to drive home from a long day, pull into the garage and close the door behind them.  Neighbors rarely talk over the fence any more and seldom help each other out.  

As a member of our community crime watch group, I have learned from local law enforcement personnel that the most powerful weapon we have against crime is to know our neighbors.  Doesn't that seem too easy?  The premise is that when I understand my neighbors' habits, vehicles and normal activity patterns, I can easily recognize when something is wrong and I can then notify law enforcement.

Making the effort to focus on anyone other than myself, though, takes effort and does not come naturally.  Being a selfish human, I tend to keep my own needs, desires and wants at the top of my list.  But when I became a member of God's family through faith in Jesus Christ, the humility of Christ became my model.  

As the Apostle Paul teaches in Philippians 2:3-4, "Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit, but in humility consider others better than yourselves.  Each of you should look not only to your own interests, but also to the interests of others."

This means when I'm running late while the grocery checker is moving at a snail's pace I can take the time to help the single mom struggling with her grocery cart and three small children.  Or when a brother in Christ needs transportation and I have two vehicles, I think of his needs before I worry about how my family will share one car.  Or if a neighbor is stressed out and needs a word of encouragement, I will put my own frustrations aside as I take a moment to pass on the hope of Christ.

As part of the family of God, I am to make others more important than my own interests.

Love Rules

I've heard a lot of things about love, like how all I need is love, it hurts or kills slowly, its passionate, I can fall into love and out of love and it's what makes the world go 'round.  If I want to truly understand love, however, I need to look to God because He is love.

Love is defined and described in 1 Corinthians 13:4-7.  God's love, ". . .never gives up.  Love cares more for others than for self.  Love doesn't want what it doesn't have.  Love doesn't strut, doesn't have a swelled head, doesn't force itself on others, isn't always 'me first,' doesn't fly off the handle, doesn't keep score of the sins of others, doesn't revel when others grovel, takes pleasure in the flowering of truth, puts up with anything, trusts God always, always looks for the best, never looks back, but keeps going to the end.  Love never dies." (MSG)

Now that's love!  Love is so important to God that He prefaced this passage with the thought that, ". . .no matter what I say, what I believe, and what I do, I'm bankrupt without love." (1 Corinthians 13:3 MSG)

I could run a successful food bank that feeds thousands of hungry families, but if I don't show respect to my husband, I have nothing.  I could spend hours a day studying the scripture and be known as an expert in God's Word, but if I carry a running list of my children's failures or disappointments, I'm a bust.  I could pledge my life to telling the gospel to everyone I meet and pray continually for the salvation of the lost peoples of the world, but if I'm not content with the position in which God has placed me, I've not impacted God's kingdom one iota.

God concludes this section of scripture with the charge to, "Trust steadily in God, hope unswervingly, love extravagantly.  And the best of the three is love." (1 Corinthians 13:13 MSG)  Loving is not easy, especially when I feel my own rights being violated, but I am able to love because He first loved me!

As part of God's family, love can rule in every part of my life.

Even though natural families are very important, my family tree does not stop at bloodlines.  As a follower of Christ, I have a world-wide network of brothers and sisters who share common traits.  We are called to put God first, think of others' more than self, and to let love rule:  These are the characteristics of the family of God.  No matter how big or small my natural family is, I can count on the fact that wherever I go in this world, I will always run into a member of my spiritual family!

As I begin this day it is my prayer that I can remember the traits that keep the family of God strong.

When do I do things for God but leave Him out of it?

How can I let love rule in my life?