Thursday, March 4, 2010

Protect This House

Genesis 2:24 for this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and they will become one flesh.

There is no mistaking the fact that God designed us to join in marriage, have children and raise them according to his teachings so that they could prosper, just as we should prosper from being raised by our God-fearing parents. God knew we would flourish in a strong family, built on his principles.

If love is the single most important ingredient in the bread of life, then our family is the oven in which it should be prepared.

Unfortunately, the number of families that function as God designed decreases every day, while the world’s population increases.

In this age, broken homes have become the norm. Many people embrace this idea as completely acceptable; they even contribute to it, and quite often turn a blind eye when families fall apart as if it’s not a big deal, when in reality it is a crime against the Lord – a broken covenant, one that was made to protect us.

God did not create us for an isolated life. If he hadn’t wanted us to be part of a family, we wouldn’t be born into one. We’d simply sprout from rocks or rise up from some primordial soup, wholly independent of one another.

Unfortunately, the family as God designed it is ground zero in a spiritual war that goes on every minute of every day. Men leave their families because they feel disrespected. Women leave their husbands because they feel unloved. Children are the victims in both cases, every time, without fail.

Pop culture romanticizes the broken home, tells us it’s a badge of honor to ride out a divorce, cements the idea that you are only in for what you can get out of it. Divorce lawyers advertise on late night TV, selling an end to marriage, as if it were a convenient new invention.

And the evil one laughs.

A wife left struggling to support her children alone often cannot devote time to the Lord, she’s simply too busy doing the job of two. Nor can she model that devotion for her kids. No woman was ever designed to be both parents.

A single father is often overwhelmed and confused, because he’s too busy working and trying to figure out how to be a mother, when God created him to be a father.

Children are left without solid role models on both sides, taught it’s okay to walk away when the going gets tough, and learn quickly that life is all about taking care of number one. These are flawed lessons that often lead to fractured lives and they perpetuate from generation to generation.

These are the pitfalls of not protecting our house, our home, our family.

James 5:16 Therefore confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you may be healed.

As Christians, we are all called to pray for one another, so that, through our fervent supplication, our Lord will hear our pleas and help those we love.

We are also called to love our neighbors as ourselves.

So, with that in mind, I beg all of you who read this, to spend a few minutes every day, praying for God’s protection on the families of every Christian brother and sister.

And if you are a mother or father or simply a husband or wife and you feel your family slipping away, pray earnestly for the Lord to heal your home. Seek help through the Church and consult the Word every day.

He designed us to be part of something more than ourselves… but alone, we are prey for the devil, who prowls like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour.

1 comment:

  1. Very true. The family is under attack and has been for years. The sad thing is that the next generation are the ones that really will suffer.

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