The Spiritually Authentic Family

Taking your family to church can sometimes be a risky proposition.

One day, after the church service was over, a little boy ran up to the pastor and said, “When I grow up, I’m going to give you some money.”

“Well, thank you very much,” said the pastor, “but why are you going to do that?”

The little boy replied “Because my daddy says you’re one of the poorest preachers we’ve ever had.”

Then there was the woman who invited some church people over to dinner after the service one Sunday. As they sat down to begin the meal, she turned to her six-year-old daughter and said, “Honey, would you like to say the blessing?”

The little girl paused shyly and whispered “I don’t know what to say.”

“Just say what you’ve heard Mommy say,” said the woman.

So the little girl bowed her head and prayed very seriously, “Dear Lord, why on earth did we invite all these people over to dinner?”

It’s not easy to fake it at home! Home is where we let our hair down. Home is where people know us as we really are. As we’ve been studying the book of Colossians, we’ve been focusing on this idea of finding spiritual reality, and becoming a spiritually authentic person. And how authentic we are is going to show up most clearly at home, in our closest, most intimate relationships.

Dr. Henry Brandt is a Christian psychologist. In one of his books, he tells the story of one of his clients—a teenaged boy—who was rebelling against going to church. This boy’s parents were Christians. They wanted their son to go to church, but he didn’t want to go. He simply refused. When Dr. Brandt asked him why, here is what he said:

“Why should I go to church? Look at the way my parents treat each other. Last Sunday morning we were sitting at the breakfast table in silence because my Dad refused to talk to my Mom. And she wouldn’t even look at him. They were having another big fight, which isn’t unusual for them.

After breakfast, my Dad turns to me and says “Get ready. You’re going to church with us.” So they forced me to go to church with them. In the car on the way to church, they didn’t say a word to each other. There was nothing but cold silence.

But then we pulled into the parking lot and it was like a major transformation took place. Suddenly, they both pasted happy smiles on their faces. We got out of the car and Dad actually put his arm around Mom and they walked into the church that way. You’d think they were actually friends or something. They were happy and laughing and joking with everybody all morning long. They looked like a perfect couple.

But then we got back into the car to go home, and the smiles came off. And they never said a word to each other for the rest of the day. That’s why I don’t want to go to church.”

Being a follower of Jesus Christ isn’t worth much if it isn’t making a difference in the way you live at home, where the masks come off. And if being a Christ-follower is making a real difference in you from the inside out, that difference is going to be most apparent to the people who are closest to you—your husband, your wife, your children, your parents.

That is what Paul is getting at in the next section of the book of Colossians. He’s already told us in 3:1-17 that having a relationship with Jesus Christ radically changes us—we become new people; we have new identities.

Our hearts are in a different place. Our minds are focused on different things. Our old self is dead. We are putting to death the old behavior patterns that cling to us like filthy old rags. We are taking off those old rags and putting on the new “grace clothes” that God gives us to wear.

We are letting the peace of Christ rule in our hearts. We are letting the Word of Christ dwell in our lives. And we are living so that the name of Christ is honored in all that we do.

And it is in that context—in light of all of those changes that take place in our lives as we truly follow Christ—that we need to consider how God wants us to live at home, in our most intimate relationships. The point is—we cannot divorce verses 18-21 from verses 1-17. They are organically connected. If I’m not applying verses 1-17, I’ll never be able to live verses 18-21.

The Bible teaches us that spiritual authenticity flows from the inside out. First I need to have an authentic relationship with Jesus Christ. Then, and only then, can I be an authentic person, an authentic marriage partner, an authentic parent or an authentic child in a family, and ultimately (as we’ll see next week) an authentic person in the public arena. It all begins on the personal level.

So in light of that, let’s see what Paul says about being authentic at home.

Colossians 3:18-21 Wives, submit 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.

Verses 18–19 talk about the relationship between husbands and wives; verses 20–21 talk about the relationship between children and parents. Let’s look at marriage first…

Wives, submit to your husbands, as is fitting in the Lord. Husbands, love your wives and do not be harsh with them.

Did you ever stop to realize that marriage is the only institution on earth today that existed before there was sin in the world? It’s a relationship that was given to us by God before man fell into sin. There was marriage in paradise before there was sin.

When you think about marriage in the Garden of Eden, you realize that Adam and Eve must have had an ideal marriage. He never had to listen to her talking about all the guys she could have married, and she never had to listen to him bragging about what a great cook his mother was.

Seriously, Adam and Eve were a married couple. And when Adam and Eve fell into sin, that had a devastating effect on their relationship. You can see in Genesis 3 how they started blaming each other, how sin drove a wedge between them. And sin not only had a profound effect on their marriage; it has had a profound effect on every marriage ever since. Let’s look at Genesis 3:16 for a moment to see the implications that sin had on marriage.

Adam and Eve rebelled against God and brought sin into the world. That meant that the world was now damaged; it was no longer the perfect, healthy, happy place that God created it to be. It was cursed. And one of the aspects of that curse is given to us in Genesis 3:16.

Genesis 3:16 To the woman he said, “I will greatly increase your pains in childbearing; with pain you will give birth to children. Your desire will be for your husband, and he will rule over you.”

Now any woman who’s had a baby knows that the first part of that verse is true. But look at that last sentence: “Your desire will be for your husband, and he will rule over you.” That sentence comes through as fairly innocuous in English, but believe me, there’s a lot of heartache in those simple little words when you look back to the original language!

The Hebrew word that is translated “desire” means a desire to control, to manipulate, to dominate. It is not a romantic desire! The same word is used in Genesis 4:7 when God says to Cain “If you do what is right, will you not be accepted? But if you do not do what is right, sin is crouching at your door; it desires to have you…” It’s a negative desire, a destructive desire. And this is one of the outcomes of sin—the woman wants to control her man.

Now the other side of this curse is that Adam would rule over Eve. The Hebrew word for “rule” means to subjugate, to put down, to force your will upon someone. It’s not a happy, pleasant, benevolent kind of leadership. Because of the presence of sin, the man now has a tendency to want to impose his will upon the woman. And, because of his superior strength, for much of human history he has been successful in doing just that. Women have been put down, oppressed, deprived of their rights.

So the relationship between men and women after the Fall became a contest—a competition between two parties who want their own way. The battle of the sexes.

A man walked into a library one day and asked the librarian where he could find a copy of a book entitled: Man: the Master of Woman. Without looking up, she pointed and said “Sir, all the fiction books are over there in that corner.”

As human beings, we have sin in our hearts. That means that if you are a woman, you will have within you a tendency to want to control or manipulate your man in order to get your own way. And if you are a man, you will have a tendency within you that will make you want to put down your woman and force your will upon her in order to get your own way.

Sin makes us always want to have our own way because the essence of sin is seflishness. That’s the driving force within us. That’s how we are as human beings in our natural state. And when you take two sinners and put them into the close proximity of a marriage relationship, you have a recipe for real conflict. In our culture, 50% of the marriages that are transacted this year will end in separation or divorce. That’s the message of Genesis 3.

But we have been studying Colossians 3, which says that when you put your trust in Jesus Christ, He changes your natural state. He takes away your sin. He brings you into relationship with God. He puts to death the old you and he gives you a new you that’s alive to God and God’s righteousness. So if you let him, the Lord actually begins to reverse the effects of the Fall in your life. He begins to change your tendencies from the inside out.

But we have to cooperate with him, and align our will with his in this process. And for a wife, that means to submit to her husband, and for a husband, that means to love his wife and not be harsh with her.

A lot of women have a problem with the word “submit” in verse 18. Feminists look down their noses with scorn at the apostle Paul. They say that he obviously hated women and that the entire Bible puts women down. But they don’t understand what the word submit means. They think that submission means subjugation or surrender, but that is not what this word means.

The word submit was a actually a Greek military term that meant “to arrange in orderly ranks”. In other words, when an officer would cry out “submit”, the soldiers would assemble into battle formation. They would take their places as an effective fighting unit. You can’t win a battle if the soldiers are all over the place going their own way, doing their own thing. You need to get them into formation so that they’re all moving in the same direction with the same purpose.

And that is what submission is. It is being willing to take your place in an authority structure in order to accomplish a purpose—to get a job done; to reach a goal; to move together in one direction, to have a successful relationship.

The Godhead is an excellent example of how submission works. The Bible tells us that Jesus Christ the Son is equal in every way to God the Father. But in the Incarnation, he voluntarily placed himself under the Father’s authority. He said “I do nothing on my own but speak just what the Father has taught me.” (John 8:28) Jesus willingly submitted himself to his Father’s authority in order to accomplish the redemption of mankind.

And likewise with the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit is co-equal with God the Father and God the Son. He is a full member of the Trinity. But the Holy Spirit has placed himself under the authority of Christ the Son. Jesus told his disciples that when the Holy Spirit comes, “He will not speak on his own; he will speak only what he hears, and he will tell you what is yet to come. He will bring glory to me by taking from what is mine and making it known to you.” (John 16:13-14) So the Holy Spirit willingly submits to the leadership of God the Son.

So it is in marriage. Marriage is a structure—it’s an organized relationship between two people. And every structured relationship has to have within it lines of authority in order for it to work. Somebody has to be the leader. Somebody has to have the final say. Someone has to bear the final responsibility.

It’s like a bicycle built for two. Both riders are equal. They both crank the pedals. They’re both going to arrive at the same destination. But the rider who’s sitting in front has the responsibility of steering the bike. That doesn’t mean that that rider is better, or more intelligent. It’s just the way it works. You can’t have two people trying to steer the bike independently. You’ll get nowhere fast!

In marriage, God asks the wife to willingly put aside her own agenda and take her place in the authority structure of marriage, and willingly submit to her husband’s leadership so that together they might arrive at God’s destination for them as a couple.

In submitting, she is not saying “I’m inferior to my husband.” She is not saying that women are somehow less intelligent or capable or have less intrinsic worth. In fact, I would argue that submission infers equality. You cannot have true submission where you don’t first have equality. An ant cannot submit to an elephant. That isn’t submission; that is surrender. Submission requires equality.

Now what about a wife who has a husband who is a tyrant? He is cruel to her and abuses her and treats her like dirt? We’re seeing more and more of this kind of behavior.

Is a wife to submit to that kind of a husband? Is she to subject herself to that kind of treatment? Absolutely not. That is not submission, that is capitulation, and God never expects a woman to do that.

If a woman finds herself in that kind of situation, and there is no repentance on the part of her husband and no desire to change, she needs to take whatever steps are necessary to protect herself and her children. God does not expect a woman to lose her dignity and identity as a human being at the hands of a husband who is trying to destroy her.

You see, the Bible links a woman’s duty to submit in verse 18 to the husband’s duty to love in verse 19. THAT LINKAGE IS THE KEY TO THE WHOLE RELATIONSHIP. This is where authentic marriage really comes into focus. It is a reciprocal relationship between husband and wife.

Verse 19 says: Husbands, love your wives and do not be harsh with them.

The kind of love that is being spoken of here requires submission on the part of the husband. He must submit his needs, his wants, his interests, his rights, in order to truly love his wife in the way that this verse expresses. Her health, her wholeness, her well-being becomes his primary concern.

And that idea was a revolutionary concept, because in the ancient world, and for much of history, men have simply dominated women. For most of history, men have treated women as thought there were not much more than pieces of property. Until recently, women have had very few rights and even fewer privileges.

But the Bible’s teaching changed all that. It elevated women by demanding of their husbands that they love their wives with a self-giving, self-sacrificing kind of love. The word love in verse 19 is the word “agape”, and it means unconditional love.

It’s a love has nothing to do with what you get in return. It has nothing to do with how a woman looks or how she acts or whether she is even capable of loving you back. It is an unconditional love. Husbands are to love their wives even when they are no longer capable of responding.

There once was a man who loved his wife tenderly and steadfastly for 15 years without any responding love on her part. She couldn’t respond, for she had developed Alzheimers.

At the onset of the disease, she was an attractive, vivacious woman of sixty, who looked at least 10 years younger. In the beginning, she experienced intermittent times of confusion. As the disease progressed, she gradually lost all her mental faculties and did not even recognize her own husband.

He took care of her at home for the first five years. During that time, he often took her for visits, she looking lovely although she had no idea of where she was, and he proudly introduced her to everyone as his wife, even though her remarks were often inappropriate.

He never made an apology for her; he never indicated that there was anything wrong with what she had just said. He always treated her with the utmost courtesy and showered her with love and attention, no matter what she said or did.

The time came when the doctors said she had to go into a nursing home for intensive care. She lived there for ten years and he was with her every day. As long as she was able to, he took her for a drive each afternoon—out to their farm, or downtown, or to visit the family—never in any way embarrassed that she was so far out of touch.

He never made a negative comment about her. He did not begrudge the large amount of money required to keep her in the home all those years, never even hinted that it might be a problem. In fact, he never complained about any detail of her care throughout the long illness. He always obtained the best for her and did the best for her.

The author who related that story is Dr. Ed Wheat, a Christian counselor. And he reveals at the end of the story that that was his Mom and Dad.

This is the kind of love that God is calling us husbands to have for our wives.

When Paul says in verse 19 “don’t be harsh with them”, he is using an expression which means “don’t throw your weight around”. As a husband, don’t be crabby and cross, or irritable with your wife. Don’t put her down. Don’t be sarcastic. Don’t treat her or talk to her so that she will feel badly about herself. She is your greatest asset. In Ephesians 5, Paul says that a man who loves his wife loves himself.

Now given that kind of love, I don’t think that a woman will have a problem submitting and putting herself under the leadership of a man who treats her that way. Authentic marriage is a reciprocal relationship—the husband actively loves his wife, and the wife submits to her husband.

Now let’s look at the responsibilities of children and parents in verses 20-21:

Colossians 3:20-21 Children, obey your parents in everything, for this pleases the Lord. Fathers, do not embitter your children, or they will become discouraged.

To whom is Paul referring in verse 20? Well, it says “children”, but what does that mean? How old do you have to be before you are no longer a child?

Well, the Greek word that is used there is the word “tekna”, and it simply means “children” in a general sense. There is another word that the Bible uses for little children—it’s the word “teknia”. It’s the diminutive form of the word “tekna”. But that’s not the word that’s used here.

The word that is used here simply means children of any age who are still living with their parents. Children who have not yet become independent, living out on their own. Children who are still living under their parents’ roof; children who are still dependent in some way on their parents.

So in our culture, that extends right up through the teenage years and often into the twenties. If you can still be claimed as a dependent on your parents’ income tax, if you are relying upon them to pay for your education, if you are still living at home and your parents are supporting you, then you are still a child, according to the Bible’s definition of the term. You are not yet completely independent. Even though you can vote, even though you can drive a car, even though you have a part-time job, you are still under the headship of your parents.

What are children to do? Children are to obey their parents. What does it mean to obey your parents?

The Bible uses a very interesting Greek word for “obey” there. It is the word “hupakouete” and it comes from the word “akouo”, which means to hear. We get our word acoustic from that same word. Obedience has to do with hearing.

Hearing your parents. Listening to them. This is where obedience starts. Proverbs says “A wise son hears and obeys his father’s instruction, but a fool does not listen. Listen to your father, who gave you life, and do not despise your mother when she is old.”

In other words, if you have stopped hearing your parents; if you have turned them off and tuned them out because you think they have nothing to say to you—you are on your way to becoming what the Bible calls a fool.

Obedience begins with hearing. But it doesn’t end there. Obedience means doing what your parents are asking you to do. And doing it on an on-going basis. This word “obey” in verse 20 is in the present tense. It means “keep on obeying”. Do it all the time. Make a habit of it.

How extensively are you to obey your parents? The Bible says “in everything”. That’s pretty comprehensive isn’t it? Not a whole lot of loopholes there! Let me ask you a question: Why does God expect children to obey their parents in everything? I’ll tell you why.

Because God expects the parents to be the kind of people he describes in the next verse—people who have their children’s best interests at heart, people who aren’t going to tell their children to do something foolish or wrong.

The relationship between children and parents is a reciprocal relationship, just as the relationship between husband and wife. There are responsibilities on both sides of the relationship. And the responsibility for the children is to obey.

Why should children obey their parents? The answer is right there in v. 20: Because it pleases the Lord. That’s an excellent reason for doing it. And Ephesians 6:1-3 tells us why it pleases the Lord:

Children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right. Honor your father and mother”—which is the first commandment with a promise—that it may go well with you and that you may enjoy long life on the earth.

Well, now we want to look at God’s instructions for parents in Col. 3:21…

Colossians 3:21 Fathers, do not embitter your children, or they will become discouraged.

Who is being addressed here? Well, the word is translated “fathers” because that’s exactly what it means. And in NT culture, the father was the chief disciplinarian and was very definitely regarded to be the head of the family.

But this same word is used elsewhere in Scripture (such as Heb. 11:23) to mean “parents” in general. And I believe that God is really talking to both parents here—you’re included Mom, and especially if you are a single Mom. You are the parent for your children.

Now what are parents to do? Or more specifically, what are they NOT to do? The Bible says “Do not embitter your children” (KJV - “do not provoke them to anger.”) What does that mean?

Well, the Greek word is “erithizo” and it means literally “to stir up”. Let’s suppose that you are out in a rowboat on a shallow pond that has a muddy bottom. You dig your oars into the bottom of the lake and stir up all the mud. Now the pond is all cloudy and silty, and it takes a long time to get clear again. That’s the picture behind this word.

Parents, don’t stir up, or disturb, your children by misusing or abusing your authority over them. Don’t harass them by constantly poking at them and jabbing at them with the “oars” of your authority.

Why? Because if you do, you will stir up their lives with anger and resentment and bitterness. Then they will not be able to see God clearly or life clearly.

They will become discouraged. The Greek here means literally “they will lose heart”. They will become listless, sullen, and downcast. You will take the heart right out of them. You will break their spirit.

If a child lives with criticism, he will learn to condemn.

If a child lives with hostility, he will learn to fight.

If a child lives with fear, he will learn to be apprehensive.

If a child lives with pity, he will learn to feel sorry for himself.

If a child lives with ridicule, he will learn to be shy.

But If a child lives with tolerance, he will learn to be patient.

If a child lives with encouragement, he will learn to be confident.

If a child lives with praise, he will learn to be grateful.

If a child lives with acceptance, he will learn to love.

Parenting is an art. It is not a science. And the art of parenting—the art of wielding parental authority—comes down to learning how to bend a child’s will without breaking his spirit.

There is a delicate balance in this matter of wielding parental authority—a balance that is not always easy to find. On the one hand, some parents relinquish all authority in the lives of their kids out of fear that they might misuse it, or that their children might resent it. Other parents go to the opposite extreme of “over-parenting”—constantly imposing their authority on their children out of a fear of losing that authority altogether.

Parental authority is like a sword. You can either use that sword to protect your kids, or you can use that sword to wound them.

There’s much more we could say on this issue, but our time is gone. Let me close with a poem from Khalil Gibran—as he shares what it means to be a parent.

You are the bow from which your children, as living arrows, are sent forth.

The Archer sees the mark upon the path of the infinite,

And He bends you with His might that His arrows might go swift and far.

Let your bending in the Archer’s hand be for gladness;

For even as He loves the arrow that flies,

So He loves also the bow that is stable.