“You don’t choose your family. They are God’s gift to you.” Desmond Tutu

One of the earliest things that I was taught is that you can’t choose your family and I have learned over the years that this is so. The truth is friends may come and go, but we cannot change our family, no matter how much we may sometimes wish we could.

John Donne, an English clergyman & poet (1572 – 1631), wrote the oft-quoted classic line, “No man is an Island, entire of itself; every man is a piece of the Continent, a part of the main.” And he was absolutely right. No matter how much you may want to deny your heritage, your family is still your family, and you are just one part of it that makes up the whole.

Thinking about this through a lens of faith: The Bible tells us, Jesus, who makes people holy, and those who are made holy are from the same family. So he is not ashamed to call them his brothers and sisters. (Hebrews 2:11 – NCV) This means that all believers are part of the same family, a spiritual family, the family of God.

Growing up I realized from an early age that my “flesh and blood” family wasn’t particularly a close one, so when I became a Christian I naively thought, finally, I get to become part of a family that loves one another unconditionally, because we’ve all been forgiven by God. I’m sad to say that this just isn’t so. I quickly found that, like in any family unit, the family of God has it’s fair share of disunity, discord, and strife.

However, over the years I come to appreciate that where there are people there will often be, to quote Obi Wan, “a disturbance in the force.” No-one’s perfect, and yet sometimes our expectations of one another, especially within the church, is that we should be. But we’re not, and yet the One who is perfect calls us to be His family!

As with our earthly families we don’t get to choose our spiritual family either, because that privilege belongs solely to God. And while we may not always get along with our chosen brothers and sisters, it doesn’t mean we should give up on them either.

There will be times, as in our “flesh and blood” families, when we will disagree, annoy the heck out of each other, and can’t stand to be around one another. But when all is said and done, the mark of a good family unit is one that can move on through their grievances and differences, to forgive and love one another.

To quote Eva Burrows, the 13th General of the Salvation Army, “In family life, love is the oil that eases friction, the cement that binds closer together, and the music that brings harmony.” Amen to that!

Christian St John M.Div, BChM, ACS
November, 2008

Picture by Paulo Correa

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