home > Pastor’s Desk > 2021 > October 17 > YOUR FAMILY IS BIGGER THAN YOU THINK

¶ For this reason I bow my knees before the Father, from whom every family in heaven and on earth is named, that according to the riches of His glory He may grant you to be strengthened with power through His Spirit in your inner being, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith—that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may have strength to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled with all the fullness of God.
Ephesians 3:14-19

My Grandmother, Ruby McCormack, harvesting on their family farm in the Wimmera, Victoria.

My Grandmother, Ruby McCormack, harvesting on their family farm in the Wimmera, Victoria, in the 1920s.

My Great Grandmother was one of eleven children. My mother was one of six children. After the financial devastation of the Great Depression, my Grandparents, my mother and my aunts and uncles moved from the Wimmera to Bunyip, a small town in Gippsland Victoria, where my Grandparents started over – again, farming sheep, dairy cows, and crops. In the early 1900s in rural Australia it made sense to have a big family because farming was so labour intensive and every farmer depended upon their children to help out on the farm. Today, families of six or more children is far less common. In fact, some couples are now getting married with the intention of having just one child, and even some are telling me that they do not intend to have any children. I wonder what this apparent trend might do to our culture? I wonder whether some of the problems that beset young men who struggle to interact in a wholesome way with young ladies might be due to their lack of growing up with a sister or sisters? While sociologists who study the effect of family compositions on societies examine some of these dynamics and how they maybe contributing to the “me generation”, I think there is also something deeply spiritual and theological to consider as well.

¶ Do not rebuke an older man but encourage him as you would a father, younger men as brothers,
older women as mothers, younger women as sisters, in all purity.
First Timothy 5:1-2

 

A THEOLOGY OF FAMILY

Whenever we follow the words ‘a theology of ’ with another word, such as ‘family’, it means that we are considering what God and His Word state, or teach us, about a particular topic. When we consider our text (Eph. 3:14-19), we might wonder what the reference to God’s family “in heaven” might mean. Eminent New Testament scholar, F.F. Bruce, in his 1983 commentary on Paul’s Epistle to the Ephesians, notes that in Jewish Rabbinical thought, God has a heavenly (“above”) family, and an earthly (“below”). God’s heavenly family is comprised of the following magnificent creatures:

We generally lump all of the heavenly creatures that God created under the heading of angels. But the word angel simply refers to one of the tasks carried out particularly by one category of these heavenly creatures. Here is a brief list of five categories of heavenly creatures whom God created with a word who then constituted His heavenly family. and to whom we generally indiscriminately lump them all together by referring to them all as angels —

1. THE CHERUBIM We have good reason for believing that quite probably, the first creatures that God created were cherubim. The Scriptures consistently refer to there being four of these magnificent creatures.

And from the midst of it came the likeness of four living creatures. And this was their appearance:
they had a human likeness, but each had four faces, and each of them had four wings.
Ezekiel 1:5-6

Cherubim are always depicted as guarding the presence of God (Isa. 37:16). When the Redeemer, who would later become known as Jesus, created them, these proto-creatures would bear faces that would one day be revealed to the world in the face of Christ. These four cherubim had four faces. Each had the face of a human, a lion, an ox, and an eagle. Thus, whenever Christ saw these cherubim, which would have been continually, He was was reminded (if it’s possible for God to be reminded of anything) that He would one day become a human being who would die to redeem all mankind. This work of redemption would be described by each of the four Gospels where the Gospel of Matthew would emphasise Christ as the Lion of the Tribe of Judah, the King; and the Gospel of Mark would emphasise Christ as the worker, the ox; and the Gospel of Luke would emphasise Christ as the man of compassion, the human; and the Gospel of John would emphasise Christ as the eternal God made flesh, the eagle.

As for the likeness of their faces, each had a human face. The four had the face of a lion on the right side, the four had the face of an ox on the left side, and the four had the face of an eagle.
Ezekiel 1:10

We are introduced to the cherubim in the opening chapters of Genesis after God had banished our original parents from Eden and sent the cherubim to guard the east gate (Gen. 3:24). They are described most frequently in the Book of Ezekiel. They are present in the closing book of the Bible as “four living creatures” after the Lamb of God is presented as Christus Victor.

And before the throne there was as it were a sea of glass, like crystal.
¶ And around the throne, on each side of the throne, are four living creatures,
full of eyes in front and behind: the first living creature like a lion,
the second living creature like an ox, the third living creature with the face of a man,
and the fourth living creature like an eagle in flight. And the four living creatures,
each of them with six wings, are full of eyes all around and within,
and day and night they never cease to say,
“Holy, holy, holy, is the Lord God Almighty,
who was and is and is to come!”
Revelation 4:6-8

2. THE SERAPHIM We have good reason for believing that God created the cherubim, He then created these other tremendous powerful creatures referred to as seraphim. These two creatures must be unimaginably large. While the four cherubim are around the throne of God, the seraphim are described as being behind and over the throne of God who lead all of heaven in worship of the Most High. When the majestic seraphim speak, the whole place shakes – 

Above Him stood the seraphim. Each had six wings:
with two he covered his face, and with two he covered his feet, and with two he flew.
And one called to another and said:
“Holy, holy, holy is the LORD of hosts;
the whole earth is full of His glory!”
¶ And the foundations of the thresholds shook at the voice of him who called,
and the house was filled with smoke.
Isaiah 6:2-4

3. THE RULING “ARCH” ANGELS After the Seraphim were created, there is good reason for thinking that God created seven extremely powerful ruling or “arch” angels. The Bible names two of them (Michael – Jude 9, and Gabriel – Daniel 9:21; Luke 1:19) but ancient Jewish tradition refers by name to five others including: Raphael, Uriel, Saraqael, Raguel, and Remiel  (1Enoch 20).

But when the archangel Michael, contending with the devil, was disputing about the body of Moses, he did not presume to pronounce a blasphemous judgment, but said, “The Lord rebuke you.”
Jude 9

My Uncle Angus with my mum ca. 1940

My Uncle Angus with my mum ca. 1940

4. THE WATCHERS We can deduce from scripture and Jewish tradition that God then created about two hundred (one traditional refers to two hundred thousand of them) Watchers who appear to have been created by God in preparation for the task of assisting the yet-to-be-made humans who would live on the yet-to-be-formed earth. These Watchers were given the ability to move between the dimensions of heaven and earth and report back to God. We might speculate that they also appear to have been created with the power to shape-shift which apparently enabled them to take on a functional human form. While each of these heavenly creatures constituted God’s heavenly family, it appears that the Watchers were specifically designated as the sons of God (Gen. 6:2; Deut. 32:8) of whom left the boundaries of God’s purpose and became both corrupted and corruptors of mankind. These corrupted Watchers appear to be in view in Genesis 6:2 having sexual liaisons with women and siring the nephilim (the giants). It is probable that Lucifer was one of these Watchers who left his station after God’s final creation – the woman. The prophet Daniel distinguishes the corrupted watchers from the holy watchers in Daniel 4:13.

¶ “I saw in the visions of my head as I lay in bed, and behold, a watcher, a holy one, came down from heaven. He proclaimed aloud and said thus: ‘Chop down the tree and lop off its branches, strip off its leaves and scatter its fruit. Let the beasts flee from under it and the birds from its branches…The sentence is by the decree of the watchers, the decision by the word of the holy ones, to the end that the living may know that the Most High rules the kingdom of men and gives it to whom he will and sets over it the lowliest of men.’
Daniel 4:13-14, 17

5. THE HOST OF ANGELS Then, it appears that God, with just a word, created billions upon billions of ‘ordinary’ angels, especially when we reflect on Christ’s statement in Matthew 18:10 where He intimates that rather than each person having just one guardian angel, each person may in fact have more than one guardian angels. (Considering earth’s current population is around seven billion, this might mean that there are at least fourteen billion ordinary angels.) I do however feel rather improper to call these phenomenally powerful creatures ordinary. The Biblical data is that they can interact with our material world including the removal of a several tonne stone (Matt. 27:60; Mark 16:4) which had been used to seal the entrance to Christ’s borrowed tomb (Matt. 28:2) and the opening of locked prison doors.

¶ Then I looked, and I heard around the throne and the living creatures and the elders the voice of many angels, numbering myriads of myriads and thousands of thousands, saying with a loud voice, “Worthy is the Lamb who was slain, to receive power and wealth and wisdom and might and honor and glory and blessing!”
Revelation 5:11-12

 

THE VASTNESS OF GOD’S HEAVENLY FAMILY TELLS US A LOT ABOUT GOD’S FATHER-HEART

All of these magnificent heavenly creatures constituted God’s heavenly family. God the Father had individually named each one (Isa. 40:26)! Therefore, God’s heavenly family consisted of billions of billions of myriads of creatures whom God knew and loved. But still God wanted create an even larger family! To do so, He created man and woman (Gen. 1:26-31). His mandate to the man and woman was to enlarge God’s earthly family by – be fruitful and multiply! To state the obvious, God loves family!!! To state the not-so-obvious: Satan hates family! The Bible tells the story of how God wanted to have an earthly family of children who would love and willingly obey Him. The hope was that Israel could be that model family. But they betrayed God. And every time it appeared that Satan had ruined God’s plan to have a heavenly and earthly family of sons and daughter who would love and honour Him, God redeemed the situation. When the chosen people, Israel, turned their back on God, God announced that He would send His only Son to be the redeemer of a new family, the church.

Jesus told a moving story of the Father’s heart in the story of the prodigal’s son (Luke 15:11-32). The prodigious father in Christ’s story is like our Heavenly Father. Even though his younger son has left home and brought shame to their family name, the father longs for his son to return to him. It powerfully describes God the Father and His heart for His children. God loves His children. God knows each of us by name.

We get a glimpse of what Father God’s ultimate family is going to look like in Revelation 7:9 where it describes all of the redeemed joining with all of the Father’s heavenly family. God clearly loves and wants a big family.

¶ After this I looked, and behold, a great multitude that no one could number, from every nation, from all tribes and peoples and languages, standing before the throne and before the Lamb, clothed in white robes, with palm branches in their hands, and crying out with a loud voice, “Salvation belongs to our God who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb!”
Revelation 7:9-10

GOD LOVES FAMILY

It’s difficult to imagine how happy, joyous, and full heaven is — and will further be. The suggestion that God created humankind because He was in some way ‘lonely’ becomes apparently and obviously fatuous after considering what we now surmise about those He created to populate the heavenly realm and experience God’s unfathomable and limitless love and goodness. It’s important for Christians in Australia and New Zealand (because we often have the gospel presented to us in a rather individualistic terms) to understand that the gospel is not merely about having a vertical relationship with God — it’s also about a horizontal relationship with other wretches who have also been saved by the grace of the Lamb of God who will ultimately entrust the redeemed with positions of unmerited and unbelievable privilege in the age to come-

They will make war on the Lamb, and the Lamb will conquer them,
for He is Lord of lords and King of kings,
and those with Him are called and chosen and faithful.”
Revelation 17:14

Do you not know that we are to judge angels?
How much more, then, matters pertaining to this life!
First Corinthians 6:3

If we endure, we will also reign with Him;
if we deny Him, He also will deny us;
Second Timothy 2:12

And you have made them [the redeemed] a kingdom and priests to our God,
and they shall reign on the earth.”
Revelation 5:10

Thus, when we come closer to Christ in unreserved surrender through prayer and the heeding of His written Word, our hearts are transformed from seeing “our family” as just those connected to us by blood, to seeing our family as our Heavenly Father sees it—that is, when we are redeemed by Christ we are adopted into a new and much larger family – God’s family. There is so much joy in heaven when just one formerly lost person turns to the Saviour and repents –  because God’s heavenly family shares in the Father’s joy every time this happens –

Just so, I tell you, there will be more joy in heaven over one sinner who repents than over ninety-nine righteous persons who need no repentance.
Luke 15:7

Just so, I tell you, there is joy before the angels of God over one sinner who repents.”
Luke 15:10

Every believer belongs to the family of God. That makes us brothers and sisters. And because we understand that our Heavenly Father’s love for each of us is infinite (Eph. 3:17-19) we cannot possibly be less loved if more people are added to God’s family. Therefore, unlike the Cadbury Chocolate kid sulking upstairs after is new baby sister arrives home from the hospital, is not how the son or daughter of God reacts when a new believer is added to the Church – the family of God. This means that every local church should reflect God’s heart for God’s family. Let us pray for, and seek to reflect, God’s heart for the lost. Let us pray for and take active measures to welcome people seeking to be reconciled to God. And in the process of seeing people find peace with God through Christ, we rejoice that our spiritual (fictive) family has just become bigger, because we share in our Heavenly Father’s joy every time this happens as well.

 

Your Pastor,

Andrew

Let me know what you think below in the comment section and feel free to share this someone who might benefit from this Pastor’s Desk.

1 Comment

  1. LYDIA

    Thank you Andrew for broadening my vision. When I was about 16 I discovered that God had given me more than my immediate family but had in His wisdom given me a much larger Family. That has never changed. Also I believed what the Scripture teaches us about Angels. What I didn’t dwell on much though was that there were different types of heavenly beings. To me angels were that, they had tasks and praised God. Yet God created a Family, His heavenly family and made this universe in all its magnificence with what you just wrote Andrew. There was complete love. A love that can’t even be described except in Jesus Christ, the fulfillment of that. I’d always understood that God was self-sufficient and didn’t need anyone else. Theologically that might be correct, yet – His love is limitless and I short- changed that. So only, just lately, have I come to understand that His love is FAR greater and by His desiring Family around Him and then after all that was completed, made the Earth ready for mankind to dwell on and to praise Him, made my LORD not an abstract God but One Who desires what we sometimes destroy. I guess it is like putting flesh around the bones – this is Who God is – but – this is Who God REALLY is!

    Reply

Submit a Comment

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

HE WAS A KIND AND CHARITABLE MAN

home > Pastor's Desk > 2024 > March 22ndr > He was a kind and charitable man.WHO WAS KENNETH TYNAN? You’ve probably never heard of Kenneth Tynan. I hadn’t. I was introduced to him while conducting some research for my current PhD program on C.S. Lewis. In...

FROM LITTLE THINGS

The first time I heard the song “From Little Things, Big Things Grow” was in early 2008. I was trying to get my head around superannuation funds. I never knew of its writers – Paul Kelly and Carmody. Neither did I know it was originally a protest song. In my opinion, the original lyrics and melody bears no semblance to what we may consider protest today. Many will agree with me that it is now synonymous with Industry Super Funds. But its principles remain true in nearly every aspect of life.

ADVICE WORTH MORE THAN GOLD OR A MOUNTAIN OF CASH ABOUT HOW TO USE REJECTION TO BECOME AN EVEN BETTER, WISER, STRONGER YOU!

For several reasons I am qualified to help people deal with acute and chronic pain. Some acute and chronic pain can be resolved medically. Some pains can go a long way to being resolved with the help of a psychologist. Some pains can be resolved with a hug from mum. But there is a pain that a doctor cannot cure, a psychologist cannot counsel, a mother’s hug cannot alleviate. It is a pain that goes deep – beyond the defences of our integumentary system, our neurological system (including our para-sympathetic nervous system), our muscular system, our skeletal system, our lymphatic system, our renal system, gastro-intestinal system, our respiratory system, our cardio-vascular system, our hormonal system, and our half-share of a reproductive system. It is a pain that wounds: our memory, our sense of self, our estimation of our worth, our confidence, and our ability to connect meaningfully with others (our ability to love and be loved). It is the pain of rejection. It not only effects who we are (our identity) but it also leaches symptomatically into each of these ten-and-a-half biological systems which every human being possesses. I am going to offer all those who have experienced the pain of rejection how they can be healed from its wound, and actually become stronger, wiser, more confident, as a result.

THE MYTHICAL PATHWAY TO HAPPINESS

I’ve accidentally found myself enrolled in a Ph.D. program. I kind of blame Associate Professor Stuart Piggin for this. A few years ago I was having some serious discussions with him about doing a Ph.D. in Historical Theology at Macquarie University focusing on the contribution of Dr. F.W. Boreham. But I found myself unable at that time to proceed. In my discussions with him about my health prognosis and what I wanted to be able to do in the remaining time that I have left, he suggested focusing instead on Philosophical-Theology and enquiring with Monash University. I took his sage advice and did as he said. This week, I formally commenced with Monash as a part-time extension (distance) student. The result is that after my first zoom meeting with my supervisor I am now having to delve into an arena that requires me to be able to convince a critical secular audience that my proposal about the Bible’s truth claims are reasonable. Oddly, in order to do this, I have to explain in some depth what C.S. Lewis meant by the word, myth. And to do this I have to draw even deeper on the writings of a now dead French philosopher who is regarded as the greatest exponent of what a myth is! Therefore, I am going to tell you something quite shocking. It might be advisable for you to go and get a strong cup of tea, then return to this screen, and read on while sipping your tea, to absorb some of what I am going to tell you. 

Follow Me AS I FOLLOW JESUS

We all walk a path in life that is set before us. We start with very little experience and knowledge about the purpose of our life and the world beyond us. All of humanity experiences joy, wisdom, strength, weakness, suffering and hardship, especially those who are “contending for the faith”. Knowing Jesus is a very special part of this life journey.

A CERTAIN GOD

We can be reasonably certain about many things. In fact, without this certainty about life, none of us could function. We can be certain that tonight the sun will ‘set’. Tomorrow the sun will ‘rise’. After the February 28th it will be February 29th. This year there will be international unrest and much political instability in many parts of the world. In the coming months global warming will be identified by politicians as the source of floods and wildfires. Several high profile international celebrities will die this year. Archaeologists will make a discovery that will require some aspects of history to be rewritten. And you will certainly have one of the most memorable moments in your life in the coming days. You see, there are clearly some things we can be quite certain about. However, there are some aspects about our future that we cannot be certain about, yet in those moments we can be certain about what we should do.

LOW COST LIVING

Turn on any TV or radio news lately and there’s bound to be a story about the current “cost of living crisis”. We all feel it. Initially most people accepted the widespread price-rises were caused by 2020-21 pandemic lockdowns. But whatever the reasons for the rapid price hikes over the past two years, every time we go to the supermarket we feel it again. While governments are striving to curb the impact of this cost of living crisis, there remains a way to enjoy low cost living. The key to this is recognising that the most valuable things in life are literally priceless. The path to enjoying low-cost living is to be found in Christ, and what He taught — and it begins with treasure.

How To Know Jesus Better

It’s a scary thought to realise that the Jesus we have been told about and worship may not really be known to us at all. We can ‘know’ about someone or something, but not really know them. In Christian circles it’s often referred to as head knowledge not heart knowledge.

Knowing Christ Better

As a church, this year’s theme is coming closer to Christ by getting to know Him better. I feel that I am “the least qualified person” to tell anyone how this is done — but someone else has already claimed this distinction – the apostle Paul. After decades of hearing directly from Christ, seeing extraordinary miracles, being taken to heaven temporarily, planting churches across the Roman Empire, he could still say I would give anything to really know Christ – even if it meant suffering like He did! (Phil. 3:7-10). Therefore, I could say: If you do this or that, you will then know Christ better – but in my view, it’s not as easy as that! How we develop our relationship with Christ is shaped by several factors including our personality, our life experiences, our physical health and fitness, and our relationships with others (especially our parents and particularly our father). In fact, I believe that there is a relationship between how we have learned to build relationships with others (and notably how we have learned to relate to those who are closest to us) and how we then proceed to have a relationship with God. Even though I have expressed my lack of qualifications in telling anyone how to have a closer relationship with Christ, I still can, like one hungry beggar to another hungry beggar, offer you a few of the morsels of food that I’ve been able to find.

SOME PEOPLE HAVE AMAZING BUTS

I know of several people with amazing buts. There’s Jo’, Mo’, Sam, Esther, Jerry, and others. Each of these people were gifted by God with an amazing but that changed there life and the course of human history. Sometimes these gifts came with a …then, or …God, or …the LORD. When it comes to the size of things, a but is a relatively small thing (in Greek it can be just two letters: de) but it can have huge implications and enormously great blessings for multitudes. I hope to show you how this was the case with each of the people I have chosen as samples, and then show you how God is your God of buts.