What Families Need to Thrive, Part 1

Today from Chuck Swindoll. Here's a life principle that I hope you will never forget. Relationships are built on trust, and trust is built on truth. The more you lie, the more you break the relationships, the more your trust is broken. I am often amazed at how many couples lie to one another.

They simply do not tell one another the truth. In today's cultural landscape, the traditional family is under attack. Clearly defining what it means to be a family unit has fallen victim to personal preference. And today on Insight for Living, Chuck Swindoll draws us back to the Biblical model and especially the personal virtues that cultivate healthy families.

During the next half hour, Chuck will identify eight characteristics that will bring your household together. So whether you're single, divorced, or widowed, your home is teeming with toddlers, or you're in the golden years, there's something in this passage for us all. If you brought a Bible, please turn. Ephesians 4 25 to begin with. Here, verse 31, let all bitterness and wrath and anger and clamor and slander be put away from you along with all malice.

Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving each other, also as Christ has forgiven you. Chapter 5, verse 21, and be subject to one another in the fear of Christ. Wives, to your own husbands as to the Lord. Verse 25, husbands, love your wives just as Christ also loved the church and gave himself up for her. Verse 1, chapter 6, children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right.

Honor your father and mother. Verse 4, fathers, do not provoke your children to anger, but bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord. Paul sort of summarizes it in verse 10. Finally, he says, finally, be strong in the Lord and in the strength of his might, put on the full armor of God so that you will be able to stand firm against the schemes of the devil.

Verse 18, with all prayer and petition, pray at all times in the Spirit and with this in view, be on the alert with all perseverance and petition for all the saints. When Edith Schaeffer, wife of Francis Schaeffer, decided to write her book on the home, she chose a title put together by four words that form the searching question, what is a family? And then she set out in the chapter titles that would follow to answer that question that appears in the title, what is a family?

One of the chapters is titled The Birthplace of Creativity. That's a family. Another, A Shelter in the Time of Storm. Another title, A Perpetual Relay of Truth.

Isn't that a good way to put it? One I especially liked, a family is a door that has hinges and a lock and educational control. My favorite of her titles in chapters of the book, A Museum of Memories. Let me ask you, as you travel back to your original family, what pictures hang in the gallery of your mental images?

Go back there, revisit the scenes. What do you find in your museum of memories of your family? Are there tears that stain the windows you look through, brought about by pain, mistreatment, perhaps even neglect, hunger? You may remember laughter that's now in the walls of your life, and from that you have cultivated a life of joy and delight in living. Those memories are so powerful, one man writes of them, the memories of family exert a remarkable influence over our lives.

This influence remains with us until the day of our death. Great writers have given testimony to the power of family and the influence of childhood. Charles Dickens, for example, as he wrote David Copperfield, if you know the life of Dickens, you know that woven into the fabric of that story are scenes from his own painful and nightmarish past. Franz Kuckfa, most notably in his work The Metamorphosis, presents vivid expressions of a disjointed and unhappy and tumultuous childhood. As Ernest Hemingway reached later years, his biographer Carlos Baker writes of how he became more vulnerable regarding the truth concerning his own unhappy family and his hatred against his father. In Baker's biography, Hemingway, he reports, had sometimes sat in the open door of the shed out back with his shotgun loaded, drawing a bead on the head of his father in the house.

On the other hand, there are pleasant memories that many have. The late General Douglas MacArthur remembered through his years at West Point and especially during the lonely years of his leadership in the Pacific front of the Second World War, the words of his father spoken to his mother without their knowing he heard them. When he was just a lad, his dad said to his mother, I think there is the material of a soldier in the boy.

Indeed. Perhaps the most tender come from Corey Ten Boom, who remembers her papa. Every night as she would go to sleep, she remembered his hand on her head as he prayed for her, always ending the time together with the four words, Corey, I love you. She said not even the horrors of a concentration camp at Ravensbrook could erase those memories.

She was able to sleep by imagining her Heavenly Father's hand on her head, saying to her, Corey, I love you. What is a family? It is certainly more than a museum. It's certainly more than a door.

It is more than a relay. It is, well, I decided to do what you would often do when you want to find the meaning of a word. I checked the dictionary.

Boy, was I disappointed. Webster says a group of individuals living under one roof and usually under one head. Well, thanks a lot. That really is great. So I pulled out my magnifying glass and drew my second volume from my exhaustive English concordance, Oxford, and I called it sometime the exhausting dictionary that I have. And I checked family and found the body of persons who live in one house or under one head, including parents, children and servants. That's not my home. I was a servant when I was growing up and you were.

Maybe that fits Oxford, but it doesn't fit us. What is a family? Well, now's the time to start writing. Here are some thoughts I've been giving to the whole subject of the family. The family is where we put down our first roots, where we form our most lasting impressions, where we put together the building blocks of our character, where we determine that we will view life through prejudiced eyes or tolerant eyes, where we learn to laugh and we learn that we are still respected when we weep. Family is where we learn to share, to relate, to treat other people. Family is where we learn to view our surroundings correctly.

It's where we determine the line between right and wrong, between good and evil. It's blurred if you're from a dysfunctional family. If you're from a solid, secure family whose parents knew the meaning of those words, you don't wrestle with them today. That's still right. That's still wrong. That's still good.

That's still bad. You have your family to thank for that. Someone has called the family the place where life makes up its mind. It's where you learn to make great decisions and to stand by your convictions. It's all of that and so much more.

Knowing that I was way over my head with my own words, I decided I would do some research. And as a result of studies done in several different areas by very reliable sources, I've come up with eight characteristics of a successful family. This is not my list. This is a composite of the list that I have read from those who have spent half their lives, if you will, studying the family. Families that are wholesome, healthy, they're even called successful in many of the writings, are marked by these eight characteristics and it's not an exhaustive list, certainly not, but these seem to be most significant. First, all the members are committed to one another. All the members are committed to one another. Family, therefore, is a unit with committed members living their lives alongside one another. Second, they spend time together. It's a characteristic of a wholesome, healthy family. And interestingly, the more time spent, the closer the family. There are exceptions, but for the most part, that's a rule. Don't believe the lie about quality instead of quantity time. Dads use that when they work late too often. Well, I'll just spend quality time between seven and 730 on Saturday morning with them.

No, it takes a lot of time. Families spend time together. Third, there is open and frequent communication, open communication. You can bring up whatever you wish to bring up. You can ask whatever questions on your mind.

You won't get slapped. You will be respected. Open, free communication.

Frequent. Number four, they're able to solve problems in a crisis. Wholesome, healthy families work through problems together. They solve problems in a crisis. Never met a family that didn't have a crisis. When those families are healthy and wholesome families, the crisis only makes them stronger. Disaster only brings them closer.

They work through problems in a crisis. Number five, they express affirmation and encouragement often. Healthy families express affirmation and encouragement. Good job, son. Great work. Hey, you did very well with that. Ooh, your report card has variety. Nice, nice.

Your brothers is boring. Yours, you've got the whole spectrum. Good work. We affirm people. We affirm who people are. We encourage what people do. Remember the difference.

Don't leave out one for the sake of the other. You are secure beyond words. If you were raised with affirmation and encouragement, you learn to accept who you are.

You understand that. And your parents have made a marvelous contribution in helping introduce you to yourself. We're not born knowing ourselves. We discover ourselves first through the council, the presence, the influence of our moms and dads. Number six, they have a spiritual commitment.

Wholesome, happy, successful families have a spiritual commitment. You learned of God through your mom and or dad. You learned to love the church. You learned spiritual dimensions of living. You learned principles from the Bible. You learned to love the word of God. That spiritual commitment was learned first at home.

If you were from a successful and healthy family. Number seven, they trust each other. I'll come back to this a little later, but we have in mind here relying on one another. The heart of it is respect for one another. If you are from a family that respects one another, then you have learned to trust one another. When there was a breakdown in trust, there was a breakdown in relationships. Number eight, you expected me to include this. It's not my list again.

It's where I've found it in others. Freedom and grace are cultivated. Freedom and grace are cultivated. You have the freedom to be vulnerable. You have the freedom to fail. Remember, I said that you have the freedom to fly, to grow, to learn. The freedom to be different from your parents and from your siblings.

You're encouraged to be free. And it's all built on a platform of grace. Now that's quite a list. Tim Kimmel calls that last quality a grace-based environment.

It's a good way to describe it. Now turn to Ephesians chapter 4 and we will see some of the things that we need most of all to get there. This is the journey that we're all taking and some of us are this far along, others are that far along, some are just getting started. Doesn't matter. There's no better time than now to start doing what's right.

We cannot change what was. And by the way, the things I'm going to share will work for single parent families. They will work for blended families. They work for families with few children and many children, families that have now launched their children and those who are just beginning to bear children.

They are for all of us. What's needed in order for us to emerge into this kind of successful family, these seven qualities I find in Ephesians 4, 5, and 6. Look at verse 25 of chapter 4. Therefore, laying aside falsehood, speak truth each one of you with his neighbor, for we are members of one another.

Will you allow me a little room with the text to apply it to the family? Therefore, laying aside falsehood, speak truth each one of you with his wife, with his children, with his parents, for we are members of the same family. First, quality is telling the truth to one another.

Here's a life principle that I hope you will never forget. Relationships are built on trust, and trust is built on truth. The more you lie, the more you break the relationships, the more your trust is broken. I am often amazed at how many couples lie to one another. They simply do not tell one another the truth.

If you've done much or any marriage counseling, you've seen it emerge in your own office. You see mouths drop open. You see heads flash to one side when one of the partners said something.

I didn't know you said that. And here they've lived together 15, 20, 25 years. Why didn't they know? Because he's lied.

Because she hasn't said it. One of the foundational platforms for a family that works is telling one another the truth. We start early, it's ideal.

We begin to do it later, it's more difficult. But truth becomes the foundation of the trust, and that's what he's saying here, laying aside falsehood. We speak truth to one another. Now, if we're going to speak truth, we have to watch our words, which explains why verse 29, 31, 32 read as they do. First of all, well let me give you the principle of modeling restraint and courtesy. Just as we tell one another the truth, we also learn to model restraint, that's verse 29, 31, and courtesy, that's verse 32. Let no unwholesome word proceed from your mouth.

We could stop right there and build a whole sermon on that, couldn't we? The word unwholesome means rotten. It's used for rotting wood or rotting vegetables and fruit outside the Scriptures. Here he uses it for words. It would include insults, put downs, verbal slams, ugly sarcasm, profanity. Let no words like that proceed from your mouth. Now, they come from attitudes, and the attitudes are addressed in verse 31. Notice the word all. Let all bitterness, wrath, anger, clamor, slander, and malice be put away. Each word is meaningful. Being the word vulture that I am, you would expect me to pause at each one and at least briefly explain it. See the word bitterness? It's a word for long-standing resentment, a spirit that refuses to be reconciled. Nursing old wounds, rehearsing old lines, it leads to us what I call a sourpuss attitude.

I have a friend who tells me when his wife gets mad at him, she doesn't get hysterical, she gets historical. And I remember back in 1987, you did so. In 1991, you did so.

In 1994, I remember, August, it was August of 1994. She said, good night. She's got a file cabinet for a brain. She goes back.

What's the problem? She's bitter. She's bitter.

She pegs it with a date. Men do that also. It's not a gender thing. It's a sinful thing. It's an unpleasant reaction. Wrath and anger go together. Wrath would represent an outburst of passionate rage, shouting matches. Anger would be more of a sullen, albeit hostile attitude.

Clamor is a word we don't use these days. It's a word for insulting and sarcastic statements put down, stated loudly and openly. Slander we all understand.

It means speaking evil of someone else and even can go so far as malice, which would be planning evil against another. You know there are families that do that. I hope yours isn't one of them.

Seriously. I can't think of a more difficult thing to live with than knowing that my brother or my sister was working against me or I against one of them. But some families live like that. They learned it from their parents who are holding grudges against someone else. Now, rather than go there, look at the positive side.

No one holds some words. No unpleasant reactions. Look at this courtesy in verse 32. If I had a wish for the family of God, you can read it in verse 32. That we would be kind to one another. Tender hearted is the word for compassionate and forgiving. Kind, compassionate, forgiving.

Say that with me. Kind, compassionate, forgiving. And the reason they are important is that all of us need all three. You're listening to Insight for Living. And to learn more about Chuck Swindoll and this ministry, visit us online at insightworld.org. Well, when his message continues, Chuck will invite us to follow along in Ephesians chapter 4 as he helps us understand what families need to thrive. And this is one of the messages that's included in a popular book Chuck's written. And if you're ready to dig deeper on your own or want to use this book as a discussion piece for your small group, we invite you to purchase a copy. Chuck's book is called Marriage from Surviving to Thriving. In his book, Chuck included a chapter about staying young as your family grows older. And he points out the danger signs of marriage relationships at any stage of life.

So ask for a copy of Marriage from Surviving to Thriving. It's available for purchase when you go to insight.org slash offer. If you're looking for a way to listen to Chuck preach, you'll be glad to learn that just a few weeks ago, Chuck presented a time-sensitive two-part series to his congregation in Frisco, Texas. One of his messages was designed to help us look back at 2021 and the other was designed to help us look forward into 2022. The response to Chuck's online sermons was broadly received. So much so that we've decided to offer both audio recordings free of charge to anyone who requests them. These two messages from Chuck are offered under the title Pressing On in Faith. And you can download the free audio files by going to insight.org slash pressing on. Through your gifts, you're receiving a constant source of Bible teaching for yourself and for countless others who've come to rely on Chuck as well. To give a donation right now, call us if you're listening in the US, dial 1-800-772-8888.

Or you can also give online when you go to insight.org slash donate. Join us again when Chuck Swindoll explains what families need to thrive Friday on Insight for Living. The preceding message, what families need to thrive, was copyrighted in 2005, 2006 and 2022. And the sound recording was copyrighted in 2022 by Charles R Swindoll, Inc. All rights are reserved worldwide. Duplication of copyrighted material for commercial use is strictly prohibited.