Family Systems

Genesis 21: 8-21 Matthew 10:24-40 There is a family of birth and there is a family of faith. One is family by the grace of God, and one is the family of God because of grace. One is our family by birth giving us genetics, identity in color of hair, skin, eyes, through osmosis giving us language and our most basic system of family. One is family of belonging who choose us, claim us, give us identity in communion, in faith, in values. We do not simply claim to believe in theory, myth, ideas or in faith, we do not baptize into absentia, we are Family. Family is a heavily loaded term. Family is our most basic identity. Family is who we identify being part of, as well as of what is right and what is wrong. The Genesis story reminds us that we are born with an umbilicus to our mother's womb, even when cut, for the first many years at least until we are weaned we are dependent upon her and fearful of life and death. Once weaned, we have a longer chord of connection, not only dependent on mother but on all of our family, and fear shifts from death, to fear of things in life. In the 1980s Edwin Friedman was a Rabbi and a Clinical Therapist, who came to realize that Family Systems give us identity. Family Systems lay claim to who we are. And our Family Systems overlap. There are certain “hot-button passages” in the Bible, passages which everyone knows and question, but often are too polite to ask publicly. Why did God harden the heart of Pharaoh, not giving Pharaoh a chance? Why did Jesus address the Syrophenecian Woman at the well as being a Dog? Why did Jesus say you will be hated by your Mother and Father and Sister and Brother? The point is not that you have to reject family, but rather that sometimes our commitments even / especially as The Church Family, our choices and decisions, put us at odds with our family of origin and are not supported by family. The irony is that 21st Century American Culture has turned Jesus' teaching on its head, such that the question for most is never will my family reject me for what I believe in, but rather: I can choose what I believe and what I do, and if anything becomes too hard or too threatening to me/ my family, I can just find and join a different church who will agree with whatever I believe. We have made Jesus' words into something cryptic as if a Mystery of wisdom needing a key to explain. WE each have burdens in life, responsibilities we have chosen to accept. What does it mean that Jesus said Take up your cross? The Cross is not and has never been our Burden. You choose to take up what gives you pleasure, worth, prestige, honor. Your Cross is not your Children, or Your Marriage, or Divorce, not your Vocation. The Cross is always about self-sacrifice. The Cross is about our Covenant Relationship with God, and with one another. Jesus died for our salvation not his, what do you choose to do for others? In the same breath as Jesus saying “Take up your cross,” he says “He who has possession of his life will lose it, and whoever loses their life for my sake will find it.” This morning's Scriptures require all of us to Grow up, to wrestle with a Mature faith. As much as we desire and try, none of us can make everyone happy, I know because I have spent all my life trying, but we cannot have it all or take it with us. Instead, we have to choose what is truly worthy, and what are you willing to sacrifice everything for, especially when you do not understand the benefit? These are questions without easy answers. I recall in College, being extremely frustrated when I came to realize that sometimes all you had to do was memorize what the text said, and regurgitate the text. On Page 34 the Geology textbook described the composition of Ignatius rock and on the test, the question was What is Ignatius composed of A) B) or C) But taking up Your Cross Daily, requires that we make decisions about what we choose in our lives, what have we found, what will we sacrifice, and do we sacrifice our faith in Jesus Christ, the love of God, our relationships in the Church, in order to be right, to not have to change or accept others? When is it required to not be politically correct? What Edwin Friedman described is that all of us are the heroes of our own epochs, we each operate on what we convince ourselves is Right. All of which is fine and good, until we are in relationship with other people, with a loved one, with a family, with a community. Suddenly what we want conflicts with what others believe to be right. Abraham and Sarah were getting along fine, until they wanted a child. Underlying both of our Biblical Passages today, and underlying most of life, is Fear. We fear being found out. We fear not winning. We fear people's expectations of us. Will my child think I am a failure? Will the one I love still love me? Can we still be accepted and loved, for who we are? Genesis is an incredible story about Fear. Out of all Creation, in all the world, in all humanity God chose Abraham and Sarah. The irony being that God chose Abraham to be the Father of Nations and Sarah to be Our Mother, when the couple were already far beyond the age where it was physically possible to conceive. They wandered like lost sheep for a generation in the wilderness, juxtaposing their Fears over against God's Promise. But in all those decades, still Our Mother could not conceive, so acting in fear she concocted the idea that her slave was her property, and therefore if the slave had a baby by Sarah's husband, then the baby's mother would be Sarah. Except after that baby was conceived, Sarah's fear turned to jealousy and resentment of this other woman who had been with her husband and given what she could not. Suddenly, God's Promise undercut all their fears and conspiring, and Sarah who was 90 years of age became pregnant! More than fulfillment of Promise, this was demonstration that Fear is Wrong, Our Mother was Wrong. Now is created the problem, because the child born of Sarah's fears plays with the Child of God's Promise. Sarah fears, because she did not trust the promise, what was born of her fears by this slave now according to the Law could inherit everything, leaving her child without anything. In this morning's passage, suddenly Hagar is transformed from The Egyptian property, to being The Other Woman. Suddenly Sarah's child through her slave, becomes competition for Sarah's son, Isaac. Suddenly Sarah wants Hagar and Ishmael dead. Fear is powerful, even overwhelming to us. Fear can be blinding. Fear is the opposite of Promise. What Jesus named, is for us to chose what we will be afraid of. Will you fear the stuff of this life, failure and success and other people and their expectations, or will you fear the one who actually has power over life and death, who loves you and cares about every hair on your head? Fear and Trust are inter-related. No longer is this regurgitation of the Text, Choose: Do we Trust God, or do we Fear Life? The problem is that life is not a one time decision. I was Baptized. I Confirmed my faith. I joined the Church. I got Married. I had a Child. All of these are life changing, monumental cathartic events, However, none of these are one time decisions, they are in fact beginnings for us to choose over and over again. Several years ago, there was an Elder on Session who named that he loved the Church. He loved the image of the church in the community, listening to the music, surrounded by the stained glass, the sermons fed, challenged and comforted him, the prayers expressed what he believed. But then he came to realize that behind the scenes there are bills to pay, decisions to make not only Yes or No but between alternatives, and our politics and our family systems sometimes disagree. In the Church we have adopted a Family System, that has become basic to our DNA: There are No Secrets. Things done in secret, develop their own power by conspiring with our fears to keep secret, so everything needs to be in the light where secrets are powerless. As members of the body, we each have responsibility to participate, to contribute and to vote for who will lead us, and if we disagree we do not act as Mother and Father rejecting you, but as followers of the teacher who each step up to be elected to take responsibility for making decisions. We take up the Cross to act not out of fear, not for what benefits, but with self-sacrifice for God.