Church-Friendly Families

Maybe you’ve seen someone do the time-management illustration with the jar and the pebbles and the big rocks. It goes like this: If you put all the little pebbles in the jar first, then try to put in the big rocks, they won’t fit. But if you put the big rocks in first, then the pebbles fill in easily around the big rocks.

The point is to decide what your big rocks are, what’s most important, and put those in your calendar first. So, for your job: what are your most important tasks and deliverables? Put those into your daily and weekly plan first; then you might be surprised how many little pebbles end up fitting in around the big rocks.

So too with the rest of our lives. Ask, What are the big rocks, the most important things? It’s not just work or school. Not if you’re married. Not if you have children. Not if you have friends and neighbors and family. And not if you’re a Christian!

So, to Christians, and especially to dads, I offer this exhortation this morning: make church life one of your family’s big rocks.

I’m focusing here on families because this might be where the need is most acute. Young families are prone to fill up our jars with all sorts of peddles, and then say, “Oh, huh, what a shame. Church life doesn’t seem to fit in the jar right now.” 

So, I’m waving a little flag here for dads (and moms) to put the (very minimal) patterns of our corporate life together into our calendars first. For Christians, church life is one of the big rocks.

I’m freshly inspired to say that because of the big, beautiful, surprising vision of the church in the New Testament. Jesus promises, “I will build my church.” That’s what he’s doing in the world. And Ephesians 5 says, 

“Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her, that he might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word, so that he might present the church to himself in splendor, without spot or wrinkle or any such thing, that she might be holy and without blemish.” (verses 25–27)

Jesus “nourishes and cherishes . . . the church” (Ephesians 5:29). And get this, Ephesians 3:10 says that the way in which God is making known the glory of his “manifold wisdom” for the watching eyes of angelic hosts and demonic rebels is “through the church.” The life and health of the church is how God shows the demons that their days are few. Christ died for his church, rose again, poured out his Spirit, and as the church spreads and grows and thrives and extends, not just more and more eyes on earth, but all the eyes “in the heavenly places” see God’s stunning, counterintuitive, manifold wisdom and stand in awe.

Brothers and sisters, if Jesus is our Lord, then his church is our single most important human association. No group, no society, no team, no other affiliation or membership comes close to the church in the eyes of Jesus. This is one of the big rocks that goes into the jar first. (Now, it doesn’t have to be this local church. But some church, if you belong to Jesus.)

As a dad, I’m often looking for family-friendly restaurants and family-friendly events. I hope this is a pretty family-friendly church. But the more important question is am I building and shaping a church-friendly family? Instead of presuming that the church should cater to our family rhythms (and dozens of other families at the same time), what if we adjust our family habits to prioritize the church? What if we build our family schedules around the few but important weekly flashpoints of church life? What if church life is one of the big rocks that goes in first before all the pebbles?

Let’s pray.

Father, apart from your word, apart from hearing and reviewing and relearning your perspective, our vision of life is prone to drift and be distorted — and with it, our priorities. We confess that with the passing of time, the pressures of life, the cares of the world, and the seeming ordinariness of church life, we are prone to forget what a marvel we are part of. Oh what grace we’ve been swallowed up into in this spectacular reality called the church! And Father, we are not only prone to wander in our perspective and priorities, but we are sinners, still wildly in need of your patience and forgiveness and grace. And so we confess before you our sins in the quiet of this moment…

…Father, what a wonder that we can say, Jesus died for me. And what a glory that we not only say it alone; we say it as your church: Jesus died for us. So, we claim your mercy in Christ for forgiveness, and your grace in the Spirit for right living, and prioritizing. Empower us together, as your church, to love and care for each other, and in doing so, to put the demons to shame. In Jesus’s name we pray. Amen.