Dr. William A. Ritter
First United Methodist Church
Birmingham, Michigan
Scriptures: Matthew 10:34-42, Genesis 12:1-3
I love looking at those big picture books that are sold to those of us who need something to put on our coffee tables. You know the ones I am talking about. Some contain pictures of animals. Others, pictures of Australia. There are books depicting gardens by day and cities by night. Most come in full color. Some, black and white. You pay forty or fifty dollars per book, thumb through them once or twice, and then never crack the cover again. But seven years later, they are still on your coffee table.
Years ago….maybe even decades ago….there was a coffee table picture book entitled The Family of Man. The title, by itself, tells you that the book wasn’t put together yesterday. But it was good in its time….chock full of people doing common things in uncommon places.
Obviously, the people who put the book together had a bias. They were trying to tell us (by showing us) that we were kin….if not by blood, then by dint of common dreams and desires, loves and labors. There were pictures of people sweating, as if to say: “Look, everybody works.” There were pictures of lovers kissing, as if to say: “Look, everybody embraces.” There were pictures of people dancing, as if to say: “Look, everybody plays.” And there were pictures of people eating, as if to say: “Look, everybody eventually sits down to break the bread of life.” The implication being: “All these people are so much like us, they might just as well be related to us. And wouldn’t the world work a whole lot better if we looked upon them as brothers and sisters, aunts or uncles, or (at the very least) second cousins, once removed.”
Years ago, Chevy Chase starred in a series of very bad movies about the world’s most inept family. In the first one, they headed for Wally World….an amusement park in California that just happened to be closed when they got there. In the second one, they headed for Europe, only to become the most pathetic vacationers the continent had ever seen. But there was one moment….in Germany as I remember it…..that justified the buck or two I paid to rent the film from Blockbuster. Late one afternoon, Chevy and his family descended upon the home of some German relatives, whose names they carried on a piece of paper, but whose faces they had never seen. Well, you guessed it. In their usual bumbling fashion, they either got the right address on the wrong street (or the wrong address on the right street) and barged in on an elderly couple to whom they had no genetic connection whatsoever.
But the amazing thing was, they never figured it out. The German couple knew no English. Chevy Chase and his family spoke no German. So they just showed lots of pictures.…ate lots of food….made lots of hand motions….laughed uproariously….and then departed the next day, talking about having fulfilled a life-long dream by touching base with the German side of the family.
Well, in one sense, I suppose they did. The sense, that is, in which we all are family. Our futures and fortunes are becoming incredibly linked. Tickle us here and (sooner or later) we will laugh over there. Puncture us there and (sooner or later) we will bleed over here. Walt Disney was right (even if his song was tedious), “It’s a small world after all.” And no man (or woman, for that matter) is an island.
But individual families have ways of becoming islands. The Flanigans are distinct from the Schultzes. And the Schultzes are never to be confused with the Charbonneaus, the D’Agostinis or the Jeffersons. Picture of group of row houses on a street. Every one built the same. Every one appearing the same. And the drama in each of them….I mean, the human drama….is being played out the same. Separated by the thinnest of walls, each family is on a similar journey from birth to death, while trying to make ends meet and lives mesh. And, if in one of those homes the baby dies….or maybe doesn’t die, but grows up to be married by the rambler roses in the back yard….all of the other families show up with a ham and potato casserole or a wedding present. Which means they share in it. But they haven’t really experienced it.
Only I know what goes on within my walls. Only you know what goes on within yours. Sometimes, as a preacher, I tell a story or turn a phrase that leads you to say: “You must have been eavesdropping in our bedroom last night, or listening to our argument on the way to church this morning.” But I wasn’t in your bedroom. And I didn’t hear you arguing on the way to church. If there was a connection, I can’t explain it. Because I didn’t intend it. Sometimes you tell me: “Bill, you’re hitting too close to home.” But the only house to which I have a key is mine, don’t you see.
What am I saying? I am saying that as a part of the human family, we are very much alike. But as a part of the Smith family (the Jones family or the Johnson family), we are one of a kind. And we have to live in both, don’t you see. Yes, we have to live in both.
For years, preachers railed against over-idolizing the family….against raising “family” to the level of deity….against making the home the ultimate object of worship. Too idolatrous, we said. Too focused in upon the self, we said. Then we recalled the guy who wrote:
Me and my wife,
My son John and his wife,
Us four, no more.
That’s wrong, we said.
And we had good biblical support. We quoted Jesus (in Matthew) where he talks about setting family members on edge against each other (son versus father….daughter versus mother…. daughter-in-law versus mother-in-law)….before adding: “Those who love family more than me are not worthy of me.” And then we recalled the day Jesus was teaching in the Temple, only to be approached by messengers, saying: “Teacher, your mother and brothers are outside.” And what is interesting is what Jesus didn’t say. One expects he would say: “Oh, bring them down front so that I can introduce them to everybody,” or “Let’s take a 30 minute break so I can go outside and greet them.” No, he said: “Who are my mother and my brothers?” But it was a rhetorical question. He wasn’t looking for an answer. Instead, he provided one. “I’ll tell you who my mother and brothers are. Those who do the will of my Father, that’s who they are.” And he didn’t go outside. Which leaves us to surmise that they went home without seeing him.
I have preached that text. But it has always bothered me. If I could have preached to Jesus that day (how’s that for arrogance?), I might have said: “Okay, make your point. Then go out and talk with your mama.” But nobody asked me.
I know what Jesus is saying. He is saying: “Get your relationships in proper order.” Which I have tried to do. I am Kris’ husband, Lillian’s son, Harold’s stepson and Julie’s dad. I am also an uncle to Trevor and Tracy and a brother-in-law to Karen, Zaide and Greg. Several others have reason to call me “uncle” by marriage….even “great uncle” by marriage. But none of these relationships explains or contains me. First and foremost, I am Bill….child of God….baptized into the body of Christ. That’s my true identity and all others flow from it.
I have preached that pecking order. But this is not the year to preach it again. Because if there is one trend that is rampant and out of control in our society, it is not that we think too much of the family, but too little….not that we deify our deepest relationships, but that we vilify them….and not that we place all our eggs in our home basket, but rather perceive most of them as cracked (and not even salvageable for a decent omelet).
Families are being roasted rather than toasted, both by analysts without and participants within. Far too many are taking the pulse of family life….their own family life….and finding it weak and wanting. I have never heard the word “dysfunctional” used so personally, by so many, so frequently, as in the last few years. And even though I have tried to empathize, I confess I do not always understand. Because I do not really know what “dysfunctional” means. Does it mean something that doesn’t work? Or does it mean something that doesn’t work perfectly….when measured against my standards of perfection?
The word “function” fits best in a discussion of machinery. And families make poor machines. They do not run smoothly. They do not run quietly. They do not run effortlessly. And they certainly do not run perfectly. From time to time, every one of us will become (in the family) the part that goes bad. And you can never get replacement parts that fit.
Which means that what you see is what you get. Whatever is, has to function. You work with what you have. But the amazing thing is that it works as often as it does….and as well as it does.
Six years ago, I preached a sermon on marriage entitled “Taking the Matrimonial Plunge.” I talked about how I used to preach somber wedding homilies, wherein I detailed the difficulty of marriage….the discipline required within marriage….and the dedication needed to survive a marriage. I was operating under an assumption that if I didn’t talk “tough turkey” at the wedding, the bride and groom would blow it off. So I warned them that marriage would ask more of them than had ever been asked before, and would require them to go further (for another human being) than they had ever gone before. Then I told them that it wasn’t going to be a bed of roses…. moonlight and roses….wine and roses….or even beer and Skittles. In short, I used my five or six minutes to take their eyes out of the stars, so that I could rivet their feet to the floor.
Which was about the time I realized that many of my brides and grooms not only knew that but, in point of fact, were scared to death of that. They knew marriage was a tough business….and a risky business. Having seen what they had seen (and heard what they had heard), they came to the idea of a wedding with no small amount of anxiety, and not entirely certain they had what it would take to pull it off.
So I began lightening up, saying: “Sure, it’s gonna be hard. But it’s also gonna be good. So, in the name of Jesus Christ, go for it. There really isn’t a better way to live. I know you can do it. You know you can do it. God is urging you on. These people (all dressed up in their Sunday-go-to-meeting clothes) are cheering you on. Not because misery loves company. But because the world will always welcome lovers as time goes by.”
Today….six years later….I need to say the same things to those of you who are stressing out over families….about committing to one….starting one….adding to one….or giving a second chance to the one you washed your hands of six weeks ago (six months ago or six years ago).
Sure, there are people in your family who are going to hurt you….disappoint you….fail you. And, at some time in your life, you are going to do the same to them. But on their best days, families are wonderful. On average days, families are helpful. And on their worst days, they are instructional. Even though the lessons sometimes can be painful to bear.
Are there horror stories out there? Of course there are horror stories out there. But there are other stories, too. Every day, in this place, I see people who are working hard at the “family thing”….and enjoying it. I see people coming together at weddings, baptisms, anniversaries, even funerals….holding each other close….holding each other up….laughing….crying….telling stories….making memories. I see families that have come through a hard patch (a dark patch, a wilderness patch) where they lost sight of each other….lost touch with each other….lost faith in each other….and lost hope they would ever become one with each other. But then they found a little light. Or made a little light. And that sliver of light was enough to come together by.
I see simpler things, too. I see church families pulling up in my driveway (at holiday time) to bestow upon the preacher a treat that they have cooked together, a picture they have painted together, or a Christmas candle they have crafted together.
I see a daughter in her late twenties who, following a need to separate a little, said to her mother: “Of course I want to be in the pictorial directory with the rest of you guys. Don’t get your picture taken without me. Schedule an appointment when I can be home. Please.”
I hear a mother in my living room saying: “You want to know why I’m bringing my family back to church? It’s because my kids are getting to the age where they have questions I can’t answer. And if I’m going to be there for them, I need the church to be there for me.”
And I hear a family who said: “We found a way to solve the senior trip issue that satisfied everybody. The four of us took off for England, and even worshiped together in Wesley’s Chapel on Easter Sunday.”
Not every family is traditional. Not every family is conventional. But people are making it happen. And thriving as a result. It can be done. Because it is being done….more often than you think….in more places than you think…..by more people than you think.
Neil Wester recently quoted me in a eulogy he delivered for his dad, Henry….married 65 years to Viola….father to nine….grandfather to 16….great-grandfather to 12 more. Said Neil (in his eulogy):
Our pastor in Birmingham, Michigan, remarked once that society should be learning from long marriages. We should be asking couples like Mom and Dad what it takes to have a long and successful union. How do they do it? What can we learn? If Mom and Dad were asked that question, I know what they would say. Especially Mom. She would say: “Neil, it’s what you make it….it’s what you make it.”
Well, to hear Neil tell it, she made it all. What did she make? She made:
Hay….whoopee….babies….brownies
Easter eggs….Halloween costumes
Mistakes….examples
Peace…..promises….prayers
Not that Neil worships her. Or worshiped Henry, either. I mean, Neil has heard me preach. He’s got his priorities straight. Besides, if Neil had ever confused his mom or dad for God Almighty, she’d have set him straight. You can bet your bottom dollar she’d have set him straight.
