Introduction: Is Christianity Anti-Family?

One of the hallmarks of Asian culture is the emphasis on family and community: respecting one’s elders, upholding traditional principles, following customs, and maintaining a good public image. As a result, though, sometimes people see a tension between Asian values and Christian teaching. Christianity is sometimes seen as “Western”—individualistic, anti-filial piety, self-expressive. When non-believing relatives see that a Christian family member refuses to participate in ancestor worship, which often includes burning incense paper and bowing before the grave of a deceased ancestor, it can be taken as a lack of respect to our elders. Does the Bible downplay honoring our family? Is God a selfish master that simply pushes us to follow him at the expense of our blood relations?

• The Flourishing of the Family

The Bible overwhelmingly affirms the importance of family. From the beginning, God saw his plan for the world as being fulfilled through the union of a man and a woman. In Genesis 1-2, God created the world and declared his works “good” (1:4, 10, 12, 18, 21, 25, 31). Although the word “good” appears as much as nine times in two chapters, God saw one instance as “not good”: “It is not good for the man to be alone. I will make a helper suitable for him” (2:18). Adam and Eve’s marriage thus makes up the first family in human history. In chapter 12, we meet a man called Abram, whose name means “he is exalted as to his father.” God tells Abram to leave his hometown and move to a foreign land with the promise to make Abram into a great nation through which blessings will come (12:2-3). In a world with no GPS, internet, email, and instant messaging, leaving one’s family was incredibly dangerous, yet Abram’s obedience to God’s commands would later cause God to change his name to Abraham, literally “the father of many nations.” (17:5)

God’s emphasis on family is not just an outdated notion seen only in the Old Testament stories. The New Testament gives us plenty of examples of God’s emphasis on piety to one’s family. For the first thirty years of his life, Jesus honored his parents. Having been lost and subsequently found in the temple (Luke 2:41–51), we’re told that he was “submissive to them” (Luke 2:51) and “increased in wisdom and in stature and in favor with God and man” (Luke 2:52). Even as he suffered on the cross, Jesus expressed concerned about the welfare of his mother and the pain she was experiencing then. He entrusted Mary and her future security and protection into the care of John, his beloved disciple (John 20:26–27). “Traditionally, the oldest son in a Jewish family was duty-bound to provide for his mother’s care if she became a widow. By entrusting Mary to John’s care, Jesus was fulfilling His family responsibility as a devoted son.” Jesus himself demonstrated the kind of filial piety that our culture exalts.

The Apostle Paul too affirms the importance of honoring our families. In several of the letters he wrote to different churches, Paul gives what historians sometimes refer to as “household codes” (Ephesians 5:22–6:9; Colossians 3:18–4:1). In Ephesians 6, he calls on children to obey their parents (6:1), but also on fathers not to provoke their children to anger (6:4). Similarly, in Colossians 3, the apostle calls for wives to submit to their husbands, for husbands to love their wives in gentleness, and for children to obey their parents in everything (vv. 18-20). Then in 1 Timothy 5:1–16, Paul commands adult children to provide for their aging widowed mums. He even goes so far as to equate those who neglect their family as someone who “denied the faith and is worse than an unbeliever.” (vv. 8). Both in the Old Testament and in the New Testament, God does not demand believers to zealously follow him and abandon their responsibility and obligations to their families. On the contrary, God sees family as the building block of a loving and faithful people. 

• The Fallenness of the Family

Given the Bible has such a positive view of the family, you may wonder why Christianity isn’t the Asian religion? That’s because even though family is important, the Bible also shows us family is far from perfect. The rest of Genesis records how Abraham’s family live out their covenant relationship with God, and we soon discover many examples of sin’s tragic effects on his family. Abraham’s son Isaac plays favorites and causes jealousy among his children (Genesis 25:27–28). Jacob, Isaac’s younger son, deceives his older brother Esau into selling his birthright for a pot of stew (Genesis 25:29–34) only for Jacob himself to be tricked by his uncle Laban when he moves into their family (Genesis 29–30). Jacob had to work 21 years before he could move back home with his beloved wife and children. When things seem to have finally settled down, Jacob is deceived yet again, this time by his own children who led him into thinking that his favorite son Joseph is dead (Genesis 37). In Jacob, we have someone who believed that gaining family approval was the solution to all his problems. Israel’s patriach sought to make family his everything only to have the same patterns of sin: deception, jealousy, and hatred plague and destroy his idealistic view of the family. 

Even family then, is unable to offer Jacob, and all of us, true refuge. A good and healthy family is a blessing indeed. But if you look to family to provide ultimate meaning and fulfilment, it will fail you (cf. Mark 7:33-35). For example, think of parents who try to give their children the best possible life and make every important decision for them. Author Tim Keller in his book Counterfeit Gods tells the story of such a woman:

My wife and I once knew a single woman, Anna, who wanted desperately to have children. She eventually married, and contrary to the expectations of her doctors, was able to bear two healthy children despite her age. But her dreams did not come true. Her overpowering drive to give her children a perfect life made it impossible for her to actually enjoy them. Her overprotectiveness, fears and anxieties, and her need to control every detail of her children’s lives made the family miserable. Anna’s oldest child did poorly in school and showed signs of serious emotional problems. The younger child was filled with anger. There’s a good chance her drive to give her children wonderful lives will actually be the thing that ruins them. Getting her heart’s deepest desire may end up being the worst thing that ever happened to her.

As another example, we often see on social media those who build their entire identity on their family: parents who upload pictures of their four-year-old daughter entering beauty contests and ask their friends for likes and shares, wives who post stories of their husband’s romantic gestures every other day and frequently upload pictures of their family trip. “Maintaining a healthy image (of a loving family)… It’s almost like a full-time job”, said an Instagram influencer that recently spoke with. When we make family our everything, it will consume us from the inside out. We will believe it is up to us to hold our family together, and we can attribute so much value to our marriage and children that even the lightest comment against them can cause us to be upset. 

On the one hand, despite all the brokenness that is in our families, God nonetheless affirms its importance in his redemptive plan. Yet we are still reminded that family is not perfect. Stories of “successful” people show that anyone who makes family their everything will eventually head towards self-destruction. After all, the Bible says that all of us, including our parents, are “sinful at birth from the time our mother conceived us” (Psalm 51). Just look at how selfish and demanding newborns can be! Babies cry whenever they do not get what they want and make the world all about themselves. Ironically, adults are not that much better! At the end of the day, even the good things we do for our family ultimately serves to make us feel better about ourselves. Whether we want it or not, we bring pride, self-centeredness, control, and insecurity into our families, and there seems to be an endless series of jealousy and hatred. Are we locked to this cycle? Is there a way out? 

• The Family of Christ

The good news is that even though our earthly families are fallen, the apostle Paul tells us God can provide us a family with ultimate meaning and fulfillment. Those who believe in God tend to think of him as the Creator. Like other religions, Christians do believe God is the Creator. Unlike other religions, Christians believe something else even more wonderful about God—we believe God is the Father. And he isn’t like our earthly fathers, who are often imperfect, sometimes distant, maybe even occasionally harsh. God is the perfect Father. The sad thing is the Bible says we chose to disown him, to mistreat him, to bring him dishonor. In other words, we “sin”. Amazingly, the good news of Christianity says that even though we treated God this way, he sent Jesus to bring us back into his family. God still wants to be our Father! And through Jesus, God adopts us in love. He sets his affection on us even when we were not lovable.

And that means we share all the privileges of being in his family. If I were to adopt a child, they would bear my family name. They. would belong. Sometimes they may misbehave and as a father, I would need to discipline him. But that doesn’t change the fact he still belongs in my family. Being a Christian is like being an adopted child. God loves us despite our imperfections and continues to shape us into maturity. Furthermore, as children of God, Christians enjoy an inheritance of a living hope, of knowing one day we will inherit a world where there will be no more family conflict, no relational breakdown, no worries of any sort, but only the joy of being with our Father forever.

In the meantime, there is one more privilege Jesus gives us now. By being in his family, Christians have brothers and sisters who are to love one another! One of my greatest joys is knowing that wherever I go in the world, I can be with family, because I can meet other Christians, whatever their background. That’s what Jesus says in Mark’s Gospel – “no one who has left home…for me and the gospel will fail to receive a hundred times as much in the present age—homes, brothers, sisters, mothers, children and fields!” (Mark 10:29-30). As God’s children, we enjoy numerous blessings through his son: inheritance, adoption, and a family beyond blood ties.

• Loving Our Families on Earth

Is Christianity anti-family? Yes and no. We should love our families as God has commanded us, but we also should not attribute ultimate meaning to them. Having a spiritual family does not mean we can disregard our earthly family. Instead, the gospel of Jesus Christ redeems the brokenness of our family and puts our family together. In Jesus, we have someone who so obeyed the will of his Father that he gave his life for sinners. In Jesus, we have someone who so loved us that he sacrificed himself to give us life. On the cross, perfect obedience was met with perfect love. Because of what Christ has done for us, we can now obey and love our family members at the same time. Rooted in the death and resurrection of Christ, the gospel changes us to be wiser, to be more patient and to be more understanding day by day, until the day when we are reunited with our true family in heaven. 

For those who seek the actual purpose and the embrace of a loving family, consider this: Knowing that we have such a wonderful Father in Heaven and a beautiful Christian family waiting for us, shouldn’t we be inspired to open our hearts and embrace the teachings of Christ, so that we can become part of this loving community that guides us toward our heavenly home?”

P/S: This article is a transcript of a presentation given at an apologetics event in Kuching called “Teh C Talks” by Paul Ling, pastor of Redemption Church Kuching and Brian King, pastor of BEM Kuching Evangelical Church. With permission from Brian, Paul has modified the original presentation and supplemented it with more content suited for the format of an article.