Articles
The "Western-Prescribed" Nuclear Family
Mark Carlton had an excellent sermon last Sunday on marriage. This is not an attempt to prop it up but rather to build on it. We have seen – if we’ve been half-awake – that various forces have been intent on destroying marriage and the nuclear family over the past several decades.
Here is a recent example of unvarnished attack against the family directly from the Black Lives Matter website:
“We disrupt the Western-prescribed nuclear family structure requirement by supporting each other as extended families and ‘villages’ that collectively care for one another, especially our children, to the degree that mothers, parents, and children are comfortable.”
For those who have unwitting advocated BLM without researching what the movement is really about, you may want to visit their website. It is very revealing. Here’s another angle of attack against marriage and family by BLM:
“We foster a queer‐affirming network. When we gather, we do so with the intention of freeing ourselves from the tight grip of heteronormative thinking, or rather, the belief that all in the world are heterosexual (unless s/he or they disclose otherwise).”
Radical revolutionary groups like BLM inadvertently confess the strength of the family structure by their zeal to destroy it. They know that if moral and spiritual values are communicated from parents to children, they have less ability to brainwash those children with their godless propaganda. It is imperative that Christian parents educate themselves on the ideological threats to their children and shield them from those who would undermine their faith. Parents must also prepare themselves to answer these attacks and to explain to as well as model for their children what true marriage and family is all about.
The nuclear family is not “Western-prescribed” as asserted on the BLM website. This statement originates from an atheistic worldview. When God is removed from the picture, then man himself becomes the only source of cultural belief and practice. And humanist/Marxist revolutionaries are all about changing the culture for their political ends. If they can convince the public that historical patriarchy is the root of all ills, then they can roll their wagon into town and sell their snake oil.
The nuclear family began in the garden of Eden and was fashioned not by slow cultural evolution but by God Himself. “Humankind” had an interesting beginning: man (Adam) was made first, but God clearly demonstrated to him that it was not good for him to be alone and that no animal was suitable as a mate (Gn 2:18-20). On the same creative day (the 6th) God fashioned Eve out of Adam’s own body “and He brought her to the man” (Gn 2:22). Though it is not expressly stated in this passage, human and spiritual equality existed between the first man and woman, for only the woman was qualified to share with Adam the “prime directive” (for you Star Trek fans) to “Be fruitful and multiply; fill the earth and subdue it; have dominion over the fish of the sea, over the birds of the air, and over every living thing that moves on the earth” (Gn 1:28).
The companionship of marriage naturally extends to reproduction and the establishment of the “nuclear family”: “Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and they shall become one flesh … Now Adam knew Eve his wife, and she conceived and bore Cain, and said, ‘I have gotten a man from the Lord’” (Gn 2:24; 4:1). Thus at the outset of man’s existence, before any society existed and before man could “evolve” a workable family structure over thousands of years, God established the family unit. Further, their children were directed to do the same – to separate from their original family and create one of their own by marital bond, procreation and nurture of their own offspring.
“Heteronormative” thinking has such a “tight grip” on humanity because it is rooted in our very creation, and for that very reason it works and cannot be improved upon. Villages, communes, institutions, gay unions, polygamy, absentee parents, blended families based on adultery and all other corruptions of the family unit are miserable failures and have done a great disservice to children. When we see reports of preteens and adolescents committing murder, robbery or selling drugs, we instinctively and rightly ask, “Where are the parents?!” And if such children had parental engagement, supervision, education, training, discipline and inculcation of God’s word we likely wouldn’t be reading about them in the news. (No, the nuclear family does not guarantee godly development but is the best nurturing possible for a child with free will and little wisdom.)
Children are starving for love, nurture, companionship and guidance from parents who love them, are willing to sacrifice for them and are committed to their spouses. Kids don’t need smart phones; they need smart parents who are involved, proactive, protective and courageous enough to stand up for the purity of the minds committed to their care.
Paul lays a grave charge on parents, especially fathers: “And you, fathers, do not provoke your children to wrath, but bring them up in the training and admonition of the Lord” (Eph 6:4). Parents, not society, are charged by God to raise their children. The “it takes a village” mentality is pure Marxist dogma. It arrogantly believes the State knows better than the parents; the State has more rights than the parents; and even the child has more rights than the parents. Human fathers are fallible (Mt 7:11), but still we make better nurturers than the cold, indifferent, one-size-fits-all institutionalism of the State.
Christian fathers, we are in the midst of a cultural crisis. NOW is the time to be fully engaged with our wives and children. NOW is the time to put aside selfish distractions and ground our children in Scripture. NOW is the time to raise your antenna to the culture and see the threats that lurk at your doorstep.
Christian mothers, you are in the crisis, too. NOW is the time to sort out the culture’s mixed messaging and renew your commitment to true godly values. NOW is the time to educate your children in what they will not get in a public school. NOW is the time to exercise your fierce maternal instinct and protect your husband and children from the social forces that are conspiring to steal them from you. All of us: “Be wise as serpents and harmless as doves” (Mt 10:16).
