Chosen Family

So what do you do when your family of origin (birth family) has past? Mom and Dad are gone. Siblings are far away or maybe you're an only child. Maybe you have never married for whatever the reason. Are you really alone? Or suppose for a minute that your family of origin has chosen to break ties with you over a lifestyle issue or that you have had to distance yourself from them because they no longer share the same family vision with you?

There are all kinds of reasons why someone might find themselves alone or without family to depend on. My own situation could be much more perilous than it is. I'm not married and that is by choice. I am an only child and my parents have passed away. I have extended family, but with few exceptions, none of them want a totally transparent relationship. They don't want the embarrassment of sharing or hearing about each other's junk; the stuff in life that we might share only with a wife or a husband. My parents were even this way. There was always this fear that if we shared our issues, something bad would happen or we might all begin to look bad in the eyes of our church or our superficial friendships.

So am I alone? Absolutely not.

When I became a Christian, I chose for myself another family. I did not realize at the time just how important that family would become. I am not alone because I have Christian friends; some I am very close to. Others I am not so close to, but most all of them know about what was once my deepest darkest secret. And they love me anyway. Imagine that. These spiritual friendships are the best and from my observation, they go far deeper than than the ties I had with my family of origin. Spiritual friends help us carry the burden, whatever that may be. The masks come off and the love flows. Jesus is among us to help us as we care for each other.

Christian friends and the Church in general - they are my chosen family.

Many people think that this idea of chosen family grew out of the LGBTQ community. As people would come out of the closet, they would find rejection by their family of origin and begin to build new families based on new friendships made with others like them.

The chosen family concept though,  is really far older, by at least 2000 years, than what has happened in the gay community in the last 50 years.

In the early days of His ministry, Jesus' family, including His mother, were having trouble dealing with what Jesus was doing with His life. This is how Mark records it in his gospel. Mark 3:20, 21 and 31-35.

 20 Then Jesus entered a house, and again a crowd gathered, so that he and his disciples were not even able to eat. 21 When his family[b] heard about this, they went to take charge of him, for they said, “He is out of his mind.”
31 Then Jesus’ mother and brothers arrived. Standing outside, they sent someone in to call him. 32 A crowd was sitting around him, and they told him, “Your mother and brothers are outside looking for you.” 33 “Who are my mother and my brothers?” he asked.
34 Then he looked at those seated in a circle around him and said, “Here are my mother and my brothers! 35 Whoever does God’s will is my brother and sister and mother.”

Jesus' birth family did not understand what was going on. They thought Jesus was crazy. They were going to take Him away. He was apparently embarrassing them by drawing attention and taking positions against the religious leadership of the time. Jesus would not cooperate with them. He made His break with His family then and there and He pointed toward His Chosen Family. It was a great day for the future Church.

Jesus takes it a step further in Matthew 10:37-39.

 37 “Anyone who loves their father or mother more than me is not worthy of me; anyone who loves their son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. 38 Whoever does not take up their cross and follow me is not worthy of me. 39 Whoever finds their life will lose it, and whoever loses their life for my sake will find it.

Once we choose our new family, things can get rough. Jesus knew that choosing faith and His Church over whatever it was that we knew before could result in separation from our families of origin. If we are called to serve Christ's kingdom in a particular way that may separate us from our birth family, then we have to learn to deal with that.There can be family tension that develops and estrangement may follow.

To one degree or another, all the apostles came to experience this. Paul did not even have a wife or children, mostly because the nature of his missionary work made that impossible. He did, however, build strong family ties in the churches that he established. His relationship with the Ephesian church and elders was particularly strong as revealed in the book of Acts. He also trained young men as evangelists, that he considered his sons, to serve with him in ministry. Timothy and Titus come to mind, but I am sure there were many others. Paul chose his family. It was the family of God; the Church.

People will tell you that you can choose what you have for lunch and you can choose your friends, but you can't choose your family. Jesus blew that last one right out of the water and I'm glad he did.

If you're interested in more info on Chosen Family from a gay Christian perspective, check out this link to Your Other Brothers. It will lead you to a podcast on this very subject. It's what inspired me to write this blog post. The podcast is almost two hours long. The meat of it is in the second hour. Just skip forward and enjoy the discussion. The whole thing is worth a listen though. These guys are great. I like to listen to them when I drive. My truck has Bluetooth, so I pull up the podcast on my phone and listen to it through my truck speakers as I drive to the next fishing spot.

Later Brother.