I always find people’s discussions of famliy get-togethers interesting. Most people speak of holidays, like the upcoming Thankgiving and Christmas, as affairs where all kinds of different types in your family get together, full of fun, but also complete with arguments, tension between black sheep and family patriarchs, etc. I can’t say I’ve experienced a lot of that myself, but there is obviously a truth in these many tales. There are many types of people in each family. And as Yancey quotes from Frost, “family is the place where, when you have to go there, they have to take you in.”
We understand family as a place where we all come together, regardless of differences, because something deeper draws us together. Blood is thicker than water.
So what does that mean for church? As thick as blood ties might be, the draw in church is even stronger. In church we are united by the figure of Christ, the one who has died for our sins, and who says we need to place relationship with him in the center of all others, to place his goals in the center of all other facets of our lives.
This is a powerful draw, but also a powerful and challenging call. And the call is to gather with folks who will be quite different from us, people who we then say we’re going to voluntarily join.
So the challenge this week is to look out at your community of Christ this week. Look to those who are different from you, and think about how you can love them in an even deeper way. After all, if we can love family because of our ties through some common blood and genes, how much more can we love our brothers and sisters with whom we share the blood of Christ.
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