What is a Normal Family?

Sunday, May 11th

My father-in-law often interjected a question in conversations about family life. "What is normal," he would ask. For some reason that question stopped us in our tracks. Usually we couldn't answer it.

The situation is aggravated in our present world. Is a normal family one in which both mom and dad have a full time job, Johnny is in school and little Jane in day-care? That was not considered normal fifty years ago. Is it normal when dad skips out on the family, and after filing for divorce, disappears to avoid paying child support? Most of us admit this may be common but not normal.

Homosexual and lesbian couples are gaining respectability. Many accept their lifestyles as normal. Books are being published for children that put lesbians in a good light. One of them talk about a family with two moms. Is that a family? What is normal anyway?

Once again the Bible helps us. The story of a mom and dad and two sons is found in the little book of Ruth in the Old Testament of the Bible. This family left home because of a famine. They became refugees in a foreign land. It reminds us of Somalia, Rwanda, or Darfur. The family is grief-stricken when the father suddenly dies. There is joy when the two sons marry local girls. Sadness overtakes the family when the two sons also die.

Then the mother and one of the daughters-in-law return to the old home town. They are destitute and on welfare. This situation seems a little abnormal too. But what is really abnormal about this story, from our perspective, is the faith in God exemplified by the two women. Although many families face financial hardship, the loss of loved ones, and extreme challenges, fewer modern families have faith in the restorative power of the living God.

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