Rev. David Holwick
First Baptist Church
Ledgewood, New Jersey
May 19, 1996
Genesis 16:1-6
FAILED FAMILIES
I. Examples of failed families.
A. It can happen to the best of us.
He was known as a gifted preacher, eloquent, intense, captivating
in his deep, booming voice.
He was a trustee of one of the largest seminaries in the country
and had the honor of preaching the convention sermon for
Southern Baptists in Alabama in 1993.
At home, though, he said he was "the great pretender," who
was guarding the secret of a crumbling marriage.
The evil was not infidelity, not the so-called "pressures" of
the ministry.
The real causes, he said, were his "pride and stubbornness,"
years of anger and bitterness toward his wife that led him to
despair.
On February 26, 1995, Don Graham, age 54, stepped up to the
pulpit to make a confession and resign his position.
"At the end of January, the Lord found me a bitter, angry and
defeated man whose family was crumbling and whose spiritual
life was disintegrating," he told the congregation.
"I lost all joy of service, of ministry, and the joy of salvation.
Driven by pride, I ignored my wife's appeals over the years.
I refused to value her opinions and disregarded her."
"Many is the time," Graham said, "that I let the sun go down on
my wrath."
A marriage counselor was brave enough to ask the tough questions,
unimpressed with Graham's reputation.
He made Graham fill in a list of all the things he had done to
wound his wife.
"After 31 entries, I could hardly stand it any longer," he says.
That same Sunday his wife, Jean, also read a confession that
described her as lacking any hope that the wounds would heal.
In her statement, she confessed to a self-centered and
judgmental character:
"I had a master's degree in critical spirit, and I was not
submissive," she said.
The congregation immediately expressed its forgiveness, but the
resignation was final.
The pastor and his wife said they were uncertain of the future
but certain "God wants us to focus on rebuilding our marriage."
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B. Bible examples of troubled families:
1) David / Sarah / Hagar
2) Jacob / Leah = Rachel
3) David / Bathsheba & umpteen others
C. Problems run the gamut.
1) Constant fighting, bickering, resentment.
2) Faith grows cold over time.
3) Love lessens, ends in adultery.
4) Children go wrong, even trying to murder parents.
II. Why families fail.
A. We are brought up as sinners in sinful families.
1) Marriage couples and "past programming."
a) It is only going to get worse. CT, 12-14-92, p.35
b) Even in good families, kids can go bad.
2) Even Christians have to grow and adapt.
a) Two can become one - but only with difficulty, and a
miracle.
b) Our problems and personality flaws don't go away
overnight, even with a spiritual conversion.
B. Addictions and temptations.
1) Millions of families are torn up by alcohol.
Shani Gray grew up a rough area of Miami.
Many of her friends turned to gangs and drugs, but her
parents encouraged her to do well in school.
For Shani, it's ironic that while her dad was encouraging her
to stay on track and resist the temptations around her,
he was sinking further into those same temptations.
"He's like the pink flamingos," Shani says.
"They start out as white birds, but the stuff they eat turns
them pink.
Their outside changes because of what's going on inside.
That's what happened to my dad.
He tried hard to resist all that stuff, but he was in the
middle of it.
It got to him."
On the day of her graduation, in which she was the top
student, she looked out across the audience to see her dad.
But he wasn't there. He was off drunk somewhere.
Soon after he abandoned his family.
The hardest part of his leaving is the message it gave
to Shani.
"I looked up to him," she says.
"He worked so hard for us and I loved him so much.
But he made a choice that said, 'My lifestyle is more
important to me than you are.'
He was my motivation to keep at it when I wanted to give up
on college.
Then he gave up on us."
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2) Other temptations are adultery, gambling, workaholism.
C. We allow resentments to fester.
1) In time, they boil over in anger.
2) Another option is lifelong "silent treatment."
a) It is the quiet killer of too many families.
D. Divided faith.
1) A house that is divided against itself will fall.
2) Faith may not seem that important when dating, but to a
genuine Christian it is essential glue in a relationship.
3) If you allow your faith to slip, selfishness can creep in
and strangle your family.
III. Failed families can be healed.
A. Running away doesn't help.
1) People don't have much luck running from unhappy marriages.
While 40 percent of first marriages end in divorce, 60%
of second marriages and 75 percent of third marriages
end in divorce, says Gary Chapman, marriage counselor.
He concludes, "We've got to learn to love the person we're
now married to."
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2) Your investment is worth safeguarding.
Last year a poignant editorial appeared in Newsweek.
Maggie McKinney was separated from her husband after 20 years
of marriage, and then they got back together.
She found that no one cheers when a "dead" marriage shows
signs of life, and frequently got the same message:
why revive a failed relationship?
Some friends promised, "You'll marry again soon - and next
time your marriage will last."
Almost everyone encouraged her: "Go for it! You can do it!"
Eighteen months later, when she and her husband decided to
try their marriage again, the support was subdued, often
nonexistent.
"When something is dead," a minister told her, "you need to
bury it."
The media also communicates the impossibility of
reconciliation ("Mrs. Doubtfire" is a prime example).
But Maggie remembered her promise of "for better or worse"
and "till death do us part."
Although she can't precisely describe what happened, she felt
a sense of completeness at trying again even though the
marriage might blow up in her face.
They had to readjust and still had arguments, and had to
get used to less freedom.
Although things now look promising, neither of them has any
guarantees that the breakup won't happen again.
But had she married someone else, she wouldn't have been
sure of that, either.
You have all the years of love and affection upon which to
build.
Shared holidays and vacations, car accidents, gifts, pictures
taken and later laughed over, as well as grief over family
deaths have all become part of an intricate structure.
Their separation taught them a little about what is and what
isn't important.
Forgiveness, they learned, is essential.
And they have avoided (at least so far) the anger and
bitterness that can come from divorce.
Their marriage is far from perfect.
They are never sure that they'll not separate again.
But the marriage is better than it was before the separation.
Thy have learned to pay more attention to each other than
they did in the past.
The minister wasn't wrong.
At the time she talked to him the marriage WAS dead.
It just that he forgot about resurrection.
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B. God can work miracles.
1) Forgiveness is a key.
a) Don't let sun go down on anger.
b) Even if you think other person is completely at fault,
you make move to reconcile.
2) Repentance is important as other side of coin.
a) If marriage is torn by adultery, you must decide to end
the affair.
b) Past acts are forgivable, not on-going transgressions.
C. Gaining strength outside of ourselves.
1) Companionship (not finances) is the primary goal of marriage
these days.
a) Problem: people are more isolated than ever due to
jobs and hectic lifestyles.
b) By being isolated we can pool our ignorance and miss
out on wisdom and love from others.
2) Seek out community.
a) Not just "two against the world," but have millions on
your side.
b) Family and friends.
c) Church.
