The Church is a "Family of Families" -- Part 3

By saying, ‘the church is a family of families,” are we confusing the church and the family?

When Andreas Kostenberger used the phrase "family of families” to describe the church in his excellent book God, Marriage and Family,¹ I doubt anyone accused him of trying to redefine the church. And rightly so, because he was simply pointing out the significance of a particularly important family relationship (marriage) that exists in the church for God’s strategic purposes for spiritual warfare and the proclamation of the gospel. In this sense, the family exists as an entity under the headship of Christ and so the church exists in the same way. The family and the church are separate, yet connected in carrying out Christ’s overall plan.

We have plainly stated that the family is not the church and the church is not the family; they are separate yet complimentary jurisdictions.

Some have connected the statement, “family of families” with concepts of covenantal family and church membership. Some have suggested that we confuse the regenerate and the unregenerate in the church and make them the same because they are part of a family. We have never done this. We do not believe that every family member is a member of the true church. On the contrary, we maintain that the true church is composed only of individual redeemed sinners.

We acknowledge that many family members, though they are under the care of their parents and come to the meetings of the church, remain unconverted. They are part of the church only in that they come to meetings of the church, listen to the preaching of the church, relate to the redeemed members of the church and participate in the discipleship experiences of the church. Children may attend church but not be part of the church as converted members of Christ. Yet, they are still in the church in the sense that they have been sovereignly placed among the people of God. They are blessed by its members, message and ministry. This is all we mean when we say the church is a “family of families.” We don’t mean that all family members are converted and part of the redeemed. Voddie Baucham stated it this way, “We Are Not Commenting On Membership in the Church.”² Like Baucham, we did not mean that every family member is a part of the universal church in the sense that they are all converted members.

¹ “Just as Christ must rule over all heavenly powers (Eph. 1:21-22) and over the church (4:15), he must also rule over the marital relationship (5:21-33), the family (6:1-4), and the workplace (6:5-9). A married couple is part of the church (understood as a family of families, cf. I Tim. 3:15), and it, too, is part of that spiritual warfare that resolutely resists evil (Eph. 6:10-14) and seeks to promote God’s purpose in this world (foremost the preaching of the gospel, 6:15. 19-20). Thus the marriage relationship should also be viewed in the context of Christian witness in an unbelieving environment, both directly by the husband’s and the wife’s living out God’s purposes for the Christian couple, and indirectly by being part of a Biblical church that actively propagates the gospel message.” (Kostenberger, Andreas, God, Marriage, and Family: Rebuilding the Biblical Foundation, [Crossway Books: Wheaton, IL, ©2004], p. 72).

² Baucham, Voddie, “Is the Church a Family of Families?”, Part 1, can be accessed at http://www.voddiebaucham.org/vbm/Blog/Entries/2009/3/26_Is_the_church_A_Family_of_Families.html (Accessed 11/9/2009)