FAMILY MATTERS
November 22, 2008
I am a purist. My world is black and white and I like it that way. I absolutely hate the word “eclectic.” To pick pieces from many different wholes and blend it into something you find interesting is a concept I can’t understand. If you live in a Victorian style house then I would expect to find Victorian style decorating throughout the entire house. To me, a Victorian home decorated in a Tuscan, colonial, and French style is nothing short of gross! Eclectic is the same as “hodge-podge,” “mongrel,” and “mutt.” But hey, it works for some.
Why I say this is because one of the styles of counseling I was introduced to was an eclectic style. Take the good from all the theories and one can conceivably counsel with great ease and with great outcomes. Of course I never bought into that. But I find myself being eclectic and pure at the same time. I took the interesting portions of two types of family therapy that had Biblical basis and created an amalgamation of the two. What I came up with was a Scriptural basis for God’s basic design for the family and incidentally, the Bible is the pure source for all truth.
The family is a system. In biology, a system is defined as a group of varying parts working together as a whole to complete a particular task. For example, the digestive system is made up of your mouth, throat, stomach, small and large intestines, gall bladder and liver…etc. All it takes is for one of those organs to function improperly to throw the whole system out of whack. So it goes with the family. If the family is functioning optimally and all the members of the family are contributing positively to the work of the family, then a stable condition known as homeostasis is achieved. That concept is stated in Amos 3:3, “Can two walk together, except they be agreed?” Can a group of people function optimally if one or more people aren’t doing what they are supposed to? No, the task won’t get done and homeostasis won’t be achieved.
Family systems theory looks at the whole family and not one particular “bad apple.” This particular way of approaching family therapy was created in the 1960’s by a gentleman named Murray Bowen. Two major aspects of his theories were the “differentiation of self,” and the concept of “triangulation.” With respect to differentiation of self, he believed that someone had to be able to step back from themselves and let their intellect guide them and not be led by their emotions. He believed that someone who exhibited a great differentiation of self would make thoughtful decisions and stand for them in the face of adversity whereas a poorly differentiated person would be easily swayed. In Ephesians 4:14 you find an example of poorly differentiated people as Paul describes new believers not firmly rooted in what they believe but are thereby “…tossed to and fro and carried about with every wind of doctrine, by the sleight of men, and cunning craftiness, whereby they lie in wait to deceive.” Basically, poorly differentiated people are wishy-washy, unstable, non-committal, and very impressionable.
This poor differentiation led to his next concept called triangulation. In this case what happens is that two people, a husband and wife for example, are having problems between them. They have stress and tension and what usually happens when this occurs is that one or both of the people will bring in a third party to reduce the stress between them. Person “A” and person “B” can’t agree so person “C” is dragged into it. Here’s where the wishy-washiness of person “C” can be a problem. He’ll side with person “A” if the argument is a decent one, but at a later time, if person “B” states a better argument, then person “C” will shift alliances and the power will shift over, and back and forth it goes. That relationship is unstable because person “C” is led by their emotions and not their intellect. Unfortunately, this is seen much of the time during divorces between spouses where children are used as leverage. The consequences of being an unstable person is clearly evident in the warnings regarding double-minded people in James 1:8. Contrast the poorly differentiated double-minded person with Solomon in 1st Kings chapter 3 who wanted to wisely discern between good and evil. He was a mediator, not swayed by emotions, but rather by God-given reason and intellect.
Along the lines of Bowen’s family systems theory was a man by the name of Salvador Minunchin. He was an Italian therapist in the 1970’s who counseled on the belief that the family needed to be structured properly in order to function at an optimal level. He focused on the structure of the family itself in relation to subsystems, boundaries, and alliances. I studied the family of Isaac in the Old Testament and evaluated that family based on Structural Family Theory, and you can find that paper on the “Resources” tab.
Minunchin believed the family needed to be structured in a hierarchy. The parents were to be at the top of the hierarchy system with the children beneath them with respect to authority. From there, he also believed in the value of the older children being given opportunities and responsibilities that were age-appropriate, with the older children having more tasks and chores than the younger, and so on. But within this family hierarchy structure is what he called subsystems. Examples would be the subsystem of the husband and wife, parents and children, and children and children. Of course, the larger the family, the more opportunity for a greater number of subsystem combinations. These subsystems are relegated by boundaries and these boundaries are well defined by the presence of clearly set rules.
These boundaries, however, can be blurred depending on how flexible the rules are. If there are poorly defined rules and blurred boundaries, the opportunity is there to build coalitions. Coalitions are damaging to the family because basically it’s two or more people in the family ganging up on one or more fellow family members. This is more severe than the schoolyard version of kickball where it’s boys versus the girls. In a family, if there is an intergenerational coalition (parent and child joining forces) there is a desire for power to exert control over someone else to yield the desired outcome. For example…I want a cat but my wife does not. I get Kaleigh and Natalie to go along with me, and pressure Sherri until we get a cat. I have used my impressionable children in a wrong way by having them side with me to get me what I wanted. I (person “A”) and Sherri (person “B”) were having difficulty working something out. I got my kids (person “C”) to side with me and put power on my side to get that cat.
This goes right back to Bowen’s triangulation aspect of family dynamics. And if you don’t believe this sort of thing goes on in families, think again. God took the time to include the lessons of which I speak here in the example of Isaac and his family. Read the account in Genesis 25:28 where we learn that each parent had a favorite child: Rebekah loved Jacob and Isaac loved Esau. Oh that can’t be…no parent has favorites. But look at how the verse reads, “And Isaac loved Esau, because he did eat of his venison: BUT Rebekah loved Jacob.” Later in Genesis 26, you’ll read how Rebekah and Jacob joined forces to deceive there weak, feeble, and nearly blind elderly father and husband.
Now go back to the differentiation argument and the double-minded person being unstable. If Jacob chose not to do what his mother asked him to because he used reason and intellect to stand his ground on his beliefs, he would have declined the opportunity to partake in the trickery based on his being able to reason with himself that it was wrong. But he was led by his emotions and joined forces with his mother. I hate applying psychological terms to Jesus, but I think this differentiation is a Biblical concept, and Jesus displayed it in a particular instance. In Mark 10:35-37, James and John (the sons of Zebedee) approached Jesus asking if He would do whatever they desired. Jesus inquired of them what it was they wanted. They said, “Grant unto us that we may sit, one on thy right hand and the other on thy left hand, in thy glory” (vs. 36). Now, purely reading between the lines, suppose James and John wanted to be somehow greater than the other disciples and decided to approach Jesus before anyone else decided to ask that favor of Him, thereby securing a greater place in Heaven than the other Apostles would get.
Jesus didn’t say, “Well, since you asked Me first, I’ll grant it to you since it’s obvious the others don’t desire it as much as you do.” No! He was very levelheaded and not swayed by their zeal or desire to be his right and left hand men. He simply replied that none of the Apostles had understanding of what it would take to be “great” in the kingdom (Mark 10:38-45). Jesus was displaying what today’s psychologist terms differentiation. He was unwavering and did not take sides nor favor anyone above the other in their disputing with each other.
So, in review, it would be beneficial to see how God used these “man made” principles long ago in setting up the family. First, it’s important to teach our children the importance of moral choices, the conscience, and the need to choose sides wisely and that the heart can often deceive (Jeremiah 17:9). Second, when difficulties arise, seek godly counsel, communicate with each other, but don’t use others (children, etc…) in irresponsible ways for personal gain. Thirdly, maintain a hierarchy of structure in the family. Parents are charged with teaching their children and children are charged with obeying and respecting their parents. God set up the church in a similar fashion with the pastor leading the congregation while the members are to respect the man God placed in that church. Also, along those lines, remember how the older children in the family should take on more responsibility while younger children should have more time spent with them teaching them…well it’s the same in the church. The more mature Christian can get more responsibility and leadership roles in the church while the newborn babes get more focus on discipleship and such until they are older and more mature in the ways of the Lord. Fourth, be sure to have clear boundaries and clear rules regarding each person’s role in the family. Remember, the family is a system, and this system has no better example than the Trinity itself. Three Persons as one God, yet they all have specific ministries. Author Millard Erickson explains it this way, “The Son did not during his earthly incarnation become less than the Father, but He did subordinate himself functionally to the Father’s will. Similarly, the Holy Spirit is now subordinated to the ministry of the Son, as well as to the will of the Father” (Introducing Christian Doctrine, 2001).
The Triune God is for us the example of pure systemic function. There is no strife or tension between God the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. They each possess wisdom and a superior intellect that doesn’t allow for the actions of each to be based on passing emotions and whims. While they are all equal in stature, for varying periods of time there was a hierarchy of sorts within the system with Christ being obedient to the Father, and the Holy Spirit bearing witness to the Son in today’s age. They were each performing their clearly defined roles harmoniously.
Obviously our families are not like the Trinity, but we can strive to have families that mirror that of God’s example. We can take the easy way out and live like the Simpsons® and at best, that’s what you’ll get. But the consequences of mirroring our families to those of sitcoms are frightening to even think about. Divorces are commonplace, weak fathers abound, children are shown to be smarter than their parents, and they are the most popular shows on TV. But that type of a family will destroy itself and eventually implode. Only at that point will the parents think about a restructuring, but it may be too late and they may end up with only a shell of the family that God had intended. After all, “Except the Lord build the house, they labor in vain that build it…”(Psalm 127:1).
