Was the Nuclear Family a Mistake?

I am a 70’s baby and a 80’s child. I was raised post sexual revolution during the greatest increase of divorce in American history.

I experienced the fruits of a broken home, single motherhood and weekend fatherhood. I was part of the first generation of latch key kids. I have lived the destruction of the nuclear family.

So what does God say about the nuclear family?

Marriage matters

And Jehovah God saith, “Not good for the man to be alone, I do make to him an helper — as his counterpart.” Gen. 2:18

From beginning, the Creator knew singleness wasn’t ideal. He knew that the first man he made needed a counterpart. Marriage was his answer to our loneliness.

Husband Wife Priority

That is why a man leaves his father and mother and is united to his wife, and they become one flesh. Gen. 2:24

Extended family has a place, but it is the husband/wife unit that trumps all. It is in the one-flesh union that God himself is represented.

It is pretty amazing to me that God chose the marriage relationship to foreshadow his relationship with his people, the bride of Christ. He knew he was going to send a savior who would die for the church, buy her back and take her home. Marriage told that story long before the birth of Jesus.

This is a profound mystery—but I am talking about Christ and the church. Eph. 5:32

Children are his blessing to us.

Children are a gift from the Lord; they are a reward from him. Ps. 127:3

They can be inconvenient at times. They require amounts of self that nothing else in the world requires. Raising them stretches us. Feeding them exhausts us. Loving them transforms us. Children are an immeasurable gift.

Godly children are gift to him.

And what does he want? Godly children from your union. Mal. 2: 15

God answered the cry of loneliness in Eden and on with marriage. He gifted us with marriage to demonstrate his love for us. He bestowed children to us to bless us.

What does he desire in return? Children who look like him.

The nuclear family was no mistake. In fact, it is God invented, ordained and sustained. It is his plan for his people and for his church.

But what happens when we mess it up? What about families like mine.

Well, I am a living stone, a memorial to redemption and second chances. This only child of a broken home has been married to one man for 23 years and had eight children. My parents are now both in Christ and actively grandparenting my brood with love.