What Makes a Family Healthy?
A gentle answer turns away wrath,
but a harsh word stirs up anger. Proverbs 15:1
When I was growing up, my parents fought a lot. My dad would often lose his temper and say things he regretted, things that hurt, things that stayed with everyone for a while. You can forgive, but it is hard to forget. By God’s grace, the prayers that I prayed that I wouldn’t be like my dad in this area were answered. I don’t struggle with anger and rage, (one of the few things I don’t struggle with.)
We are in a series at our church, Cross Point, called Pursuit. In the series we are talking about pursuing wisdom, through the book of Proverbs. I have been asked to speak in a few weeks on Pursuing a Healthy Family.
I thought it would be cool today to ask you to help me write the message for that week. I’d love to hear from you on what you feel like are the ingredients to a healthy family.
One ingredient I feel a healthy family has is gentleness with one another.
So, take a few seconds and leave a comment of ONE OR TWO ingredients that YOU feel are necessary to have a healthy family…if you’re single, think about your family of origin. Help a brotha out with his message prep!
62 Comments to “What Makes a Family Healthy?”
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Spending time together doing simple things, playing games, weekend canoe trips, sometimes just being quiet together.
You can’t replace time! You can replace toys, clothes, and video games but you can’t get time back! Thanks Laurie!
2 things that have really helped is build a strong marriage and family (outside the obvious of having God as our center):
1 – communication. never stop communicating and take the time to learn HOW to effectively communicate to each member. it's important for others to know your thoughts, dreams, desires, needs, and when something is bothering you. UNDERSTANDING those in your family and how they communicate helps you better say what needs to be addressed.
Everything from understanding my husband inside and out, to continuously changing forms of communication as our child grows through each stage of life.
2 – CHOOSE TO LOVE AND COMMIT: I don't know why 90% of people still believe that love is a feeling and commitment is from yearning. That could not be more false! Truly understanding that these are choices we make is what gets us through tough "days" – which help to reduce tough "times". If I'm not "feeling" very mom or wife, but I choose to give my family the same attention, love, respect and commitment to caring for them, the feeling is usually shifted as a result of that commitment. When I let my feelings take over my commitments, it continues to build leading to trouble for several days and beyond.
Look forward to hearing it!
Thanks Paula! GREAT thoughts! I appreciate your thoughts on feelings overtaking commitments!
That's a great word, Paula. Thanks for the reminder!
Do life together, that’s what you signed up for, right? This may sound silly, but I am totally serious. “Husbands and wives should go to bed at the same time”. It's tough when one is a morning person and the other a night owl, but it's so important. Bedtime, (with no TV in the bedroom), is download time for us. We lie quietly and talk about what's going on in our day, our life and our head. It’s hard to avoid being open and transparent. Without that time quiet time together, so many things can get swept under the rug and left to build into huge problems.
Doesn’t sound silly at all! Thank you for sharing!
1. Communication
2. Turn the TV off
@cshell…good word!
Goose Island Honkers Ale…and plenty of it!
Classic Doug!
Wow! The previous comments were the exact ones I was thinking of.
Communication
Time together
Making your family a priority
Another thing that I think is really important is to never criticize members of your family in front of other people. Nothing good comes from it, and it just creates more bad feelings.
Great thoughts Beth!
one of the things we do every day that has really helped us is, Pat prays for our family and marriage everynight before we go to bed. This has been so crucial for our marriage and it keeps us from ever going to bed angry!
Great thoughts Mandy! Prayer has been a huge thing for us in our family too!
Be a parent first to your kids not their friends. This is especially crutical during those teen years. They may hate you now ( but really they don't. They might resist the rules and discipline but when there isn't any they think you don't care about them ), but they will love you for it in the future…..and so will society
Remember to take time for family day. Life is too busy, but family is too important not to make time for it. We are not promised tomorrow. Keep date night fun and exciting. Dont be too complacent. Husbands and wifes need their own time weekly too
Great thoughts on parenting. I said to Trisha this morning, "I wish we could freeze time. The boys are getting so big!" Thanks for your thoughts!
FIRST, put the other family members first! ALWAYS, even when it's hard to do so. That will give you JOY! Jesus Others You, in that order! Can't wait to see your thoughts on this subject Justin, love ya man!
POPS…thanks so much. Such wisdom in what you said. I think Jesus said something very similar
Love you!
1. Real communication
2. Genuine interest in each other
3. Honesty
4. Discipline on children (not harsh but firm)
5. Hitting each other with eggs (or some other fun, nonsense thing that builds joyful feelings when together)
That list assumes devotion to God is assumed in your question.
I agree with the other posts — we add lots of laughter!!
1) Choose grace! Each of us is a work in progress. Realizing that God isn’t finished with His work makes it easier to forgive issues that don’t really matter anyway.
2) Keep Jesus as your centre. Acknowledge each and every day that it’s not about us anyway.
3) Find time to pray together. Sharing those moments in conversation with each other and with God are priceless.
Great List! Thank you for sharing this. I love how you put "Choose Grace" first!
Great list Jason!
Pick up a copy of Stephen Covey's "7 Habits of Highly Effective Families". Key takeaways: Nurture your family physically, socially, mentally, and spiritually.
i haven't read that book doug…thanks for suggesting it!
Hey Brotha,
I don't know how good my input would be having a failed marriage, but I do know where I don't wanna be with my beautiful bride now and that is having to repeat the same cycles that were very much in the way of Being who God wanted me to be. God has brought me into a new discovery of finding out my true identity in him and not the identity of past hurts and pain which distorted my ability to be a good husband and father in the past. As a young family man I ran my family based on how I was raised and in some ways it wasn't so bad but in a lot a ways it was severly dysfunctional. Anger and rage was how I dealt with conflict for one; not being able to show love and affection the way God intended was another. I know that God has a plan for how we should live life but when you have so much yoke and bondage that you're carrying around than tell me how are you supposed to be what God wants?!…..
Keep it real! Thats my two cents!
Carlos (los)
Carlos…wow, thanks for your honesty and openness. Great words of wisdom here from your experience! Thank you for sharing!
Service.
Living a life of service.
Especially on the families on accord without the organization of someone else offering an opportunity to serve (ie church, youth groups etc).
The life of service will speak more volumes because the families choose to serve instead of "signing up" to serve.
Make sense?
My prayers are with you!
Thanks Lantz…makes perfect sense. Thank you for sharing!
…patience.
Where my heart needs the most work right now is as a Dad. In the process of raising my oldest child, I am finding weaknesses in this area. I find myself struggling and doing more to keep him in his ‘boundaries’ rather than striving to cultivate a relationship that will strengthen his character far more than just obeying rules will.
LOVE you bring up patience…I struggle with patience so often. What a key ingredient! Thank you!
Honesty
Extending Grace to family members
Time spent together
Can't wait to watch the sermon online!
Thanks Alison!
Respect for one another. I think if you can respect someone you will always try hard to treat them with love. You won't be as likely to hurl hurtful words or make fun of a person.
Respect is huge…thanks for sharing!
Communication, being open and honest….being real. Plenty of time together. One of my regrets is that maybe we didn't do enough as a family. We were too busy with extracurricular activities. Slowing down and listening.
Pam…thank you for sharing your heart! Praying for you!
Time
Trust
Humility
Time to build, rebuild, and demonstrate that family members are more important than TV, jobs, church (yes, church) sports, the car, money…. Nothing says "I Love You" like time.
Trust needs to be earned, especually when coming out of a bad situation. You earn trust by being trustworthy. 'nuff said.
Humility. It's not about you. It's about them. Doesn't matter who the "you" and "them" is.
Humility is HUGE! Great word!
I think that full acceptance of one another is crucial because my husband never accepted me as I am which caused me to resent and reject him. He was always pointing out my flaws and was critical of me. It seemed to me that no matter how hard I would try to please him he always found something else to belittle me with.
I put up Big walls and shut him out. He continued to be angry and frustrated with me. We quit communicating on any intimate level and our marriage died.
In Nov. I discovered he has been having an affair for the past 2-3 years with a coworker. During which time I had a one night stand and turned to porno.
He immediately ended his affair and began counseling and is ashamed that everyone knows about his double life. We are trying to work through this crisis. He still works with her which is torture for me. We are praying that he can find another job soon.
Unconditional love and acceptance are essential in a family, without it Satan will sift everything like wheat.
Wow, Rhonda. Your transparency is so brave and appreciated. Thank you for being so honest. If we can do anything to serve you or your husband on this journey, please let us know. Praying for your marriage and your complete healing as a couple!
Being honest when we are wrong.
Good stuff!
I say that, cause I know from experience. I am the worst offender in our family.
I don't know that I can add anything new after 41 posts. Been thru 28+ years with an alcoholic who was using alcoholism to self-medicate as yet undiagnosed, rapid-cycling bi-polar disorder. The 1st eight years were tough. And no, I wasn't as full of grace as I should have been. He returned to the Lord after 8 years of marriage. Everything began to get better then. I however, resisted the Lord's nudging for another 5 years! After I came to Christ, WOW.
COMMITMENT !! Believe me, the urge to run, with my child, was totally there, but I'd made a commitment, as had he – and we honored it.
Communication, YES. (and we do still struggle as patterns were set in the beginning….)
Agree to disagree – PRIVATELY! Your children to NOT need to hear loud arguments or words said when angry. They can learn how to disagree and talk it out from you and your spouse only IF you MODEL IT FOR THEM!
Family time – even on long car trips, and there have been a LOT, all music, electronics, books, naps, etc. were put on hold every few hours to just connect with each other, even though we were all in the same car.
Our boys are out of the house now (and yes, I sometimes wish for the old days) and both the married-with-children son and the 20 year-old son have thanked us for the way we parented them. They will discuss ANYTHING and EVERYTHING with both of us and to me, that says we did ok.
We are truly enjoying our time alone together during this new chapter, as I'd always prayed we would. We LIKE just hanging out together alone!
Sorry this was so long.
Amy
Amy,
thanks for sharing your story with us. What an example you guys are of a couple that could have given up at numerous times through out your marriage, but your commitment carried you. Thank you for sharing!
So many words of wisdom in what you shared.
Great post and insightful responses. We have strived to practice 1. a kind look, 2. an encouraging word and 3. a touch of love. every day. Also when we were fostering teens we always told them that we were glad to have them in our home every evening when they went to bed.
Great wisdom Gene! Thank you!
Eating dinner as a family at the table! It's a great chance to connect with the family and what's been going on in everyone's day.
Forgiving wrongs. I love my family, but they really don't forget the bad things we did, even as kids. They may bring it up in a joking manner, but you walk away feeling like they wanted to take that jab at you.
HONESTY HONESTY HONESTY! Kids are A LOT smarter than adults sometimes give them credit for, and tip toeing around big issues doesn't help anyone. If your marriage is having issues, chances are your kids already know
Eating dinner as a family changed our life too! Thank you for sharing this with us!
As a kid, I heard my parents fight all the time. At the time, I worried a lot about them getting a divorce… but they stayed married for over 40+ years before my dad passed away very unexpectedly last year. I know now, they loved each other through thick and thin. I just wish as a kid I could have understood better about fighting/communicating. I married right out of college and it's no surprise, I modeled a lot of the same fighting my parents did. But my marriage ended after 5 years. I was single again for 12+ years. During that time I gave my life to Jesus and made a vow that I would not marry unless I knew my life with be infinitely better with him than without. Just when I thought it would never happen, I met the love of my life. We've been married over 3 years and have a 6 month old son. Life has not been without it's difficulties and challenges. At times it has been so rough and I know we've both wondered if our marriage could survive… and the answer is… yes, as long as Christ is the center of it. Without Jesus, we would not make it.
So my answer to your question is… a healthy family must have the Lord at the center. It's the only way to combat the selfishness and sin nature we are born in to.
My husband and I pray together. We read the Bible together. I read scripture to my son and also pray with him. I want him to know that no matter what happens in life, Jesus loves him and accepts him unconditionally.
God bless you and your ministry Justin. You and Trish are inspirations to me!
No doubt what you say is so important…vital! Thank you for sharing your journey and your marriage with us!
-Listening
-Love, before and after mistakes
-Learning from mistakes
-Looking into a mirror and realizing you may be the problem, not always someone else. Then fixing it.
I just realized I could have one of those fill in the blank on your notes with all 4 starting with L
But, one final one is Prayer!
Fred…MOVE OVER RICK WARREN…that was awesome. Seriously, I love how you put before and after mistakes and looking in the mirror is huge! Thanks for taking the time to share.
I love that Fred. You covered all the bases and to cover it all with prayer. Perfect!
I am reading a book called " Treat me like a customer" by Louis Upkins Jr.
It talks about treating your family and loved ones like you would treat your most prized customer. Here are some of the nuggets I have gotten from it so far.
Know your customer!- know your family. What are their dreams, fears. What makes them excited and sad.
Communication-How do they communicate. What is there love language. How do they respond to instruction. What delivers the best response. What are your expectations what are your dreams. Have you shared them?Tell the ones you love that you love them. Show it and say it! Empower them.
Celebrate Your success- Celebrate the small things. The Lost tooth, perfect attendance,the affirmation from your boss, the returned sales call, the one pound weight loss, It is Tuesday.Show your family that everyday there is a reason to give thanks and praise. Make life enjoyable when you can.
Never give up and extend grace- Imagine the best in your family, in your spouse, look at them through the eyes of Christ. extend Grace when needed but affirm in love your expectations.
Great stuff!
Having a foundation of faith is crucial for our relationship but this isn't something everyone has. I do believe however, that the Golden Rule is pretty universal. Basically, evoke knowledge, express love, empower dreams and extend grace! Oh and watch the tongue it can do a world of damage.
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I listened to a sermon online by Joel Osteen on Unrealistic Expectations. I feel in my relationship with my ex husband I had very unrealistic expectations which lead to a unhealthy relationship with him. I think this can apply to our children also.