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Tonight Im continuing a sermon series called Faith Lessons for Life. Last spring I shared with a planning group for Sundaes on Wednesday some faith lessons around which I could design this sermon series. They chose ten simple lessons. So far weve looked at making decisions, discovering wisdom--POLO, living out the Golden Rule, experiencing life in a world of expectations. Last week we looked at how we can survive the setbacks and storms of life. All of these sermons can be found on our web site. Tonights faith lesson is How can I love my family when families are so different. Were using the game of Life as a launching pad to explore each faith lesson. The game of Life was invented by Milton Bradley in 1860. It was re-issued about a hundred years later and is still very popular. The game of life involves a journey in a car with our family. The journey ends at Millionaire acres. The game of Life represents the American Dream. Who doesnt want to retire with their family at Millionaire acres? In your bulletin is a Life Card. This Life Card is formatted after the card in the game of Life. The Life Card will give you more biblical application to tonights life lesson. The picture on the game of life gives us one image of family. Look at this picture SLIDE What do we call this familytwo parents with two kids. It is the nuclear family. I can relate to the nuclear family as I grew up in oneDad, mom, two kids, I was the older brother. The nuclear family has always been lifted upat least as long as I can rememberas the ideal family structure. SLIDE Heres a picture of the ideal nuclear family in the 1950s. Dad, mom, two kids, in

this ideal the son is older than the daughter.

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The success of the nuclear family largely depends on the parents marriage. It doesnt take an expert to know that a strong marriage is the greatest contributor to a strong family. Every time I officiate at a wedding I meet with the couple for at least four times. One of the first things I share with them is the most important thing they will do in their life is to have a strong marriage. I tell my wife, Amy, all the time that the best parenting technique that we can do is have a strong marriage. Ive told Hannah and will continue to tell her that the most important decision she makes in her life is a choice of a spouse. Not only is a strong marriage vital for the health of a family, its vital for the economic health of a family. I came across some fascinating information in a book by Jim Wallis. Look at this information. SLIDE SLIDE In 2008 the poverty rate for married couples was 6.4 percent; The poverty rate for nonmarried, single-headed households was 36.5 percent

SLIDE According to the Heritage Foundation marriage drops the probability of poverty by 80 percent SLIDE According to the Brookings Institution if we had the marriage rate we had in 1970, the poverty rate would fall by more than 25 percent. One way to keep people out of poverty is to support marriages. You and I know that the structure of families is changing. More information to back up this idea Sixty-four percent of children ages 017 lived with two married parents in 2012, down from 77 percent in 1980. In 2012, 24 percent of children lived with only their mothers, 4 percent lived with only their fathers, and 4 percent lived with neither of their parents.

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This information was taken from the web site childstats.org who got their information from the Census Bureau Our realityand weve known this for a long timeis the structure of families is changing. It will change even more as gays and lesbians get married. . People have different opinions on different family structures. Whatever our opinion is on the differences in family structure, that this is the reality. The question that we are looking at tonight is very significant. How do we love our families when families and family structures are so different. Im going to share two ideas. They both come from the story of Joseph. Im guessing that many of us know the story of Joseph through the musical Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat. How many of us have seen the musical. Its playing at the Chanhassen right now. I remember when the Community Theatre of Plainview shared the musical in the sanctuary of Community Presbyterian Church. We heard just a snippet of the story tonight, only five verses. The entire story covers chapters 37 to 50 of Genesis. I want to challenge us to read those thirteen chapters this week. It will only take you about half hour. The story of Joseph is just as good as any summer novel. Its easy to understand. Josephs family did something that prevented them from loving each other. You and I can learn from their mistake. The mistake they made was they kept secrets. There were all sorts of secrets kept by the people in the story. At the beginning of the story Jacob told Joseph to go find his brothers. The brothers saw Joseph walking towards them. They were jealous of Joseph because he was Jacobs favorite and

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Joseph had treated them poorly. The brothers threw Joseph into a pit. Then they got greedy and sold him to a group of slave traders. This was terrible. The brothers then covered up what they did. The cover-up was worse. They told a lie. The brothers shared with Jacbo that Joseph had been killed. The reality of what happened to Joseph became a secret between the brothers. Only they knew that Joseph was still alive. Ive had the privilege of loving families for almost 20 years as a pastor. Families give power to secrets. The secrets are perpetuated to protect someone or a group of people or something. They are developed so someone can avoid the messiness of the truth. In the Joseph story the brothers were afraid of telling their father of what they did. I think we can understand why they didnt tell Jacob the truth. I think they miscalculated the longterm damage of that secret. Joseph was not off the hook here either when it comes to keeping secrets. He kept secrets. Through a series of events he became the second most powerful person in Egypt. Much later in the story a famine hit the entire area. Josephs brothers came to Egypt looking for food. The brothers met with Joseph. Joseph recognized his brothers, but the brothers didnt recognize him. Joseph didnt disclose his identity. He hid behind a secret. Lack of truth-telling takes different forms. Hiding behind a secret is one form. Joseph hid behind his true identity. Then he manipulated his brothers. He gave them food, but through his own manipulations he kept Simeon in Egypt. He told the brothers that they couldnt have Simeon back unless they sent Benjamin. The brothers went back to Jacob and told him what had happened. They pleaded with Jacob to send Benjamin. After some soul-searching Jacob agreed to the request.

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When Benjamin came to Egypt he didnt recognize Joseph as Joseph. Joseph knew Benjamin. He played some more games with the brothers. He had Benjamin detained. Josephs brother Judah pleaded for Benjamins release. This set the context for the reading we heard. SLIDE Joseph could no longer control himself before all those who stood by him, and he cried out, Send everyone away from me. He wept so loudly that the Egyptians heard it, and the household of Pharaoh heard it Genesis 45:1-2 Weve been having table conversations after the sermon during Sundaes on Wednesday. Were not doing it tonight for time reasons. But if we had, I would have asked you to discuss why you think Joseph wept so loudly. What drove Joseph to cry so loud that people in the next room heard it? The weeping of Joseph wasnt a few small tears coming down his cheeks. It was the wail of a man who had suffered from lack of truth telling and a man who had caused pain when he hid behind his identity. Then Joseph did one of the first healthy acts in this entire story. Joseph asked his brothers to come closer to him. They came closer. Joseph said this:

SLIDE I am your brother, Joseph, whom you sold into Egypt

Genesis 45:4

Joseph told the truth. The power of the secrets was gone. The truth was like a pin that was placed on a balloon. The balloon represented a secret. The longer the secret was kept the larger the balloon became. The only thing that can bust the power of a secretis the open air of the truth. Secrets can destroy families and harm people. Sometimes they arent discovered for years. Im sure that some of us are carrying secrets about our family. I dont know your secrets, I just know how easily secrets are kept. Im not asking you to share your secrets with me. I am

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asking you to do your best to stop giving power to them. Let the air out of the balloon. The way to let the air out of the balloon is to tell the truth. At Chain of Lakes our Purpose is to be an authentic Christian community. One way to be authentic is to always tell the truth. Congregations can keep secrets too. Just as with families they can foster a corrosive power. The cover-up is more often worse than the original secret. I can promise you that as your pastor I will do everything in my power not to keep secrets in our community. I want us to be an authentic Christian community. This is heavy stuff, I get that. Theres another quality thats important to go along with truth telling. Its a second way that we can love families when families are so different. That quality is forgiveness. To love our family we have to be skilled at forgiving. We can learn about this in the story of Joseph. As soon as he told the truth he forgave his brothers. He said this: SLIDE Do not be distressed, or angry with yourselves, because you sold me here; for God sent me before you to preserve life. Genesis 45:5 Joseph went on to tell a long story. He never used the word forgive, but if we push into the story we know that Joseph forgave his brothers. Truth telling without forgiveness does not ensure love. Truth telling and forgiveness does. . Sarah parker is going to preach on forgiveness next Wednesday night. Shes the husband of David Parker, the new pastor at Presbyterian Church of the Way. I know that the church is going to send a delegation to worship that night. I encourage you to come. We cant love fully unless we forgive.

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Lewis Smedes wrote the best books on forgiveness. I encourage you to read his books. One of the best things he wrote is when we forgive we give up our right to get even. When we are hurt we have every right to get even. Our culture outside our doors encourages us to nurse our wounds and then get back at the people who have hurt us no matter what the wound. But even though every muscle in our body might encourage us to get even, God wants us to forgive. Forgiveness doesnt mean we are tolerating what has happened; forgiveness doesnt mean we are putting ourselves sin a situation to be hurt again; forgiveness means we are willing to let go of the pain that we have experienced. It takes tremendous amount of strength and fortitude. I cant imagine forgiveness happening without an active prayer life and a group fo people who encourage us to forgive. Forgiveness isnt for the other person, its for ourselves. Joseph forgave his brothers. They still had some rocky moments during the rest of the story. They experienced reconciliation. . My prayer for our community called Chain of Lakes is we can be a place where forgiveness happens. We will hurt each other and be hurt; not because of who we are, but because we are human. We will be hurt when we come here. I pray that we will encourage each other to forgive, to let go, to experience the wholeness and love that God desires for us. God understands forgiveness at a profound level. The greatest example of forgiveness is when Jesus was about to die on the cross and he offered a prayer of forgiveness to his assassins. God wants us to forgive. The world needs to experience this forgiveness. Were still learning about our new neighborhood. We had a great experience on Monday night in getting to know them. Last night at our worship meeting Dave Nyberg said that we were

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the community on Monday night for the Lakes area. Thats church. I hope that over time that Chain of Lakes can be known as a place where people are encouraged to forgive, that we are place that doesnt encourage each of us to get revenge. Instead we learn how to let go and forgive. Forgiveness and truth-telling. The two can help us love our families when families are so different.