Family Discussion Time

It was my daughters birthday this weekend and we had a meal with her and her husband on Friday night. It was a real blessing having all the family there enjoying a lovely meal and some good conversation.

Actually our family can have some very lively discussions, we can get intense and immersed in our point of view. Our daughters (new) husband comes from a different kind of family without brothers and sisters to add to intensity of a good discussion. He is very quickly adjusting to our style.

Well, we started talking about how we stand up and express our Christian convictions. Is it better to stay in the background or to stand up and be noticed by society, even if they get offended by either our message or style. The issue was illustrated by the recent Destiny Church protest in Wellington. The great thing is we have people arguing both sides.

The discussion then moved onto creation and if a Christian can except a role for evolution or the 'Big bang theory'. I'm not sure how it got there!

The discussions in themselves were not so important, it was more that we were able to talk about our understanding of Christian faith in an open and honest manner. At least the family was trying to grapple with issues of faith and what does God's word say about these things.

What does our faith look like to those around us, how are we relating to non-believers especially those folks that are often ostracised by the Christian community. The Homosexual community was one we talked about. Why is it that we are seen to be haters of Homosexual people? How do we say that we actually love the people but hate the sin? Does a protest against the activity send out the right message, are we making friends of people who are homosexual or do we belong to organisations like the AIDS Foundation?

We must examine very carefully what our words sound like and what our actions look like because as sure as not the media and other groups will take them out of context.

So I think we all ended our discussion on good terms and hopefully it will lead us back to scripture and see what the heart beat of God is on the real issues.