Deuteronomy 6:7 You shall teach them diligently to your children, and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, when you walk by the way, when you lie down, and when you rise up.
A family is often known as the basic unit of society and this is because of the fact that every other institution has people who are from a family. People in governance, health, a system of worship, education, etc. have families. This means that society is a direct reflection of the family system.
The quality of people in a society is determined by the quality of families we have.
Most, if not all, of the problems in the world today, stem from a rotten family system.
In the opening scripture, Moses was telling the people to teach their children the laws he had received from God. This meant that it was not enough for them to know the laws. The most important thing was to pass that knowledge on to their children. These people were not going to be around forever and so once that knowledge was not passed on to the next generation, that generation was definitely going to live in a way that opposed God’s laws.
Malachi 2:15 Has not the one God made you? You belong to him in body and spirit. And what does the one God seek? Godly offspring. So be on your guard, and do not be unfaithful to the wife of your youth.
God is interested in godly offspring because it will in turn affect the quality of people in the society at large. The devil knows this and that is why there are high divorce rates that make marriage look irrelevant.
Proverbs 29:2 When the righteous are in authority, the people rejoice; But when a wicked man rules, the people groan. Both the righteous and the wicked come from families and once someone becomes a ruler, they influence a wider scope of territory and lives are affected. This goes to also show that once people are raised and taught wrongly in their families, it affects how they lead in a place of power. The quality of the leadership of a society is dependent on the family system. Whoever leads determines how life goes in the particular place where they have influence. The people were admonished to teach their children so that since the children were going to be future leaders, they were going to live life by what they were taught.
In primary school, I remember vividly, what a family was defined as. We were told that a group of people related by blood and marriage was a family. Years later, I see that I don’t have control over who I’m related to by blood but I do have control over who I’m related to by marriage because I get to choose who I marry. This is where it all begins. Because God wants a godly seed, it would all start from who we marry.
The question is: Do I want to reproduce this person I desire to get married to?
When Adam sinned, it affected humankind because people reproduce who they are. Once Adam and Eve sinned, every seed they were going to produce would automatically be sinners without any fault of those who have just been born.
In recent times, many people are so much in a hurry to be attached to someone or be in a relationship that they end up choosing wrongly. The wrong choice may lead to broken homes or toxic families that affect children and then move on to corrupting society at large. It is often said that hurt people hurt people. There are a lot of hurt people in the world today and when you critically examine where that hurt is coming from, it’s from an experience in their families, mostly during childhood. From people who attack the self-esteem of others on social media to people who murder, rape, or struggle deeply with certain addictions you can see that those who raised them left some loopholes.
If people thought more about generations after them, they would be mindful when starting a relationship. Many people suffer things they did nothing to warrant at all because of the choices of their parents. If society would be a better place, it lies in the family system – the way children are raised.
David’s decision to have sex with Bathsheba, another man’s wife, led to a lot of bloodshed among his children. Jacob’s marrying Rachel and Leah created a division between the brothers that caused them to sell Joseph into slavery. Hannah’s vow to God, on the other hand, made Samuel a prophet. Ruth became a part of the genealogy of Jesus because of her loyalty to her mother-in-law and marriage to Boaz.
If you didn’t have the best of parents, ensure you become one and choose someone you can co-parent them with to produce a godly seed.
The Word In Clarity 