Today's reading from the Chronological OT/NT Reading Plan is Genesis 25-26; Matthew 18:1-20.
What I saw today in the reading wasn't so much a particular verse. Rather, I saw these things:
Abraham had seven sons besides Isaac. Isaac received everything Abraham owned upon his death, but prior to that Abraham "gave gifts to the sons of his concubines and sent them away from his son Isaac to the land of the east."
Ishmael had 12 sons "And they lived in hostility toward all their brothers."
Jacob and Esau were not only brothers, but twins, and yet they were as different as could be - Esau loved hunting and the outdoors and Jacob preferred peace and quiet and stayed among the tents. Consequently, "Isaac, who had a taste for wild game, loved Esau, but Rebekah loved Jacob." Which led to Jacob blackmailing Esau out of his birthright.
Then, of course, you have Cain and Abel from a couple of weeks ago. The very first murder on Earth and it's one brother killing another.
Sibling rivalry is a common thing. We more or less expect our children to fight with each other at least to a certain extent, as we did with our siblings when we were young. Yet at the same time, I try to tell my children, when they've been having "one of those days" where they can't seem to be in the same room for more than two minutes without getting into a scrap of some kind, that their brother/sister is part of their family no matter what - they need to learn to get along and care about each other. Of course this is great practice for being kind, compassionate and thoughtful towards everyone else in their lives as well, but there is something special about siblings.
My sisters and brother and I fought with each other growing up, as I'm sure most people with siblings did. And yet today they are some of my best friends in the world. In particular Rebekah (sorry, Rebekah, hope you don't mind me saying this) who is two years younger than I irritated me beyond all reason when we were kids and teenagers (not saying it was all her fault) and she and I are now as close as I can imagine sisters being. We've often said to each other in the last couple of years "Who do people talk to about this stuff if they don't have sisters?" (I'll leave the stuff up to your imagination.)
I can't imagine my siblings and I not being friends. We still don't always agree about everything, but I can't remember the last time there was an actual "fight" with hurt feelings between any of us. I just assumed that it was because we're all grown-ups now and we've matured to the point where we can get along and love each other without agreeing about everything all the time. Apparently this is not always the case. I've heard a number of instances in the last while of grown siblings who are having or have had disagreements, arguments, fights... whatever you want to call it... and stop speaking to each other. That makes me very sad to hear.
Linking nicely with our Matthew passage today, we have the verses on A Brother Who Sins Against You. "If your brother sins against you, go and show him his fault, just between the two of you. If he listens to you, you have won your brother over. But if he will not listen, take one or two others along, so that 'every matter may be established by the testimony of two or three witnesses.'" Of course this is not talking only about siblings, but brothers and sisters in Christ. I take notice, it doesn't say to talk to the two or three others first, talking behind his or her back. Nor does it say to stew about it for a while or let it grow and fester. Talk to him or her privately. If that doesn't work, bring one or two people along. In other words, don't broadcast it to the general public and cause embarrassment or defensiveness, which is likely to make him or her less receptive to what you have to say. And only if that doesn't work, tell it to the church, who are still the loving Christian family of this person, who (hopefully) have the person's best interests and wellbeing at heart and will seek to correct lovingly.
The Bible says that Jesus had siblings... I wonder... we know almost nothing of Jesus' childhood. Did they argue? Did they wrestle? Did they purposely provoke each other when they thought their parents weren't looking, and then tattle when the other one retaliated? Did Jesus look at a younger sibling and think "Man, what a dork!" Were his siblings envious of him, not only as the oldest (who inherited everything in those days), but because he was different? Could they see, even then, that he was special? Or was he "special" in the way that gets teased, bullied and made fun of? I don't know... what do you think?
Tomorrow's passage: Genesis 27-28; Matthew 18:21-35.
6 comments:
Gah! Again I scheduled it, and again it said DRAFT instead of SCHEDULED and didn't come up when it was supposed to. I'll double-check next time. Sorry!
Thanks Miriam - great insights. Those same verses in the Genesis passage jumped out at me too.
One thing we're instilling in our girls especially is that they are so fortunate to have siblings, especially close in age ones. No matter what happens at school, they will always have someone who will back them up or who they can play with if kids are being mean. This hasn't happened yet, but we're just really trying to teach them that they can be each other's greatest allies.
Of course, minor sibling rivalry is to be expected. When you live with someone you know exactly how to push their buttons and kids have sin in their hearts too, so there will be days where we, as parents, feel like tearing our hair out.
But parents also have a huge responsibility in sibling rivalry. We need to make sure that we are not favouring any child over the other in any way. Not that everything has to be fair (we're teaching our kids that too!). But from the viewpoint of the child they need to see the love equally spread around.
I'm curious too about the family dynamics in Jesus' family!
Good post!
No I don't mind . . .I know I irritated the living daylights out of you, and you got me back ;-)
I've often wondered about Jesus and his siblings as well. Since Jesus was perfect I imagine he didn't do any provoking or retaliating (or secretly calling his brother a dork ;-) but I am very curious as to how the sibling dynamic was affected by Jesus being perfect.
I was just talking about Jesus and His siblings with my mom on the weekend and we wondered the same things. There's just so much about His life we DON'T know!! Except during His ministry, Jesus' brothers seemed to resent Him a little bit and almost seemed embarrassed that He was making the claims and causing he stir He was. But then later, of course, they seem to have had a change of heart, because both James and Jude write letters attesting to the Gospel that ended up in our New Testaments.
I think it's safe to say there was a bit of sibling rivalry in Jesus' family as well. They were, after all, human! Somehow, I think part of the reason we know so little about Jesus during His first 30 years is because His life was quite normal. I guess the other reason would be that the writers of the Gospel only focused on His ministry years, since that was the reason He came.
Interestingly, I have no experience with sibling rivalry, and even with my own daughters, we don't see it a whole lot. People tell me if they're not struggling with it now, they'll REALLY have problems with it when they're older and more vocal/violent! I'm hoping that's not true!!
I love the parallels we're seeing between these Old and New Testament passages. Great post, Miriam!!
We're talking to our boys about some of the same things, Tammy; basically that their other friends they can't be with and see all the time, or some of them they don't see very often at all, but they always have each other to be friends with, so they need to help each other out and take care of each other. We're also teaching them that life isn't always fair, but we love them all the same.
Tammi, you may find that your girls won't fight as much ever because they're a bit further apart in age. My fights with my brother (six years younger than I) were mainly when he didn't want to listen to me when I was babysitting, or he wrecked something of mine, and with Julia (who is 9 years younger than I) there just wasn't anything to fight about. It was mostly Rebekah and I that tangled, being closest in age and having the most in common. Interestingly, that's a big part of what makes us the best of friends now.
Thanks for your insights. I have wondered the same thing about Jesus' siblings and the whole sibling rivalry aspect. I was not close with my sister and we fought ALL the time. Everyone would tell us that when we grew up, things would be different but honestly it really hasn't. We may not be fighting or angry with each other but we are essentially strangers. I envy my own kids and their relationship with each other because they very rarely fight and they genuinely love spending time together. This is so foreign to me because I would never choose to be with my sister. I think as parents we do play a huge role in fostering the relationships between our children and making sure they feel loved equally and to not show favourites. I do think that the favouring of one child does cause some serious issues.
Post a Comment