The Bible is full of examples of God working His will and story even through and despite severe human problems, failures, and downright purposeful immorality. For this post I’d like to talk about family dysfunction. Sometimes things turn out well and sometimes they don’t, but either way, God is still there with us.
Abraham took Sarah’s maidservant, Hagar, as a wife and surrogate, at Sarah’s request (Genesis 16:1-3). This was not part of God’s design for and promise to Abraham. When Hagar became pregnant, this caused a lot of jealousy and bitterness between her and Sarah. The situation got so bad that Hagar ran away. God sent her a messenger on the way and told her to go back, telling her that He would bless her son, Ishmael. In this interaction, Hagar realized that God could see what she was going through, and that comforted her (Genesis 16:4-16).
Even after the son of God’s promise, Isaac, was born from Sarah herself (Genesis 17:15-22; 21:1-7), the situation didn’t improve. As Ishmael grew older, things got so bad between one “side” of the family and the other, that Abraham had to send Hagar and Ishmael away (Genesis 21:8-14). But God still looked after Hagar and Ishmael, and He spoke to Hagar again to let her know He was still there (Genesis 21:15-21). Though Ishmael didn’t grow up to be the sweetest man you’ve ever met, God still kept His promise.
Isaac grew up to have twin sons, Jacob and Esau (Genesis 25:21-28). Esau was the first-born, but was dealt out of that birthright by Jacob when Esau decided his birthright wasn’t that valuable and sold it (Genesis 25:29-34). Later on Jacob cheated Esau out of his blessing with mom’s help to trick dad. Esau grew so angry that he planned to kill Jacob, so Jacob left home for a while to visit his uncle and other family (Genesis 27:1-28:5). While there, his own uncle cheated him several times, and Jacob ended up with two wives, one he didn’t even want (Genesis 29:13-30). Because one was obviously favored and because they were sisters, things didn’t go well. A baby war soon started as the sisters did what they could to have children and endear themselves to Jacob, and they even had Jacob take their handmaidens as concubines and surrogates (Genesis 29:31-30:24). But throughout it all, God was still working on Jacob and his family, teaching them about trusting Him. God kept Jacob safe from his angry uncle (Genesis 31), and appeared to him on his way back home (Genesis 32:1-2). Jacob talked to God on the way back home about his fears over meeting with Esau again (Genesis 32:3-12). After making preparations and sending gifts ahead of him, Jacob stayed behind for a bit and ended up wrestling with God, who affirmed him with a blessing (Genesis 32:22-20). God seems to have been working with Esau while Jacob was gone, since he meets Jacob like he missed his brother, hugging him intensely and weeping (Genesis 33:1-4). Though the reunion doesn’t quite allay all fears and restore much trust, there was no animosity between the brothers now, and they went their own ways (Genesis 33:5-17).
I was going to put a few more dysfunctional family summaries in this post, but it would get way too long. Suffice it to say that whatever is going on with you and yours, God can still work with that. Your life and your family don’t have to be perfect or even pretty good for God to do what He plans to do. If you’ll let Him, God will walk right alongside you. Things may not always clear up the way you’d like, but God will never waste a moment of your mess.
Related:
Just Right Is Not Necessary
God Doesn’t Waste the Wilderness
Struggling with Expecting God’s Goodness