Hi, my name is Kathleen Brown and I'm a teacher of 30 years, a children's choir director for 15 years, and the mom of seven wonderful children that my husband and I raised. They are now three doctors, three nurse practitioners, and an entrepreneur in business. I will be speaking today about family and the importance of God's place within this bond through role modeling, family structure, and discipline. Today we will discuss families through Scripture – Matthew 2:13-15, 19-23 – which focuses on the Holy Family of Jesus, Mary, and Joseph.

Families may look different, with different dynamics. Their culture and their traditions and their flavor are as varied as the stars in the sky. Yet the core of the family is the same throughout time, and that is love. Emotional bonding and physical security that one needs to be supportive in order to thrive. The bond of love is taught from family - parent to child -  and the Creator is Love. So, He wants families to have that glue - that cohesion - that love brings. Family is the foundation of human and social well-being. The family is the first bastion of care, culture, and learning.

Jesus was human and divine, and he entered humanity through the love of a family. The family was the simple way that God showed us that He wanted his Son to experience humanness. The Creator wanted the family to model for Jesus, to teach him, to show him expectations, and to guide him as he was young. The Bible shows us how the Creator wanted the Holy Family to model, by accepting the rearing of a child and going through the all the different challenges that parents have in raising children and family.

Role modeling, guiding, and education is how we learn right from wrong. Your family is an example of the Creator's love and expectations of what our Father wanted in children. It was my mom and my grandmom that set me on a path of recognizing the importance of God in my life. Every Sunday, rain or shine, we went to church as a family.

My mom and my grandparents knew that if I was given a routine of regular visits to church on Sunday, then that would become a habit within me. I would then build on the relationship with the Creator through simple things: understanding the Ten Commandments or simple prayers like thank you prayers for things that I wanted – like a bike.  But as I prayed and as I grew, I learned that these talks with God became more than just thank you and blessing prayers.

I especially noticed when my family trusted God as they went through life and as they prayed. And it engaged me. But it was the blending of my own life experiences as I grew that helped me understand the relationship that God, the Creator, had for me. And it instilled in me the relationship that I passed on to my own children.

The Father teaches us that family is the way that we also learn to forgive each other - compassion and sharing and responsibility through discipline and expectations that we show as parents within our home. Our siblings learn to share for each other. We learn to deal with trials and disappointments and taking care of each other.

Now my mom is 91 and I am her caretaker and my family sees how I take care of her, and we are all focused on trying to now change into that way of life.

Families are pulled in many more different directions and places than they were when Jesus was coming up. Our hectic lives pull us away from the focus of God and love. In a recent 2025 poll, only 20% of adults attend church weekly and about 40% attend church monthly. Although God gives us choices to do what we want in life, one of His main focuses and of course the first Commandments have to do with honoring him and obeying him, especially on the Sabbath. This means putting other things aside. Without the activities of church and congregational engagement and support other outside influences and influencers become our new attention, our new focus, and we become disinterested in the values and the practices that a spiritual routine will bring in our daily lives. Church families bring understanding of God and the compassion towards others, and positive mindset towards life.

The family structure is necessary for a holistic balance and the ability to inspire yourself as well as others. The most important commandment is to love your brother, and the Creator uses the family to teach us that love is learned through the family. My seven, although they're now in their 30s and their 40s, still bring joy to me as I now see them raising their own children. They are all married except for one. And they deal with life's ups and downs and the challenges and responsibilities that we all have, even the regrets. But I see them passing on that same love that I gave them. Or I should say, my husband that I gave them, gave them. And God gave us the patience, the cooperation – the honest, tough love that was given to me by my parents I now give to them.

Family is the closest measure to God. It's a day-to-day prayer and interactive relationship that shows the Creator's love to us through Him. Never take your family for granted. Although there are moments of dysfunction, as we all have in our relationships, it was meant by the Father, the Creator, for us to have this unit so that we can become closer to Him as we interact with each other and then take it out into our world.