This week in worship we began a new series called Family Values. The series will explore the intersection of television and theology, especially around issues of family. The term “family values” brings up a lot if images, some helpful and some…well, not so helpful. One of my hopes for this series is that we will see values of healthy relationships, with all whom we consider family.

In the first week of the series, we looked at The Pearson Family from the NBC show “This is Us” along with Ephesians 4:1-6 (NRSV). The full text appears at the bottom. Here are three things from this week’s message:

• The letter to the church at Ephesus shows a shift from waiting on the return of Jesus to living together as Christian community. Chapter 4 is less theory and more practice. The values raised for living life together include gentleness, humility, patience, and bearing with one another in love. These are core values that hold relationships together and provide for the unity we seek. We are often hardest on the people we love the most.
• In the scene from This is Us depicting Kate and Toby’s wedding (Season 2, Episode 18) Randall says this as part of his wedding toast, “nobody knows where we will be. What we can control is the people we choose. Choosing our people in the closest we come to controlling our destiny. While everything else may change, if you choose right, your people will stay the same.”The people who walk alongside of us each day are important. We make the choice whether or not to be in relationship with those people and we choose the values that guide those relationships.
• The love that is spoken of and that we see lived out in our most crucial relationships, is a love built on the unselfish concern for others’ well-being. It is the type of love that overcomes anything that seeks to tear us apart. It is loving others in the way that God loves all. It is a love that creates value in a person.

To watch the full worship service, including some pretty powerful music, go to https://youtu.be/echQ6fboRlE and subscribe to our YouTube page while you are there.

Ephesians 4:1-6 (NRSV)

I therefore, the prisoner in the Lord, beg you to lead a life worthy of the calling to which you have been called,with all humility and gentleness, with patience, bearing with one another in love, making every effort to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace. There is one body and one Spirit, just as you were called to the one hope of your calling, one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all, who is above all and through all and in all