I’m still perplexed each time I remember that only 8 people ended up in the ark with Noah before God sent the flood. It gets even more worrisome for me to realise that the 8 comprised of himself, his wife, 3 children and 3 daughter in laws. There was no other outsider. Not even extended family members.

We live in a society where we hear often about how no one has us like family and how blood is thicker than water and while I myself have totally subscribed to that, I think we must also remember that in the family of God, in our adoption to sonship and heirship, we must keep same energy, because blood connects us also in the family of God. It’s not random that we refer to ourselves in the kingdom as “Brother” or “Sister”, it’s not an attempt to sound religious, it’s actually our reality, that we now belong to one family and have become related by blood (Jesus blood) and something even more powerful than blood; The Holy Spirit, who dwells in every believer.

We can let the people who lived in the time of Noah off the hook, even though obstinate people, they didn’t share that same connection we have now because Jesus hadn’t been to the cross, there really was no common spirit in all of them.

But honestly, I realised that if a similar situation arose today, maybe only a Noah and his family might end up in the ark again, because everyone will be minding only their ‘family’s business’ and listening to the ‘family plan’. Forgetting that there’s a larger family of God that we should share a similar connection with.

The sentiment of family in the world makes us a bit more quick to act, a bit more desirous to pray, a bit more excited to be there, that same sentiment must cross the border of nuclear family and be evident also in our dealings with the family of God because it is just as valid.

God is growing us in His body to a point where we have the same mindset we have towards our earthly nuclear family to the larger family of God because in the realm of the spirit, it is that way to God. All sons; Brothers and sisters, co-heirs with Jesus.

God isn’t trying to cause any division amongst our family’s today but show us something higher. His word did caution us that “If anyone comes to me and does not hate father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters—yes, even their own life—such a person cannot be my disciple.”
‭‭Luke‬ ‭14:26‬. This scripture shows us a possibility that our sentiment of family can easily grow to become an obstruction to our being Gods true disciples.

God wants us to come to a place where the sentiment of our earthly family becomes secondary to Gods idea of the family of Christ; all of us connected by His spirit.

Maybe the people in Noah’s time didn’t listen because Noah was only a distant cousin or a total stranger, and maybe also, Noah would’ve been more persuasive to the people if they were his sons and daughters too. If he was human like us, his mind might have convinced him that the larger work was done since his family was already safe inside so others really can do what they want.

While the family unit is instrumental to fulfilling Gods purposes here on earth, we must not allow our understanding of it grow to cloud and hinder the reality of our family as believers. We should take the word of fellow believers as we will our biological brothers and sisters. We should act in same alacrity as we would to our sibling when we hear about a brother in church, we should be as gracious to the person in church as we would be to our siblings, and finally and most importantly, we should be just as zealous to see more brothers and sisters come into the fold (the ark) as we are to see our family members saved.

There’s a challenge God is calling us to. One that’ll only be overcome by the Holy Spirit in us. A call to recognise the body of Christ as a family in every sense of the word, because this is exactly what is it before God.