Ecclesial Families as Protective and Healing Communities for Children at Risk: Lessons from the Letter to Philemon

Children at risk often grow up in contexts of toxic stress, where their family members can come to a point of near or complete absence in their lives. Children can be left physically alone by caregivers who die or who are overwhelmed by the grind of responsibility, or children can be left psychologically alone in the wake of abuse, neglect, or vicarious trauma. Whatever the reason, when children are left to experience the toxic stress of their environments without reliably supportive relationships, their stress regulation systems can become overwhelmed and they can experience a host of deleterious outcomes. Thankfully, while the role of biological family is critically important in promoting healthy childhood development, other community members can successfully play that protective role of family as well.

As neuroendocrinologist Bruce McEwan explains, “supportive relationships,” even with non-family members, can help create a buffer between the child and their stressors so that the child’s stressors go from being “toxic” to “tolerable.”¹ In this way, McEwan’s research can offer guidance to churches wishing to participate in mission to, for, and with children at risk. What children at risk need more than anything are supportive people who are willing to “wrap around them”²—and, ideally, their families—with compassionate presence, as extended family would in a healthy family system. Put differently, what children at risk need from the church is for the church to be family to them in real and practical ways. Such a role should be natural for the church, since the New Testament describes the church with a variety of familial metaphors. But what does it mean for the church to be family today?

The New Testament authors do not say the church is “family” in a singular way. Rather, they define proper relationships within the church with a host of contextually situated familial metaphors. Some of the familial metaphors used in the New Testament include brotherhood and sisterhood (e.g., Matt 12:46–50; Acts 11:12), adoption (e.g., Rom 8:15; Gal 4:5), fatherhood (e.g., Phlm 10), motherhood (e.g., Gal 4:19–20), heirs (e.g., Gal 3:29; 1 Pet 3:7), joint-heirs (e.g., Rom 8:17), and members of the same household (e.g., Gal 6:10, Eph 2:19). In speaking in such ways, the authors drew from people’s lived experience of family to express to the ecclesial community the new ethical commitments that were required of them as Christ followers. Moreover, though there was flexibility in the metaphors, the idea always remained the same: people within the church community had a responsibility to live lovingly and sacrificially toward one another in real and practical ways now that they were bound together as family in Christ. As a result, old, exclusive ways of relating to one another based on gender, class, ethnicity—and, I would add, age—were no longer to apply. In Christ’s family, every member has been leveled by Jesus’ work on the cross, every member has value and purpose, and every member owes one another a continuing debt of love.

Yet notionally accepting this idea of the church as family and actually behaving as a healthy family system within which children can develop well are two different matters. In what follows, I would like to explore lessons that the very practical letter to Philemon, which is packed with familial language, might offer us regarding the kind of ecclesial families we need to become if we want to offer healing spaces to the children at risk in our midst.          

Philemon: A Case Study in the Liberative Power of Church as Family   

In his letter to Philemon, Paul urges Philemon, a wealthy householder, to make the decision to free his slave Onesimus on the grounds that, through Christ, Onesimus and Philemon should no longer relate as master and slave but as “dearly beloved brothers” (v. 16). According to Paul, Onesimus and Philemon’s connection to Christ required a revision of their former relationship, and that revision was to be more than sentimental. Paul was asking Philemon, in particular, the more socially privileged member of the pair, to engage in the economically costly act of releasing Onesimus from his responsibilities to Philemon’s household in order that Onesimus might become Paul’s coworker in the gospel.

Throughout the letter, Paul makes his case by weaving together language of self-identification with the more vulnerable Onesimus in tandem with the familial language of brotherhood, childhood, and begetting in order to compel Philemon to recognize the transformed relationship that must be forged between Philemon and Onesimus. Accordingly, Paul asks Philemon to recognize that Onesimus is not only Philemon’s beloved brother but that Onesimus is also Paul’s begotten child and Paul’s own “innards” (v. 20)—that is, his very own self.   

In so doing, Paul engages in notable social pressure by making a public and very personal request of Philemon in a letter that would have been read before the entire worshiping community. Moreover, Paul all but assures a favorable response from Philemon by asking Philemon to use his resources to prepare a hospitable welcome for both Onesimus and Paul himself. Nonetheless, throughout, Paul maintains that Philemon must freely choose to release Onesimus rather than being forced into that decision. Paul’s repeated mention of his own “chains” seems to underscore Paul’s identification with the forced slavery of Onesimus over the privileged freedom of Philemon, a freedom that Paul is now asking Philemon to freely give to Onesimus as well. 

Looking at the letter to Philemon in this way suggests that, in our fellowships of faith, we are expected to be deeply bonded together in relationships of love in service to the gospel as beloved sisters and brothers in tangibly practical ways that will necessarily be culturally situated but will also break through culturally conditioned social expectations that create barriers to the full and relationally leveled inclusion of more vulnerable members. Such deeply bonded, countercultural relationships will emphasize the relational bondedness of believers together as family in ways that will also involve an expectation of familial care for one another in practical terms. The following recommendations, then, are meant to constructively create some parameters around how ecclesial families might operate, particularly with children at risk in mind.³

Creating Protective and Healing Communities: Lessons from Philemon

First, in Christ’s family, we are called to voluntarily lay down power and privilege for the sake of our more vulnerable and oppressed family members. This includes, but is not limited to, children at risk. Within ecclesial families, there is to be no lording it over one another. Even Paul’s own posture toward Philemon displays a new way of relating to others as those compelled by love, not force. As such, ecclesial families must continually consider ways in which power imbalances might still exist within the church and work to reform those areas. For instance, one can imagine how long it might have taken Philemon to stop treating Onesimus as a slave. What changes would Philemon have needed to make, mentally and relationally, in order to treat Onesimus as a dearly beloved brother instead?

We must begin asking ourselves the same questions regarding the vulnerable members in our own community, including children at risk. Namely, how have young people’s marginalization outside of the church remained unchanged within the church family? Related to this question, Joyce Mercer, in a chapter called, “What Child is This? Religious Ambivalence Toward Children,” identifies a number of North American cultural views of children that have seeped into the North American church in negative ways.⁴ For instance, she writes about how children are often viewed as “innocent” in ways that disempower them by stripping them of their agency; how they are viewed as consumers to be entertained and placated with programs and productions that do not ultimately nourish their souls; and how they are viewed as weak and innately sinful in ways that encourage adults to “[break] the will of children” in controlling and sometimes abusive ways.

Unfortunately, Mercer’s insights merely scratch the surface of ways in which children are marginalized in the broader global context. What of contexts where young girls are being married off as child brides, or where children are being conscripted as soldiers, or where only males or wealthy children can be educated? What oppressive views of children must be pervasive in a context for such practices to exist? Consequently, since the church has a responsibility to set captives free, the church in every locality must pay attention to the plight of children around them and ask searching questions for themselves.

As such, churches would do well to engage in the following queries: What barriers exist in our context that keep children from reaching the fullness of their God-given potential?⁵ What capacity do we as a congregation have to begin chipping away at those barriers? Within our congregations, are young people given space to speak, belong, and act as dearly beloved brothers and sisters? Are we recognizing them as positive and capable contributors to the ecclesial family? Or are they functionally living at the outskirts of our communities? Would we be willing to flip our ecclesial family practices and resources on their heads in order to place our more vulnerable members at the center? Ultimately, if we view our ecclesial communities as real families, then we have a responsibility to advocate for the well-being of the whole child in the same way biological families are meant to nurture every aspect of a child’s life across the lifespan.

Second, those who have been recognized as more spiritually mature members of the ecclesial family bear an especially greater responsibility, as did Paul, to intervene in any out-of-balance relationships with their very selves as they mentor, guide, protect, and patiently walk with diverse parties through situations of conflict or inequity within and without the ecclesial community. Inasmuch as the language of brotherhood levels, Paul’s mediatory posture as Onesimus’s father recognizes the need for spiritually weighty members to assist the ecclesial family in maintaining a healthy balance. This is important when considering the role of children at risk in our ecclesial families. Children must be treated as equals in the family of Christ while also being treated in developmentally appropriate ways. Specifically, children have a developmentally distinct need for protection and guidance, but also, with each stage of development, they offer the church unique, and often overlooked, gifts and abilities.

Resultantly, at a baseline, churches need to take seriously child protection policies within the church, but they must also make space to listen to the voices of children and young people regarding what they feel they need inside and outside of the church. Children are often intuitive, creative, and willing to share what moves, frustrates, or scares them when they are asked in developmentally appropriate ways. As Paul did with Philemon and Onesimus, those who are leaders in any ecclesial family must make including and responding to the voices and needs of children at risk a critically important task.   

Third, the church’s commitment to the children at risk in their midst cannot remain limited to their lives within the ecclesial family. Rather, in the same way healthy family systems strive to protect and advocate for their children in every aspect of life, ecclesial families should do the same. This will require ecclesial families to listen to the voices of the children in their midst, to observe their gifts and needs, to advocate for them in and out of the church, and to partner with them as they grow and develop across the lifespan. To this end, children at risk in our midst will need the full resources of the ecclesial family at their disposal, especially for those children who have experienced an array of traumas, abandonments, and losses that make their lives complexly difficult. In this way, each ecclesial family will have its own resources to offer. Some will have monetary resources, some will be adept at political organization, while others will be creative in the arts. The power of missional approaches to ecclesiology is that no church is meant to be an exact replica of another. Instead, each church is meant to bring the strengths of all its members, children included, together in partnership with the Holy Spirit to engage the distinct needs and assets of their local communities. Maybe a community needs safe spaces for children to gather, and churches have rooms to spare. Maybe low-income children need trauma-counseling, and a church has licensed therapists willing to donate their services. The possibilities are endless when churches are willing to listen to the Spirit while they also listen to children’s voices.

Fourth, and related to number three, just as Paul asked Philemon to relinquish the “economic asset” of Onesimus his slave, personal resources like money, food, time, and space all matter in ecclesial families. None of us can greedily withhold ourselves or our resources from those among us who are in need and then continue to be in right relationship with God and the community. In an ecclesial family, community members must be willing to take on the social responsibility normally reserved for biological family to provide a safety net for more vulnerable members of the faith fellowship. Learning to cooperate with resources will very often test the limits of the community, but it will also provide opportunities for creativity, accountability, honesty, collaboration, discipline, discernment, and forgiveness. Despite the potential struggles involved, learning to share resources with one another in community seems to be one of the only pathways through which church communities can exist as more than just metaphorical families.

Fifth, ecclesial families will naturally put people into the kinds of relationships where their very lives and hearts will become intertwined with the lives and hearts of others. Such deep bonds naturally open us up to experience the incredible gifts of mutual love, patient endurance, and magnified joy, but conversely, they can also open us up to the potential for pain, frustration, and worry. As such, Paul’s reference to his “innards,” and his request that Philemon “refresh” his “innards,” reminds us that being part of an ecclesial family can affect us viscerally. Consequently, we should not be disheartened by the challenges of ecclesial family life, especially when working with children at risk and their many struggles. Instead, as Paul models for us, when we experience brokenness and pain in our familially-bonded fellowships, we must pursue one another in love, in truth, and in community in order to bring an equitable and edifying resolution. Moreover, we must remember that at times there may be need for strong words, community discipline, and the leveraging of social pressure to bring about change, especially if vulnerable members are being excluded. The example of Paul’s letter to Philemon provides a model of such an encounter with the hope that the relational depth and committedness of the community can withstand the pain of conflict in order to strengthen the community in new ways.   

Finally, within an ecclesial family, each member has a role to play in the “family business” of partnering together for the sake of the gospel. Since each community and context is different, each fellowship will have its own take on what the gospel is and on its particular role to play in the gospel work. Yet each member of the ecclesial family should feel that they have more than a superficial role to play in the work of the gospel in their community. This is especially important for children at risk and other vulnerable members who can easily be relegated to the role of needy receivers. Instead, when the habits of the ecclesial family include space to center the voices, experiences, and gifts of people who are often marginalized, the community itself can grow together in new and healing ways.

In conclusion, the lives and needs of children at risk are complex. Yet when churches commit to the process of becoming healthy family systems for the children at risk and other vulnerable peoples in their midst, the ecclesial family can become a place of stability, hope, protection, nurture, and purpose that provides a buffer to the extreme and destructive stressors many of these young people experience in life. That process is healing not only for the children at risk involved but for the ecclesial community as well.