Today we are living in a time when the family is under great attack, and the rate of divorce is just as great in the church as outside the church. So many families are broken and need to be healed and restored, many going for years trying to figure out what is wrong and they are too embarrassed to ask for help.

God designed the perfect plan for the family; but if the family you were born into is dysfunctional, the plan was not implemented. God’s plan has always been for the fathers and mothers to teach their children the ways of the Lord. The home should be a divine school where God’s Word and godly principles are taught and lived out on a daily basis. The parents are responsible for establishing a standard of righteousness, and a standard for what is right and wrong.

Where do you start? Start with love. God is love; therefore, the ways of God cannot be learned apart from the love of God. His ways will appear to be just a set of rules; however, a home where love is present is the perfect environment for a child to learn God’s ways. A home that is in alignment with the ways of God is a home that is blessed.

To come into alignment for the full blessings of God, we must come into agreement with Him and learn His ways. When a family has the love of God, even the laws of God will be viewed and embraced as guidelines that ensure God’s blessings. We keep His commandments because we love Him. He, in turn, blesses us because He loves us.

Just as there are laws in the land to keep us safe, there are spiritual laws that God has set to keep us safe. Psalms 74:17 tells us, “It was You who set all the boundaries of the earth....” However, unlike the laws of the land, we are always subject to spiritual laws and will always pay the consequences for breaking those laws.

Spiritual laws are much like natural laws. Take gravity: if a pencil is thrown into the air, it will fall to the ground every time. The same is true with a spiritual law - break it, and the devastating consequences must be paid every time. This is true if we believe in God’s laws - or if we don’t. In fact, it is Satan’s aim to destroy families by destroying the belief in the absoluteness of God’s laws.


The following four spiritual laws are keys that will restore any family:

The Law of Honoring
Deut. 5:16 “Honor your father and mother, as the Lord your God has commanded you, that your days may be prolonged, and that it may go well with you on the land which the Lord your God gives you.” (Ps. 119:1-3; Ps. 19:7-10; Eph 6:2)
To dishonor our parents will bring trouble to our own lives.

The Law of Judging
Matt. 7:1-2 “Do not judge lest you be judged. For in the way you judge, you will be judged; and by your standard of measure, it will be measured to you.”
We judge another because we see in them (speck) what we have in our own life (log). When we pass judgment on the speck, we are also condemned for the log.

The Law of Reaping
Gal. 6:7 “Do not be deceived, God is not mocked; for whatever a man sows, this he will also reap.”
A man reaps what he sows. Sow bitterness, you reap bitterness. Sow anger, you reap anger. Sow joy, you reap joy. Whatever you sow, you will reap. This is much like the natural law: For every action there is an equal but opposite reaction.

The Law of Increase
Hosea 8:7 “For they have sown the wind and they shall reap the whirlwind: it hath no stalk: the bud shall yield no meal: if so be it yield, the strangers shall swallow it up.” (Gal 6:7)

We sow the wind and reap the whirlwind. If bad seed is sown and not immediately unearthed, years later it will produce an entire crop of devastating consequences.

To stop the domino effect, we must first track from the fruit (the behavior that has resulted from breaking God’s laws) all the way back to the root (why and when we first broke God’s laws). No good tree bears bad fruit, nor does a bad tree bear good fruit. (Luke 6:43) Likewise every good tree bears good fruit, but a bad tree bears bad fruit. A good tree cannot bear bad fruit, and a bad tree cannot bear good fruit. Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. Thus, by their fruit you will recognize them. (Matt. 7:17-20)

The only provision for stopping this powerful force is the cross - His sacrificial death and resurrection.

1. Recognize where the laws of God have been broken.
2. “Honor your father and your mother, as the Lord your God has commanded you, so that you may live long and that it may go well with you…” Deut. 5:16
3. Repent of unbelief in the absoluteness of God’s laws. “Blessed is the man who does not walk in the counsel of the wicked or stand in the way of sinners or sit in the seat of mockers. But his delight is in the law of the Lord, and on his law he meditates day and night. He is like a tree planted by streams of water, which yields its fruit in season. Ps. 1:1-3
4. Realign with the Word of God and learn to walk in a new way. “You shall walk in all the way which the Lord your God has commanded you, that you may live, and that you may prolong your days in the land which you shall possess.” Deut. 5:33

When this standard of righteousness has been established in the home, the blessings of God will come.
“Blessed are they that do his commandments, that they may have right to the tree of life and may enter through the gates into the city.” Rev. 22:14

Do the following exercises:

1. From your own life, give an example of the consequences of breaking the laws of God.
2. List the four keys that will restore the family.
3. Identify any reoccurring life patterns – job losses, betrayals by/of friends. Describe personal characteristics which you hated, resented or disliked in the primary people who raised you, and which you now recognize as patterns in your own life.
4. Write out at least three standards of righteousness (what is right and what is wrong) that you would like to establish in your home.

Written by Denise Boggs