him Father.

If we sum up all the teachings of Jesus and separate them from our
preconceptions of their theological content, we cannot but be impressed
with the facts that he seized upon the family life as the best
expression of the highest relationships; that he pointed to a purified
family life, in which spiritual aims would dominate, as the best
expression of ideal relationships among his followers; and that he
glorified marriage and really made the family the great, divine,
sacramental institution of human society.

We can hardly overestimate the importance of such teaching to the
character of the family. The early Christians not only accepted Jesus as
their teacher and savior; they took their family life as the opportunity
to show what the Kingdom of God, the ideal society, was like. Family
life was consecrated. Men and women belonged to the new order with
their whole households. Religion became largely a family matter. The
worship that had been confined to the temple now made an altar in every
home and a holy of holies in the midst of every family. The scriptures
that belonged to the synagogue now belonged in the home. Above all, this
family existed for the purposes taught by Jesus, that men might grow in
brotherhood toward the likeness of the divine Fatherhood. It was an
institution, not for economic purpose of food and shelter, not for
personal ends of passion or pride, but for spiritual purpose, for the
growth of persons, especially the young in the home, in character, into
"the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ."

Christianity is essentially a religion of ideal family life. It
conceives of human society, not in terms of a monarchy with a king and
subjects, but in terms of a family with a great all-Father and his