We still love those who revile us but we have no Spiritual connection and as time passes we also lose the emotional connection.
Sometimes people keep cogitating on what they think is a loss when really it was a gain.
The culture brainwashes us to think we must have a family who loves us as though no one outside the bio family can do that. But we know that born-again believers do love one another and have become our real family for eternity.
Bio family often reviles us but we keep them close anyway because the culture pressures us to do so. They say things like "but he's your brother" as though his character doesn't matter, how he treats you doesn't matter, as long as he has familiar blood running through his veins. This is irrational at best, genetics does not determine who is our brother or sister or whether they will make a supportive friend in Jesus Christ.
How we relate to one another in love and deep concern tells us who is our brothers or sister. In Christ we share the same God living in us Who shed His blood for us, we share the most important thing there is and that is Christ. And, because it is Christ this includes His commands and principles in His Living Word.
Jesus Christ shed all His blood to save anyone who will place their trust in Him. His blood matters, the blood in the veins of humans does not matter.
We can treat with respect everyone we come in contact with but we do not have to make them our close companions. Our dearest companions must be those who love Christ, not just say they do but live as though they would die for Him.
Proverbs 18:24 “A man of many companions may come to ruin, but there is a friend who sticks closer than a brother.”
Our love for the brethren is a passionate love driven by our love for Christ. There is no love like it in the world.
Proverbs 17:17
"A friend loves at all times, and a brother is born for a time of adversity."
John 15:12-13
"My command is this: Love each other as I have loved you. Greater love has no one than this: to lay down one’s life for one’s friends."
Job 16:20-21
"My intercessor is my friend as my eyes pour out tears to God; on behalf of a man he pleads with God as one pleads for a friend."
Notice these verses speak of friendship not family. It is wonderful when a family is a godly friendship but often even most of the time it is not. Bio Family often works against us when our desire is to walk with Christ, obeying His principles and seeking Him in all things in our lives.
Even "Christian" family will come against us when we bring Scripture to bear on a situation in which everyone in the family is supporting the sinful thing rather than God's principles and standards.
Matthew 10:35-36 "…35 For I have come to turn ‘a man against his father, a daughter against her mother, a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law. 36 A man’s enemies will be the members of his own household.’ 37 Anyone who loves his father or mother more than Me is not worthy of Me; anyone who loves his son or daughter more than Me is not worthy of Me;…"
My advice to anyone suffering the loss of family because of our Christianity is to stop grieving over the loss of their friendship and begin praising God for those He sent to be our real brothers and sisters.
Sadly many keep the grieving going for many years when the grieving is producing nothing but discontent and a distraction from what God has called them to do. Let them go and get on with serving Christ and those He has placed in your sphere of influence. There might not be many but there are some and that's enough.
Luke 14:25-27
"25 Now large crowds were going along with Him, and He turned and said to them, 26 “If anyone comes to Me and does not hate his own father, mother, wife, children, brothers, sisters, yes, and even his own life, he cannot be My disciple.
27 Whoever does not carry his own cross and come after Me cannot be My disciple."
