God and Families
Ardon Hinton

It is hardly possible to give this basic building block of human society more attention than it is due. No institution has filled a more significant role in human history. When families and their related concerns begin to decline, so does their homeland. God knows best, and rejecting His viewpoint is dangerous indeed.

The word "family" in this use of the word includes. such concerns as marriage, bringing up children, responsibility for parents and others, and household management. It provides the very important beginning of a child's education and training. Never doubt that every child is learning something and being trained for living. The teaching and training may be faulty, even ungodly, but certainly it is taking place, day by day.

Another thing you should not doubt is that every family, even if it is reduced to one person, has some influence on the world around it. All people, whether God and the Family (continued from page one)

married themselves or not, should feel obligated to uphold the sanctity of marriage and to work for the preservation and edification of the family.

Although people have family ties by birth or adoption, and thus have family ties even if they never marry, the fact remains that marriage is the source of on-going families. Tampering with God's will regarding marriage results in polluting this vital social stream at its source.

God made His view of marriage known in the fast chapter of the Bible. It is one man and one woman, united in heart and mind in a partnership that cannot be dissolved without the one doing the dissolving being found guilty by God.

Mankind has devised numerous substitutes for the real thing: polygamy, nofault divorce, cohabitation without marriage, no-commitment marriages, same-sex unions, and casual sex outside of marriage. None of these really work. They produce problems for society, downgrade women, create epidemics of some diseases, undermine the nurturing of the next generation, and create a lot of unhappiness. Beyond all this, we must never forget that whenever people violate the system God Himself has established, they offend Him and must suffer the consequences.

New Member
We are pleased to welcome Bill Clayton, who has asked to be identified with the number of saints who worship here at Orange Street. Be sure to meet brother Clayton and make him welcome to the congregation. We will provide his directory information when it becomes available.

Directory Photos Today
Chad and Sabrina Tagtow will be taking photos of members who’s names start with “I” through “P”, TONIGHT in Assembly Room B after the PM services.

Men’s Breakfast
The monthly “Men’s Breakfast” will be hosted this coming Saturday morning (18th) at 8:00 am by the N. Jackson Avenue church of Christ in Bartow. All of our men are invited to attend. There is a sign-up sheet in the foyer if you plan to attend.

If people knew as little about how to handle fire as they do about to handle the Bible, every town in the world would probably burn to the ground tonight.

When a crime is committed, there is a trend by those who defend the criminal and to make the arresting officers or the court the "trouble makers" for the way they handled the arrest or the evidence. This causes some people to forget that the real "trouble maker" is the one who committed the crime in the first place.