Answer

What If I Can't Explain What I Believe About the Family?

Someone asked you a question about marriage or family and you froze, or you answered and it came out badly, and you have been replaying it since. That is a common and uncomfortable place to be, and it is not a sign that your belief is thin.

Then you are qualified. God has never required eloquence from His witnesses. Scripture is largely a record of frightened, inarticulate people being given words, and the requirement in every case is willingness rather than fluency.

Eternal Truths

God has always called people who said they could not speak. Moses told the Lord he was slow of speech and was told to go anyway, with a promise to be taught what to say (Exodus 4:10-12). Jeremiah said he was a child (Jeremiah 1:6-9). Enoch said he was slow of speech and that all the people hated him, and the Lord sent him (Moses 6:31-34).

What you are asked to give is a reason for your hope, not a defence of everything. Peter asked the Saints to be ready to give an answer for the hope that is in them, with meekness (1 Peter 3:15). You have a hope. You are not required to have a complete apologetic.

The Proclamation asks less of you than you think. Its final paragraph calls on responsible citizens and officers of government to promote measures designed to maintain and strengthen the family (The Family: A Proclamation to the World). Promoting is mostly living it and saying so when asked. It does not say win arguments.

What Can Make This Confusing?

The fear is usually about you rather than about them. Underneath “what if I say it badly” is often “what if I look foolish”. That is worth naming because it is answerable: you probably will look foolish at some point, and it will matter far less than it currently seems to. Marie Madeline Cardon, a teenage girl who faced a mob in the Italian Alps, said the words she spoke were not her own. Nobody remembers whether she was articulate.

Questions to Think About

• What do I actually believe about the family, in one sentence, in my own words?
• Am I afraid of being wrong, or afraid of being embarrassed?
• What is the question I most dread being asked, and have I ever looked up the answer?

What You Can Do

Write two sentences this week: what you believe about the family, and why it matters to you. Say them out loud until they sound like you talking rather than a lesson. Then practise the other complete answer, which is “I don’t know, but I can find out.” It is far more credible than an improvised one. The essay behind this answer goes further.

Jesus Christ gives words to people who show up without them, and He has been doing it since Moses stood there listing his disqualifications.