What IF the Church Was More Like a Family?

IF the church were more like a family, living as a Christian could be drastically different for the Western church. I picked up When the Church Was a Family, finished chapter one the other day, and my thoughts have been running wild. I have also had some good conversations with friends.
What if you could save hundreds of thousands of dollars a year? If the church were a strong-group family, as possibly intended by Christ, then these dollars may be used for the advancement of the kingdom of God instead of paying your psychologist and pharmacist.
Let me explain.
You and I are individuals raised in a radically individualistic society. Three key questions define who we are. 1)What do we do (job, student, ect.)? 2)Who we are married to (wife or husband)? 3)Where we live (current location)?
Think about it for a minute...(Are you thinking?)...if you get into a conversation with someone to introduce yourself, you typically answer these three questions after, and some times before, you have stated your name.
The most interesting thing is that in being apart of a radically individualistic society (of which you really did not have a choice) has given you and I great freedoms. But, at what cost?
The cost has been dynamic and exorbitant.
A person today has to make decisions about those three questions. This decision making process has caused a drastic increased is the use of psychotherapy and medication to help people cope with the stresses they now encounter because of this dynamic decision making process. People who make these decisions do so with vast amounts of stress added to their emotions and psyche. People experience stress additionally because of the isolated existence they find themselves in while making these decisions. The emotional, psychological, and 'solitude' stresses people experience are causing large amounts of cash to change hands between patients and doctors.
However, when Jesus instituted the church he said it was to be something more like a family than indviduals existing together in a common group playing at church. A family for Jesus was drastically different from families you and I have experience of in our culture. When people in Jesus' time thought of what they would do, who they would marry, and where they would live they did not experience the stress you and I do. They did not experience the stress because they did not have to make those decisions by themselves.
What if the church was like the family Jesus expected it to be?
If the church were more like a family you and I might not be on Prozac. You and I might not have Thursday afternoon appointments to lay on our doctor's' couch and answer question about our childhood (some of us need to do this and others of us are doing it because of 'the stresses of life' we needlessly put ourselves through as Christians).
If the church were more like a family you and I may not have the emotional and psychological struggles we have. We could be collectively dependant on one another in such a way that we bore each other burdens and even helped one another out during the decision making times of life (no room for pride here).
If the church were more like a family the hundreds of thousands of dollars each year spent on psychotherapy and psychotherapy drugs could be used for the advancement of the gospel.
For the church to become more like a family is going to be difficult work. However, we are set apart to be cross-cultural. We are called to be a family of brothers and sisters, bearing each other burdens, and loving each other so that the world will know that God loves us.
The society may not be able to revert back to a strong-group culture but the church needs to find these roots. We are no longer individuals doing our own thing in this world. You and I have crucified the old self and are new creations in Christ. You and I have laid down our self for the advancement of the kingdom via cross bearing (that is if you call yourself Christian).
Are you ready for the church to be more like a family? It begins with you and I with the help of the cross riding ourselves of the concept of self and understanding that our decisions (both God glorifying and sinful) have an impact on the body of Christ, the family of God.