God gives Adam a family
At humanity's earliest beginning, there was only one human being, Adam. As a single male, living alone, with no other human being around to share his life, he was not in what His Creator considered a good environment for him (Genesis 2:18). In resolving this problem, God gave Adam a family that included one wife, Eve, and, later, sons and daughters (Genesis 5:4).
God's intent for the children of Adam and Eve was that, as they grew up, they would marry and form new families. As God said: "Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and they shall become one flesh" (Genesis 2:24). God wants people who marry to stay married. He hates to see divorce—for a husband or wife to leave and divide the family (Malachi 2:16). Further, God, in the Seventh Commandment, forbids adultery (Exodus 20:14), an important safeguard for protecting family relationships.
From the instructions He gave, it is clear that God wanted marriages—and the families created by them—to last. Surprisingly, however, God's purpose in demanding stable families is for far more than just providing immediate happiness.

What marriage teaches us
In writing to the church at Ephesus, the apostle Paul told husbands and wives to love each other and treat each other respectfully—just as Christ treats the Church. In concluding his discussion on marriage, Paul then made an astonishing statement: "This is a great mystery, but (in speaking of marriage here) I speak concerning Christ and the church" (Ephesians 5:32). Previously, in this same letter, Paul spoke of God the Father having a "family in heaven and earth" (Ephesians 3:15).
Paul explained that the human family is similar to our spiritual relationship with Christ. In this analogy, Jesus is the Husband, the Head of the Church (Ephesians 5:23), and the Church is the wife, the Bride (Revelation 21:9). Jesus died to make it possible for us to become part of God's family (John 1:12; Romans 8:14,19). This has been God's purpose and plan from the beginning.
Just as God intended marriage to be a relationship of continuity and trust, so should our relationship with Christ be. In His relationship with the Church, Jesus will never abandon the Bride He deeply loves or betray that relationship (Hebrews 13:5; 2Thessalonians 3:3). His Bride, the Church, is to be composed of individuals who are likewise faithful (Revelation 2:10; 17:14). God's eternal spiritual family will not be a temporary, disposable relationship.
A human marriage built on the same principle of trust gives its participants a small taste of this relationship with Christ. Family, as designed by God with inherent trust and happiness, was planned to give us a foretaste of an even greater relationship with God in His future kingdom.

Foretaste of our spiritual family
Given that families serve as workshops for insight into spiritual principles, how can we fulfill God's desires for us in our families?

For starters, we can obey the Fifth Commandment, which tells us to honor our parents (Exodus 20:12). In learning to honor our physical parents, we indirectly learn to honor our spiritual Father.
If we are blessed with parents who love each other and are faithfully committed to each other, we see firsthand how to build and sustain mutual respect and love for others. Such families are safe harbors in a dangerous world of false values, deception and misinformation. The coming Kingdom of God, in the simplest of terms, is a large, happy family that will last forever.