Honor Your Parents

Far too often I have been out and about, and even at work, when I witness children abusing their parents. Even at very early ages. About a year ago, I witnessed a grown man scream at the top of his lungs in the middle of the street, telling his father that he had better pay to get his car out of the tow yard. It got so bad tat we had to bring the father into our office, lock the doors and call the police. Where do you find honor in that?

Have you ever been in the store and been witness to an assault of a young child on their parents because they wanted something they could not have.

I was with my youngest son a few years back when we stopped at the Safeway (I believe it was) anyway, we are standing in line and in front of us was a young mother and her 8 may 10 year old son. He want candy and the mother said no. Well the next thing you know after a tantrum, the boy reached back a punched his mother.

My jaw dropped and my son looked at me and said, dad if that were me, you would have put me through that plate glass window. I agreed and then he laughed and said but then you would have came outside and fixed me up.

On this first Sunday of November, I want to possibly wrap up our series on the ten commandments.

The title of our message is “ Honor Your Parents ”

Our scripture for today is taken from the Book of Exodus Chapter 20 verses 1 thru 17.

Our focal verse is take from verse 12 of this chapter … which focus on the 5th of the ten commandments given by God.

The New King James Version Chapter 20

12 “Honor your father and your mother, that your days may be long upon the land which the LORD your God is giving you.

Background

Let me repeat part of my opening statement .... far to often, children disrespect, abandon or abuse their parents. That may be the way of the world, but it’s not God’s way.

So, How did we get to this point, well let me give you a little history lesson ....

The children of Isreal were slaves in the land of Egypt

They cried to the Lord for relief

The Lord sent Moses to lead them out of this bondage, but Pharoah that he was mightier than God and refuse to let God’s people go. But he finally did.

Moses lead the people out of Egypt along the route the Lord had planned, but there was a sea blocking there exodus. But God again came to their rescue and parted the Red Sea.

It wasn’t long before Moses was called to a meeting with God and a few rules were put in place for the Children of Isreal. But they never got to see them because some of them would rather worship the god of that they created, than the God that created them.

Moses became angry and broke the two tablets of stone that God had written on. Yes, the one’s that God wrote on Himself.

and so it began. Worshiping the gods we created not the God that created us. You know the ones.

money

self indulgent

self worship

disrespect

disobedience

and on and on ....

You know our Father in Heaven put such importance on a child honoring their parents that He brought up the subject in more than just one place in the scriptures, here are just a few.

(Read All Text)

Ephesians 6:1–3 NKJV

1 Children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right. 2 “Honor your father and mother,” which is the first commandment with promise: 3 “that it may be well with you and you may live long on the earth.”

Mark 7:10 NKJV

10 For Moses said, ‘Honor your father and your mother’; and, ‘He who curses father or mother, let him be put to death.’

Mark 7:11 NKJV

11 But you say, ‘If a man says to his father or mother, “Whatever profit you might have received from me is Corban”—’ (that is, a gift to God),

Leviticus 19:2-3

The New King James Version Chapter 19

And the LORD spoke to Moses, saying, 2 “Speak to all the congregation of the children of Israel, and say to them: ‘You shall be holy, for I the LORD your God am holy.

3 ‘Every one of you shall revere his mother and his father, and keep My Sabbaths: I am the LORD your God.

Exodus 21:15 NKJV

15 “And he who strikes his father or his mother shall surely be put to death.

Subject ...

Our world is obsessed with living long and prospering. It is said that one of the things the some of those with lots of money are spending it on Cryonics — being frozen until, get this a cure is found for what ever ales you.

Here’s how cryogenics works: Bodies are preserved through the process of vitrification. An antifreeze agent is added, replacing water in the cells. The tissue is then cooled to -220 degrees Fahrenheit, but instead of crystallizing into ice, the chemicals clump together and become solid, molecularly similar to glass. The new glass form prevents the cells from bursting and, theoretically, holds them in stasis forever.

What is not being told about Cryonics is this ...

1. Human cells may continue to age while cryonically preserved. Although the cryonics process slows down the metabolism of cells, it may not actually slow cell aging. ...

2. It interrupts the natural cycle of life. Death is a natural part of life. ...

3. It may not do anything.

The problem is, they are looking in all the wrong places. Exodus 20:12 and Ephesians 6:1–3 give the clear answer to the individual and national question of survival.

Exodus 20:12 makes it clear that the health of a nation is directly tied to the family. Ephesians 6:1–3 comes at it from a different angle—quality of life.

Paul is not saying that if you live a short life, it is because you did not honor your parents; neither is he saying that if you honor your parents, you are guaranteed a long life. The focus here is on the quality of life. Those who honor their parents enjoy a prosperous life. It is also a promise to a nation.

What does the word honor mean in the Exodus text? The Hebrew word kābēd means “to be heavy, or weighty.” In this text, it means to give weight to our parents, or to honor them.

What’s the Connection?

What is the connection between honoring our parents and living a long and prosperous life as an individual or a nation? The respect of authority!

It is in the home that we first learn to respect authority. If children do not learn to respect authority in the home, they will not respect authority anywhere—school, workplace, government, etc. Pope John Paul II said, “As the family goes, so goes the nation and so goes the whole world in which we live.”

But it has ramifications beyond the school, workplace, and government. If children don’t learn to respect authority in the home, they will not respect God’s authority in their life.

Listen how James Montgomery Boice, the late pastor of Tenth Presbyterian Church, drives home the connection. The dark background of this commandment is to be found in the natural human dislike for authority. That is why the family is so important in God’s economy.

If children are not taught to respect their parents but allowed to get away with disobeying and dishonoring them, later in life they will rebel against other valid forms of authority.

If they disobey their parents, they will disobey the laws of the state.

If they do not respect their parents, they will not respect teachers, those who possess unusual wisdom, elected officials and others.

If they do not honor their parents, they will not honor God.

Is it any wonder that America is in trouble? I want to read from Annie Gottlieb, one of many writers who identifies the Sixties as “the generation that destroyed the American family.” She wrote, and I quote “We might not have been able to tear down the state, but the family was closer.

We could get our hands on it. And . . . we believed that the family was the foundation of the state, as well as the collective state of mind . . . We truly believed that the family had to be torn apart to free love, which alone could heal the damage done when the atom was split to release energy. And the first step was to tear ourselves free from our parents.

Oh yeah, they tore themselves free from their parents, all right, and look where it has gotten us!

God Is Serious

God is serious about this, as made clear in His Word (Ex. 21:15, 17; Deut. 21:18–21; Prov. 30:17; Rom. 1:18, 28–32; Col. 3:20). Honoring our parents is no laughing matter. Our national and individual well-being rises and falls with honoring our parents. This is serious stuff.

Honoring Our Parents

Let’s consider the practical ways we can honor our parents.

1.We obey our parents.

Obey and honor go hand in hand; in fact you can’t have one without the other. Obedience is what we do; honor is the attitude motivating our obedience.

2.We respect our parents.

Leviticus 19:3 commands children to respect their parents. Again what does that look like?

a. We speak kindly to our parents.

b. We speak kindly of our parents.

A little girl was very unhappy because her parents had refused her wishes. That evening her mother was amused to hear her pray, “Please, Lord, don’t give her any more children; she doesn’t know how to treat the ones she’s got now.”

Now, I know someone out there is saying, “But Pastor, you don’t know my parents!” What if your parents don’t act respectable? Respect their God-given position.

3. We listen to our parents’ counsel.

Shaquille O’Neal, one of the most dominant players in the history of the NBA, attributes his success to his father. “Thank God, I listened to my father. I would have been dead otherwise. He raised me the old-fashioned way. He taught me how to play basketball. He taught me about life. He loved me and he whipped me when I needed it. And things have turned out good.”

4. We live wisely (Prov. 10:1).

Proverbs 10:1 {{ Don’t Read}}

Proverbs 10:1 NKJV

1 The proverbs of Solomon: A wise son makes a glad father, But a foolish son is the grief of his mother.

Proverbs 10:1 is attributed to Solomon, himself was the ultimate wise son, receiving and valuing wisdom above all other things (1 Kings 3). When King David saw this heart in his son, it no doubt made him a glad father.

Many of the proverbs work on the principle of contrast. This proverb contrasts the foolish son with the wise son. Ironically, we could say that Solomon ultimately turned out to be a foolish son (1 Kings 11), though it was long after the death of his mother.

Our wisdom or stupidity affects more than ourselves. Wisdom benefits more than the individual, and stupidity grieves more than the individual.

The great Theologian Matthew Pole once wrote this about the phase “the grief of his mother” in Proverbs 10 an 1: “The occasion of her great sorrow, which is decently ascribed to the mothers rather than to the fathers, because their passions are most vehement, and make deepest impression in them.”

5.We forgive our parents.

Ephesians 4: 32 says “And be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, even as God in Christ forgave you.”

Ephesians 4:32 NKJV

32 And be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, even as God in Christ forgave you.

Parents will make many mistakes; and children must learn to forgive them (Eph. 4:32).

6.We care for our parents.

Jesus sternly rebuked the Pharisees for a practice called Corban (Mark 7:9–13). Corban meant that something of material worth had been devoted to God and could not be given even to a needy parent.

Jesus made it clear that it was morally wrong not to care for aging parents.

A good illustration is the story “The Old Man and His Grandson” from Grimm’s Fairy Tales, the story of a very old man who was feeble and nearly blind.

He lived with his spoiled son and the young man’s uppity wife. The couple, disrespectful of the old man’s age and unsympathetic with his trembling hands, were disgusted and scolded him when, at mealtime, he frequently spilled his food.

Finally, they made him sit in the corner on the floor and eat out of a bowl, like a dog.

Now, the couple had a toddler son. One day they saw the boy gathering up bits of wood. “What are you doing, son?” they asked. The little boy said, “I’m making a trough for you,” he answered, “for you to eat out of, when I grow up.”

In shame, the couple began to cry. They brought the aged father back to the table for every meal, and never complained again about his spilled food.

Live Long and Prosper

God has given us the key to national and individual prosperity. It begins when we are but children and continues as we grow old.

Conclusion

Now, I can just hear some of you saying, Pastor, we already raised our kids, and I would say yes you did. But what about your grand kids, or the person that may just be listening to the recording of this message.

Any way, I want to close with this simple message … Obey God’s command and Honor your parents, that you may live long and prosper!