Sermon Tone Analysis

Three weeks ago, our church began a preaching series through 1 Corinthians, a letter written “To The Church.”

If you ordered or received a copy of the study resources for that series, this week is a good week to catch up, if you are behind.

You can access sermon manuscripts on the website, re-listen to preaching there as well, or subscribe to the Southside Sermons Podcast to engage with any material you may have skipped over, and prepare together to make the most of this letter of 1 Corinthians, as we prayerfully apply God’s Word to our own Church assembly.

Today, on this Mother’s Day, we make a short detour away from 1 Corinthians, as we will on a couple of other occasions this year.

Today, we visit our old friend, Matthew — Matthew 15:1-9.

We preached through Matthew’s account of The Sermon on the Mount earlier this year, and picked up several other pericopes as well, especially at Easter.

Today, we hear from Matthew 15:1-9 for a special message on Mother’s Day.

You may ask —

Why preach a special message on Mother’s Day?

Why not keep preaching through 1 Corinthians?

Do we let the calendar dictate our course of preaching in this church?

There is no end of specials days!

Why detour on Mother’s Day?

And the answer is simple:

Mothers are on our mind today, and

God commands that our mothers be honored.

When we as the church show honor, we are placing value on something.

We are saying in our act of honoring, that “this is something important.”

“This is something that carries weight.”

“This is something God values.”

Our children are listening with us today.

Our children need to hear that they are to honor their mothers and that this is important to God!

In this way, this message is for everyone - whether you are a mother or not.

Because this message reveals something that God values and places weight upon.

And we need to know what God says about mothers.

The Church cannot afford to let a godless culture define motherhood for us or for our children.

We will see that the 1 Corinthians church had been influenced greatly by culture in a negative way.

So Paul, as he was moved by the Holy Spirit, spoke to specific issues in Corinth to put them in their right place.

That is what we are doing today.

Our text is not in 1 Corinthians, but this message does remain in the spirit of that letter as we speak to the honoring of our mothers on this Mother’s Day.

Let us prepare now to hear this reading from God’s Word.

Matthew 15:1-9.

Pray

I. Reading of Scripture

This is God’s Word, Amen.

Matthew 15:1-9 “Honor Your Father and Your Mother”

II.

Introduction

A. Introduction to Theme

The title of this message is that command: “Honor Your Father and Your Mother.”

This is one of the oldest commands in the Bible.

It is one of the Ten Commandments!

We often make much of the other commandments, like “do not lie, do not steal, do not murder” - and we say “I don’t do any of those things!”

But, do we honor our parents?

This is the first commandment that has a promise attached to it.

God places value on the role and responsibilities of both the father and mother for their children.

So much so, that when children honor their father and mother, they will live long in the land.

This commandment and associated promise is timeless.

It is not limited to Old Testament Israel, for it is repeated again to the Church in the New Testament.

What does it mean to “honor your father and your mother?”

If you had to explain what this commandment means to yourself, or to your children, your grandchildren, or your neighbor — how would you explain it?

What does it mean to “honor?”

B. Introduction to Text

The word “honor” in Matthew 15:1-9, appears three times.

Once in verse 4, once in verse 6, and once in verse 8.

Each time it appears in these verses, it is not a noun or an adjective.

What that means is, “honor” is not spoken about in these nine verses as a thing, or as a description of a thing.

It is not something that can be purchased, placed in a box, wrapped with paper and decorated with a bow - and given as a thing.

“Here, dear mother, is your honor.”

That is not what it means here — but that is what we tend to think it means.

“Honor,” as it appears In these three occurences, is a verb.

It is an action.

Meaning - there is no honor unless something is done.

There is no honor unless some action is performed.

Think of it this way.

When someone dies, hopefully they have left behind a will.

That will represents that person’s wishes for what will happen with all of his/her possessions.

When the will is followed, that person’s wishes are what?

— Honored.

We say we “honored” their wishes.

We did what they wanted us to do.

This is the kind of “honor” Jesus is speaking about.

The kind of “honor” God commanded for our fathers and our mothers.

The kind of honor Isaiah spoke about as being a form of hypocrisy when it came to this people’s worship of God.

The act of honoring is an act of valuing with both words and works.

It is treating what is honored as having more weight than other things.

Imagine with me a set of scales.

The thing that is honored is heavier.

It has more weight.

That is the essence of the Hebrew word for “honor.”

(see ChALOT).

To put it another way - honoring goes beyond lip service.

Honoring will be in some way, costly.

If it is not costly to us, it is probably not honor.

If we as the Church are to live God’s way, valuing what God values, honoring the people God says to honor, we must be willing to pay the price.

We must honor whom God says to honor whether we think we can afford to or not!

Because if we do not place a value upon it and show that value in our investments, then no one will take notice of how valuable it is to God.

God will bless honor because God has commanded honor — And God always blesses obedience to Him.

It’s time that we, as the Church, re-learn how to honor and get serious about honoring, and to practically put our money, our investments, and our time and efforts into honoring whom God says we are to honor - and I am confident if we do, God will bless us beyond measure.

We watch in confusion as our culture redefines and destroys the concept of a biblical family - how the words “mother and father” are replaced with terms like “birthing parent and non-birthing parent.”

How is this happening?

I suggest this is happening, in part, because God’s people are not honoring fathers and mothers in the way God designed and commanded.

In a way that costs us.

Clearly the price is worth paying if we are to show the world what God values.

III.

Exposition

Matthew presents a problem that the Pharisees and scribes had with Jesus’ disciples.

It wasn’t a problem of theology.

It was a problem of tradition.

Jesus’ disciples were breaking the tradition of the elders.