Honor Thy Father And Thy Mother... All Year Around (5) Series

ILL. Here is several things you’ll never hear form a parent:

- You know Pumpkin, now that you’re 13, you’ll be ready for un-chaperoned car dates. Won’t that be fun?

- I noticed that all your friends have a certain hostile attitude. I like that.

- Here’s a credit card and the keys to my new car. Go crazy!

Your Mother and I are going away for the weekend. You might want to consider throwing a party.

- Well, I don’t know what’s wrong with your car. Just have it towed to a mechanic and I will pay whatever he asks.

- No son/daughter of mine is going to live under this roof without earrings and tattoos. Let’s go to the tattoo and piercing-saloon for the rest of your body.

- What? You wanna go and get a job? I make plenty of money for you to spend. (http://www.sermoncentral.com/illustrations/sermon-illustration--2535.asp0

Honor your father and your mother… Consider those things:

1. God has given us our parents. We all have biological fathers and mothers. Parents or Step-parents. Others of us have someone who has stood in as a real father or mother and did the “dad” or “mammy” things with us. But we all have a heavenly Father who has demonstrated His love for us… He has accepted us as sons and daughters because He has accepted the work of His Son on our behalf.

2. God has given us instruction on how we are to treat our parents. Read Ex. 20:12. We are told to honor our parents. The word “honor” means to show respect, to reverence, even to hold in awe. What this means to us is that, no matter what our age (since this is a timeless command), we are to treat our fathers with high esteem.

3. We honor God by honoring our parents. This should inspire us to think differently than we have at times. We may have the tendency to be critical if our parents failed us in some way. At the same time, we need to remember that that we did not have been for them perfect son or daughter. So whatever the mistakes of the past, whether they are ours or our parents’, we are to honor them. One of the ways we honor our parents is by listening to them and:

4. Learning from our parents ILL. A young boy was talking to his father about what little boys know and what their fathers know. The boy asked, “Do fathers always know more than their sons?” The boy’s father answered, “Yes.” The boy asked another question. “Who invented telephones?” Alexander Graham Bell,” his father replied. The boy then asked, “If fathers always know more that their sons, then why didn’t Alexander Graham Bell’s father invent the phone?” (Dr.James Dobson - Parenting for eternity, radio program 11.23.08)

5. Respecting Your Elders Looking at the scriptures it begins with Elisha who is the successor to Elijah. He was on his way to a town called Bethel. In this town was a school for prophets.

However the people of this town were not too pleased in having this school for prophets. They wished that the school for the prophets would move to some other town or even not to be in existence.

As Elisha was coming near the town a group of boys around 42; some commentaries even went to call them a group of hoodlums, approached Elisha. And as they approached him they began to tease him and calling him names. They said to him Go on up you baldhead, go on up you baldhead.

Little did they realize just who this man truly was. Little did they realize the relationship that Elisha had with God. Elisha was God’s man.

You better be careful messing around with God’s men and women whom He has set aside for His purpose, because the Bible says in 1 Chronicles 16:22 – “Touch not mine anointed, and do my prophets no harm”.

They teased Elisha by calling him an old bald head and asking him the question of why did he not go up in the chariot of fire into heaven like his successor did who was Elijah.

Elisha, the prophet of God turned and faced the young boys. He immediately called down a curse form the Lord on these boys. Two she-bears, which are female bears that have cubs which are baby bears,came from out of no where from the woods and killed all 42 boys.

The Bible says in Exodus 20:12, Honor your father and your mother, so that you may live long in the land the LORD your God is giving you. Disobedience will shorten your days to live.

HE PROMISE. Now we have a very interesting parenthesis by Paul here; interesting because of the way it is worded. He says, “Honor your father and mother” quoting the 5th commandment given to Moses on Sinai, then says “(which is the first commandment with a promise)”