Asbury Church

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

At the very least, it means to be grateful that the Lord used them to give you life. Procreation is a partnership with the Lord; obviously, a man and a woman have to come together for there to be conception, but it’s God who makes life possible. The Lord has delegated power to fathers and mothers to make procreation possible. So, every human life is a product of what the Bible calls the “one flesh” union between a father and a mother. There are no people who do not have both a biological father and a biological mother.

Now, many people don’t know their biological parents for many reasons, and many other people had parents who were abusive or even evil. And yet, the basic fact is the same: none of us would be here were it not for our parents (and their parents, and their parents, etc.).

So, honoring your father and mother must always start with gratitude that the Lord used them to give your life. It can be more than that, but it’s not less. And gratitude is always a good place to start.

P.S. As the Apostle Paul wrote to the church in Ephesus (Ephesians 6:2-3), this is the first commandment with a promise. Do this, and things will go well for you.

On the face of it, the utility of the Sabbath Command seems relatively obvious: it’s good to take a weekly day of rest. “All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy.” That kind of thing.

But I think that’s exactly backwards—I’m convinced that thinking of the sabbath day as a day of rest is missing the point.

Of all the commandments, maybe the Sabbath Command is the one that we ignore the most, which means for us in our day, it might be the most misunderstood and the most important.

Here’s the key to understanding Commandment #4:

Sabbath means “stop.”

Let’s talk about it.

Tim Tennent, President of Asbury Theological Seminary, preached at Asbury Church on Sunday, April 28, 2024 about the last chapter of John’s Gospel.

What if you had a low-level carbon monoxide leak in your bedroom?

A significant amount of carbon monoxide would obviously kill you immediately; exposure to a low-level leak would make you sick with mysterious symptoms, the cause of which might take a while to pinpoint.

Can you imagine how bad something like that would be? You’d be sick, but unable to immediately find the cause.

This is what idolatry is like—it always leads to spiritual sickness—anxiety, anger, negativity, depression, discontentment, loneliness, etc.—but the root cause is often hard for us to see.

This week, we continue our Ten Commandments sermon series by looking at the Second Commandment:

Don’t make things into idols.

Let’s talk about how to practically identify—and then destroy—the idols in our lives, idols that we may not even be aware have a hold on us.

The Ten Commandments aren’t rules we have to obey.

Rather, they are guiding lights we *get* to follow.

At Mount Sinai, the Lord gives the Israelites the Ten so that they can live well and be an example to the nations.

These Ten principles are still rules for life that the Lord has given us, and #1 is the foundation:

Put the Lord first and serve only him.

Let’s talk practically how to do that.

Our lives changed drastically in 2020—do you remember how everything affected you and the people you love? Churches were forced virtual, businesses shut down, and lives were lost. How did you make it through? Was there grumbling? How did the Lord deliver you? Do you remember?

In the Scriptures, we see God do a mighty work to bring the Israelites out of Egypt, through the Red Sea. They celebrate the miraculous deliverance of the Lord, and are then faced with a trial. That trial leads to questioning. Do you remember what the Lord did next?

We are not much different from the Israelites we read about in Exodus, are we?

We are spiritually sick in America these days. We are sick because we lack hope in the future; without hope, life is not possible.

The signs of the sickness are all around us:

In our paralyzed creative culture. Haven’t you wondered why no one makes any original movies any more?

In the despair among our young people. Our young adults have less hope in the future than any generation in the last 50 years.

In the staggering increase recently in hospitalizations for girls and young women for incidents of self harm.

It’s hard to see things getting better any time soon.

But the good news is that no one—literally no one—expected what happened that first Easter Sunday.

The women went to the tomb expecting death and instead they received the greatest news in history: He Has Risen!

Jesus Christ is risen from the dead, which means that there is ALWAYS hope. (Even when you can’t see it.)

We conclude our series on the Plagues, the Passover, and the Parting of the Sea by looking at the moment when Israel finds itself trapped between the sea and slaughter by Pharaoh's advancing chariots.

Moses reminds the people that the Lord will fight for them. That's, of course, true (as we see when the waters part).

BUT, God also then tells the people to 'go forward.'

This is what it looks like to refuse to play the victim.

In Exodus, God is constantly moving in miraculous ways to defend and deliver the Israelites.

No matter how many times God moves, the next time they face an obstacle they doubt and despair.

Why are the Israelites so quick to forget what God has done for them?

If we are honest, we are so often like the Israelites.

Is there anything we can do to walk with greater faith during difficult circumstances?

Can remembering what God has already done for us help us walk in faith and hope in these present trials?

Even the most casual reader of Exodus will wonder:

Why does the Lord harden Pharaoh's heart?

How is that fair to Pharaoh?

A close reading of Exodus chapters 4-14 will help answer those questions, but honestly the question I'm more interested in is this:

What about the state of my heart? What is going to keep me from becoming as stubborn and stiff-necked as Pharaoh?

Why are so many people stubbornly walking right to their own destruction?