Honoring your father and mother is more than just obedience when you’re a child.  What does it look like to honor our parents in the different seasons of life?

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If you grew up in the church, you more than likely know that one of the ten commandments is to honor your father and mother.  Even if you didn’t grow up in the church, you probably know that.  Until the last few decades, it’s been widely accepted that in most cases, children should obey their parents.  One of the questions we want to look at today is does that mean children are always required to obey their parents?  What if their parents are asking them to do something that is against God’s Word?  What if their parents ask them to do something that could cause them harm or harm to someone else?  Another thing we want to wrestle with is does this honoring our father and mother look the same in all stages of life, or does it change in different seasons?  So we’re going to break it down to obeying your parents when you still live with them, honoring them once you’re out on your own, and how do we honor them in their last stages of life.  

Obedience in the Home

Learning to submit to our parents’ authority is one of the first steps in learning how to submit to God’s authority.  We can respect their position as parents even when their actions are not worthy of honoring.  

Exodus 20:12 12 “Honor your father and mother. Then you will live a long, full life in the land the Lord your God is giving you

• Being obedient to God’s covenant is what would bring them long and peaceful lives in the land God had given them. The parents were charged with passing God’s commandments on to the children.
• We first learn to submit to authority from our parents. Our culture hates the word submission, but as believers, we submit to God’s authority in our lives. 
• Bond Servant analogy
• You can honor the position even if you don’t honor their actions. We must obey God rather than men. 
• Paul’s response to Sanhedrin 
• Acts 23:4-5 Those who were standing near Paul said, “How dare you insult God’s high priest!” 5 Paul replied, “Brothers, I did not realize that he was the high priest; for it is written: ‘Do not speak evil about the ruler of your people.’”

Ephesians 6:1-2 Children, obey your parents because you belong to the Lord,[a] for this is the right thing to do. 2 “Honor your father and mother.” This is the first commandment with a promise: 3 If you honor your father and mother, “things will go well for you, and you will have a long life on the earth.”

• Obey - hypakouō, v. to obey, be obedient; to answer (the door)– obey, obeyed, accepted, answer, obedient
• Honor - timaō, v. to honor, show respect, give recognition– honor, give proper recognition, honored, price set, show proper respect
• Multiple reasons to honor our parents
• We belong to the Lord - learning to submit to authority is a chief responsibility of parents for their children.  It helps us to learn to submit to God’s authority.  
• There is blessing.  Israelites were told it would lead to a long life in the land God was giving them.  

Can Disobey when obedience would result in harm or is against God’s command.

1 Samuel 20:28-34 "Jonathan answered, 'David earnestly asked me for permission to go to Bethlehem. He said, ‘Let me go, because our family is observing a sacrifice in the town and my brother has ordered me to be there. If I have found favor in your eyes, let me get away to see my brothers.’ That is why he has not come to the king’s table.' Saul’s anger flared up at Jonathan and he said to him, 'You son of a perverse and rebellious woman! Don’t I know that you have sided with the son of Jesse to your own shame and to the shame of the mother who bore you? As long as the son of Jesse lives on this earth, neither you nor your kingdom will be established. Now send someone to bring him to me, for he must die!'”

32 “'Why should he be put to death? What has he done?' Jonathan asked his father. But Saul hurled his spear at him to kill him. Then Jonathan knew that his father intended to kill David. Jonathan got up from the table in fierce anger; on that second day of the feast he did not eat, because he was grieved at his father’s shameful treatment of David."

Luke 14:25-27 Large crowds were traveling with Jesus, and turning to them he said: “If anyone comes to me and does not hate father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters—yes, even their own life—such a person cannot be my disciple. And whoever does not carry their cross and follow me cannot be my disciple.

Leave and Cleave 

Men are called to leave and cleave when we marry.  There is a shift and the most important earthly relationship we have is now with our wife.  That relationship needs to take precedence over the relationship with our mom and dad.  

Genesis 2:24 That is why a man leaves his father and mother and is united to his wife, and they become one flesh.

Matthew 19:4-6 “Haven’t you read,” he replied, “that at the beginning the Creator ‘made them male and female,’ and said, ‘For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two will become one flesh’? So they are no longer two, but one flesh. Therefore what God has joined together, let no one separate.”

• Scheduling, holidays
• Parenting
• Take ownership of communicating to your parents, your spouse takes ownership of communication with their parents 

Final Stages 

1 Timothy 5:1-2 "Do not rebuke an older man harshly, but exhort him as if he were your father. Treat younger men as brothers, older women as mothers, and younger women as sisters, with absolute purity."

1 Timothy 5:3-4, 8 "Give proper recognition to those widows who are really in need. But if a widow has children or grandchildren, these should learn first of all to put their religion into practice by caring for their own family and so repaying their parents and grandparents, for this is pleasing to God. Anyone who does not provide for their relatives, and especially for their own household, has denied the faith and is worse than an unbeliever."

• There may come a point where we can’t physically meet their needs. We shouldn’t experience guilt and condemnation when we get assistance. 
• We shouldn’t just automatically pick the solution that is most convenient for us.  What is going to truly honor them?  
• We need to treat our spouse’s parents situation with the same care and thoughtfulness that we do our own situation.  
• Even when we can’t care for them physically, we shouldn’t neglect the emotional and relational care they need.  

Close

• Don’t talk negatively about your parents, write words of encouragement to them
• Most parents are doing the best they know how to do, empathy