So far in this lesson series, we’ve tried to understand what a godly family should look like. We’ve tried to understand what it means for wives to submit to their husbands and how a husband should love his wife. In this lesson, we’re going to try to understand why it’s important for children to obey and honour their parents.
Most parents want to think nothing but the best about their child. It’s clear that our society is breaking down, and families are breaking up more now than at any time in history. Parents are getting divorced at an alarming rate, and more kids are ending up in gangs and in prison.
When I was younger, if I got caught doing something by a neighbour, the neighbour would always say, ‘I know who your dad is and I’m going to speak to him about this.’ I would usually say ‘sorry’ to them, but ‘please don’t tell my dad’, because I know my dad would punish me for my behaviour.
Nowadays, if a neighbour said that to a kid, the kid would say, ‘Go and tell my dad, he’ll come around and sort you out!’ And so, if there was ever a time for our Christian children to shine, it’s now.
Just like wives love to be reminded that they are to submit to their husbands. Just like husbands love to be reminded that they are to love their wives like Christ loves the church. Children love to be reminded that they are to obey their parents.
Reminding children that they must obey their parents is almost old school these days, because we’ve got to the point in our society where children have almost more rights than their parents.
But whether society accepts this command or not is irrelevant, because God says, ‘it’s right for children to obey their parents’. And the greatest example of an obedient child is Jesus Himself.
Now remember, Mary and Joseph weren’t well off; they were poor, and I’m sure that being poor brought about a lot of financial stress on their family. And like most parents, I doubt very much if they were perfect parents, but nonetheless, Jesus lived obediently under their roof for around thirty years. But let me ask you, is there ever a time when children shouldn’t obey their parents? Notice again what Paul says.
I believe there are times when children shouldn’t obey their parents. For example, if your parents asked you to steal some food from the shop, should you obey them?
If your parents fell away from the Lord, and they asked you to stop attending worship, should you obey them? You see, the Lord is above your parents, and there may come a time when you have to choose between obeying God and obeying your parents. Remember in the Old Testament when Saul asked his son Jonathan to help him kill David?
There are times when children shouldn’t obey their parents. Jonathan refused to help his father to sin. He chose to obey God rather than his father, Saul. And if you, as a child, find yourself in a position where your parents want you to do something which goes against the Lord, then refuse to obey them. I’m not saying it easily, but remember what Jesus says in Matthew.
Now, please don’t misunderstand me, I’m not promoting disobedience here. I’m saying that children should always obey their parents, but not if their parents ask them to do something which is against God’s will. And kids, please understand this very important point: just because you refuse to obey your parents, this doesn’t mean you’re rejecting them as your parents.
If your parents aren’t Christians, or if your parents have separated, that’s not an excuse to drift away from them; you still have to obey them. It simply means you’re just not obeying them in that one area where they want you to do something which you know God wouldn’t agree with.
Now, what does it mean to ‘honour’ your father and mother? The word ‘honour’ basically means ‘heavy,’ which implies that your parents carry some weight in your life. Think about it, your parents brought you into this world, they cared for you, nurtured you, fed you, clothed you, provided for your needs, loved you, kept you safe and watched you grow.
But here’s the thing: it was God Himself who placed your parents over you. And He holds you especially accountable for your relationship with them because they share something of the honour of God Himself.
In other words, every family stems its existence, its concept and its experience from God. We’re in a family and are under a father because God Himself created men and women in His likeness and created marriage and the family. But how do you honour your parents? You listen carefully to their instruction and you take any advice they give you seriously.
I remember when I was younger, I used to think, concerning my parents, ‘Oh, what do they know!’ ‘They don’t understand what it’s like to be in love!’ ‘They don’t understand what peer pressure is all about!’ ‘They just don’t get it!’
And as children, we often forget that our parents were young once, but now that they are older, they have many years of experience in life. They’ve lived longer than you; they made some great choices in life, but also some bad ones.
As children, you need to understand that they don’t want you to make the same mistakes they made; they want you to be wiser and help you to make good decisions in life.
You know, I’ve never hidden my past from our children; they know all about my alcohol and drug problems. They know all about the bad decisions I made in some relationships. But the reason I shared my past with them is that I don’t want them to make the same mistakes as I did.
Mistakes that I still pay the consequences for, even to this day. It’s funny, now that our kids have grown up and one has a child of her own, she said to me not long ago, ‘I now understand what you were trying to teach me when I was younger.’
It was Mark Twain who said the following.
‘I thought my parents were out of it, that they were way behind the times, that they just didn’t get it, but once teenagers grow up and make it through that stage, there develops a new respect for the wisdom of parents.’
And so, not only are kids to honour their parents, listen to their parents and take their advice seriously. Children need to understand that God takes their obedience to their parents seriously, too.
Now I know this seems a bit extreme, but the Bible says that honouring your parents is a life and death choice. Let me ask you, who do you honour? Who carries the most weight in your life?
Thomas Carlyle once said the following.
‘Show me the man you honour, and I will know what kind of man you are.’
When I was younger, I didn’t honour my parents, and most adults could tell I didn’t because of my behaviour. As a kid, I thought I knew it all, and got myself into all kinds of trouble, and that’s because I submitted myself to someone else’s authority.
I guess today we would call it peer pressure; it was my friends who carried the most weight in my life. I wanted to please them more than I wanted to please my parents.
I wanted to get drunk when my friends were getting drunk, and I wanted to get high when my friends were getting high. I dressed like a punk because most of my friends dressed like punks. I smoked and used foul language because my friends smoked and used foul language.
As far as I was concerned, my friends were my family; they carried the most weight in my life. Now, please know I’m not blaming my friends; I was fully responsible for making my own decisions. But as a result of ignoring my parents’ advice, I made an absolute mess of my life.
Who do you honour? Who carries the most weight in your life? For some kids, it’s the media that carries the most weight in their lives. Our televisions and newspapers are filled with adverts telling our children they can’t be happy until they buy the latest product.
We have adverts showing young people hanging out in a bar drinking a certain product of alcohol because they think it’s cool. We have adverts showing half-naked women, telling our young women they should buy this product because they’re worth it.
We have adverts showing young men being surrounded by women, telling our young men that they too can have women lining up to go out with them because they’ll have the Lynx effect.
We have adverts promoting what they call safe sex, just use this brand of condom, and you’ll feel great. We have adverts encouraging our young people to gamble and to take out a loan in less than five minutes.
Someone once said the following.
‘Children are like wet cement. Whatever falls on them makes an impression’.
Let me tell you something, kids, that you may not be aware of. The people selling all these products don’t care about you; all they care about is making money from you. There are companies all over the world making billions of pounds out of people’s addictions, desires and miseries.
Ask yourself, do you think they really care if you end up being an alcoholic? Do you think they really care if you end up thousands of pounds in debt because of gambling or because you can’t afford to pay back a loan?
Listen, the people who carry the most weight in your lives should be your parents. Why? Because they’ve got a personal interest in your wellbeing, they’ve got a personal interest in your soul, and they want you to get to heaven more than anyone else on this planet.
The direction of our lives is determined by whose voice we listen to. Where we spend eternity is determined by whose voice we listen to. You see, in a real sense, listening to your parents is like a training ground for listening to the Lord.
If you won’t listen to parents who know what’s best and want what’s best for you, how can you listen to the Lord who knows what’s best and wants what’s best for you?
Jesus says, He didn’t come to grab your money and wreck your life, and neither do parents who love God and love you. Just like Jesus, your parents want you to have life, and have it to the full. Now let me quickly address an issue which, for some of you, may be a bit sensitive.
There are a lot of kids who have had nothing but negative experiences with their parents. There may be some kids here today who’ve experienced nothing but physical, mental or sexual abuse all their lives. If that’s you, then listen carefully, you have a God who wants to protect you all the days of your life.
There may be some kids here today who’ve heard nothing but things like, ‘you’re a waste of space! You can’t do anything right! You’re good for nothing!’ If that’s you, then listen carefully, you have a God who doesn’t create a waste of space, He understands that we all make mistakes, and He certainly didn’t create you with the ability to do nothing good.
There may be some kids who don’t know their father, or never had a father in their life as a role model. If that’s you, then listen carefully, you have a God who wants to be your Father and wants to treat you like a father should.
Now, let’s be honest here, we often speak about the ungodly behaviour of children, but some parents do some ungodly things too. Maybe your parents had nothing but negative things said to them when they were younger.
Maybe your parents were abused when they were younger, or maybe they never knew their father. I’m not suggesting this as an excuse for the way they treated you because you can’t control other people’s behaviour. But what you can control is the way you deal with your experiences.
Let me ask you a really important question: can you find it in your heart to forgive your parents for their ungodly behaviour, as God found it in His heart to forgive you of your ungodly behaviour? Now that’s a tough question, but you need to understand that the healing from all those past hurts begins when we’re willing to forgive others who’ve hurt us.
I’m not saying this is easy, but Jesus says we have to forgive others in order for us to be forgiven. And so, if you’re struggling to forgive your parents, speak to God about it, ask Him to help you to forgive them. You may not change the attitude of your parents, but God will help you change your attitude towards them.
And I know from experience that God will use all those negative experiences you’ve had to bless others who are or have gone through similar circumstances. Notice the reason Paul gives as to why children should honour their parents.
Out of all the ten commandments, this is the only one which has the promise ‘that it may go well with you and that you may enjoy long life on the earth.’ Now this doesn’t mean that if you honour your parents, you’ll live to one hundred and get a letter from the queen.
There have been some godly people who’ve lived long, and there have been some who’ve died young, despite honouring their parents. After all, Jesus was obedient to His parents, but He still died at thirty-three years of age. So, what does it mean?
Think about this: how many times have your parents said to you, ‘Don’t hang around with those guys!’ How many times have you heard your parents say to you, ‘Stay away from alcohol and drugs!’ How many times have you heard your parents say to you, ‘Don’t have sex with anyone until you’re married!’
Have you ever wondered why your parents give you this kind of advice? The answer is simple: they want things to go well for you; they want you to have a long life.
Too many kid’s lives have come to an end prematurely simply because they haven’t listened to their parents’ advice. They got involved in gangs, they ended up with addictions, they caught a sexually transmitted disease, they had children of their own, and they can’t handle being a parent.
Let me encourage all of you, children, to not only obey your parents but honour them too. Listen to their advice, learn from their experiences and remember, just like God, they want nothing but the best for you.
Let me finish by asking the parents this question, a question which we’re going to try and answer in the next lesson: Do you, as parents, give your children a reason to honour you?