The Fifth Commandment

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Preacher: Ross Macdonald Scripture: Exodus 20:12

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We took a little bit of a hiatus as we extended our time on the Fourth Commandment, but it was refreshing to get back into Watson this week, at least for me, if for no one else.
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And I'm especially appreciative of the fact that he saw that the heart of the Fifth Commandment goes well beyond the confines of the family, that the honor that God desires for a mother and a father to be shown is illustrative of the kind of honor that we show to any in authority.
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And then also he showed how those in authority have obligations to regard and honor those under their authority.
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And so there's an interdependence of honor that's expressed in this commandment.
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And all these things that were so helpfully put out by Watson, I hope that some of them we can consider together tonight as we convene again to have some open forum discussion about applying this commandment to our lives.
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But this morning, as we look at the commandment together here, I really want to focus more on the household and on the family.
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So I'll have some more to say, I think in some ways it'll go broader than that, but really, as broad as the
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Fifth Commandment is, I leave to Watson and perhaps a discussion later on tonight. Honor your father and your mother, that your days may be long upon the land which the
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Lord, your God, is giving you. This is the first of the commandments that deals with human to human relationships, rather than human to God relationships.
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We set that out last week when we considered the difference between the first table and the second table. And the Fifth Commandment is the head of the second table.
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The honoring of parents was not merely a matter of social relationships, of course. As we said, you don't get the second table unless you have the first.
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This indeed was part of one's honor to God. If you honor God, the natural outflow of that honor would be that you would honor all that God has given to you, all that God has put over you.
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You would honor your mother and your father. And of course, God attaches a promise to this commandment.
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And the promise is with immediate reference to the people of Israel. In fact, this forms what we call an inclusio with verse 2.
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Verse 2, we have the Lord who brought them into this land. And then here in verse 12, we have that your days may be long upon the land.
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So that forms a sort of unit between the first and the fifth commandment.
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But at the same time, we recognize that this promise was meant to be an encouragement. It highlights how important this commandment is to God.
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It's near his very heart. It's enough for God just to say, honor your father and your mother, full stop.
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But in order to encourage our obedience to this all -important command, he gives a promise. That your days may be long upon the land which the
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Lord your God is giving you. Now that land, with immediate reference again, is the land of Canaan.
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It was that land into which Israel was brought. But of course, this is a foreshadowing. It's a type of that great promise of the land that we will one day inhabit, where we will be in the presence of God, never to be removed again.
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Israel was dragged away as Adam was dragged away, because of their disobedience. The Heavenly Father had given a command to Adam.
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Adam disregarded that command, disobeyed his Heavenly Father, broke the command, refused to honor
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God, and therefore he was dragged out of Eden, forbidden to return to the presence of God.
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Here, Israel, God's son, is brought into this land that the Lord God has given to them. They're given this same condition.
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They must obey all that God has commanded. They must not do what Adam had done and broken the covenant and dishonored
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God. Otherwise, they'll be taken from the land. Of course, that has immediate reference to the law here and the covenant being made at Sinai between God and the
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Israelites. Leviticus 19, we have these things held together. The Lord spoke to Moses saying,
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Speak to all the congregation of the children of Israel. Say to them, You shall be holy, for I the
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Lord your God am holy. Every one of you shall revere his mother and his father and keep my
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Sabbaths. I am the Lord your God. You see how we have the second table and the first table held together.
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I am the Lord your God. You shall be holy as I am holy. You shall have no other gods before me.
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You shall honor your mother and your father. You shall revere them. You shall keep my Sabbaths. So the captivity, in part, was brought about when
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God's people were dragged away from the land of promise, brought into the captivity of the
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Babylonians. This was in part because of their disobedience to these commands. Ezekiel 22 says as much.
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In you, God says, they've made light of father and mother. Rather than revere, they've made light.
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They've rolled their eyes. They've disregarded. In your midst, they've oppressed the stranger. In you, they've mistreated the fatherless and the widow.
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You've despised my holy things. You've profaned my Sabbaths. What's the result of that in Ezekiel 22?
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I'm going to scatter you among the nations. No longer will you be in this land with my dwelling presence.
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Rather, you'll be scattered all about. You'll be taken away from my presence from the land. So you see how important this command is.
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To break this command is to break down God's intention for humanity. To break the fifth commandment is to express the breakdown of human society.
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This is why Arcanicism, and Watson was so good at elaborating on this, it requires much more than just honor to your parents, than just filial respect.
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The fifth commandment we read requires the preserving of the honor and performing the duties belonging to everyone.
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And there are several places in relations, whether superiors, inferiors, or equals. So, first point here this morning, there is authority for all.
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There is authority for all. There is no human being you will ever encounter that is not under authority.
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We are all under authority. Paul makes this point crystal clear in 1 Corinthians 11 as he's speaking to the matter of headship at the church in Corinth.
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And he says that man is the head of woman, and Christ is the head of man, and God is the head of Christ.
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So speaking to Christ in His state of humiliation. So authority is inescapable.
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We are all men under authority. Mankind is under the authority of God. And the fifth commandment is specifically about authority.
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The fifth commandment is about authority. Cornelius Van Til, I only recently came across his exposition of the
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Ten Commandments. I'm glad I found it. Very important reformed thinker, professor of apologetics at Westminster when it was newly minted, and in some ways the purveyor of all things bavink to the
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English -speaking world, which has been a boon. So Cornelius Van Til, and he says of the fifth commandment, it's not limited to the family life, but involves the general question of authority wherever it appears.
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Wherever there is a relation of authority, here you have the fifth commandment binding you. The family is the unit from which all of society is built, and for this reason the family is mentioned in the fifth commandment.
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In other words, the seed of human society is the family. It's the household.
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He elaborates what would have happened in the fall, sorry, prior to the fall in Eden, if man had never sinned, but man was being fruitful and multiplying.
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What would the result be? Would you have 800 ,000 autonomous family units? No, naturally you would have a certain form of hierarchy.
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You would have captains of tens and of thousands and so forth. You would have elders, as it were. Even in an unfallen society, you would have a structure of authority, which is to say the family unit is the seed of human society.
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As goes the household, so goes the nation. That's what Van Til's point is. And he says society is suffering from the neglect of the creation ordinances of God.
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Sin has affected and distorted all of these dynamics. What is the result of the fall?
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A curse upon man's labor. A curse upon man's marriage. Enmity between father and son.
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Between brother and brother. The household is completely broken down as a result of sin.
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All that God intended for man and woman to be as His image bearers, shown forth in the production of families and therefore of societies, to bring
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His glory to the very ends of the earth, sin distorts and turns back, undermines and hollows out.
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Which means this, only by the redemption of Jesus Christ can you even begin to understand what proper authority is.
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Redemption shows us the right authority that belongs to God and therefore all lesser authorities under Him.
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In other words, grace restores nature. Grace restores nature.
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We understand human nature and the nature of human authority when we understand by God's grace what
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His intention for humanity is. So in the body of believers, in other words, those who confess and live their lives according to the law of Christ, in the body of believers, you actually have the sketch, the hint, the foreshadowing of what human society was always intended to be.
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Now sadly, sin has affected us and we find the same breakdowns within that we find without. But within at least you have the potential and by the sanctifying
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Spirit of God you will have the fruit of human society as it was intended to be. No wonder we're called the household of God as a church of believers.
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Brothers and sisters, God renewing that original family of mankind as it was intended to be through the work of Christ by His Spirit.
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Christ, this is Van Til, Christ is already King of the nations whether they recognize it or not.
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It's therefore the business of the church to maintain strictly His authority and to preach the true concept of authority for all society.
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That is our business. We show forth the right authority of God and what that means for all other human authority.
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We show that in practice as a church and we preach that and live that out in society.
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The fifth commandment draws us to consider God's design, in other words, for society and therefore for the family.
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As goes the household, so goes the nation. A family needs authority to fulfill its purpose.
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A family needs authority to fulfill its purpose. This was true even before sin entered the world. Sin just frustrated this, set it on edge, set it against and undermined it.
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But a family still needs authority in order to fulfill its purpose. There must be unity.
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There must be harmony within a family. But the husband is called to be the authority in his household.
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He's to exercise his authority unto God and to the good of his wife and the good of his children.
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You see how God sets the tone for the exercise of all authority. A husband is given authority to God and he's required by God to exercise that authority unto the glory of God and unto the good of his wife and children.
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Insofar as a man is self -serving and unto himself, he is usurping the authority that God has given him.
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Likewise, a wife is called by God to honor her husband in submission to God and for the good of her husband and the good of her children.
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And to the degree that she seeks to rest away from God's ordained role, she'll be the source of misery in her household, misery and sourness in her marriage.
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And she will rob God of the glory due his name. And children, called by God to honor both father and mother in all respects unto the
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Lord as God has desired. The fall, of course, has tainted this design, rendering husbands to be passive, neglectful on the one hand or tyrannical on the other, self -serving, rendering wives to usurp and grate against God's good design for their marriage, rendering children to be resentful, unthankful, disobedient, neglectful of their parents.
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This is a result of sin. And so the fifth commandment is about authority and it gets to the very heart of how we live and who we are, who we're related to, who we're with, who we're under, who we're for, who we're obligated to.
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The fifth commandment is about authority, honor, and love. Now all authority, all honor, all love belongs first and foremost to God.
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We really established this last week, so I won't spend much time on this. There's a reason Jesus says in Matthew 10, whoever loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me.
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So the same Lord who commands, you shall honor, you shall submit to, you shall love your father and your mother, also says if you love them more than me, you don't belong to me.
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Right? You never get the second table without the first. Likewise, he says of the parent, who loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me.
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Sadly, in our age today, more parents need to realize what Jesus is saying here in Matthew 10.
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So many parents have a life and perhaps therefore a certain moral instinct that the sexual degradation of our culture is wrong, and they've resisted that, and they're uncomfortable with that, but as soon as their children fall headlong into it, they start to get a little loose with God's commands.
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Well, I just want them to, if this is the only way they'll still go to church or still speak of Christianity, then
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I guess this is okay, and yeah, we're going to this sort of rainbow banner church, but that's okay, I'm just loving them.
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And Jesus says, you've loved your son or daughter more than me. You're not worthy of me. This means elsewhere, let the dead bury their own dead.
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Even one of the most important forms of filial honor, taking the care to bury the father.
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If you just look at Genesis and look at how Esau and Jacob are united in this great cause. Look at the great pains that Joseph entertains in order to bury his father and show respect for the dead.
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But when it comes to this great, Lord, I want to follow you, just of course, there's going to be no issue here at all.
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I have to go back and bury my father who's just died. And he's fully expecting Jesus to say, well, of course,
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I mean, don't you know what the fifth commandment says? But Jesus says, don't put your hand to the plow and turn back.
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Seek the kingdom first. Let the dead bury their own dead. That's how important the first table is in regard to the second.
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If anyone comes to me and does not hate his own father and mother and wife and children, brothers and sisters, yes, even his own life, he cannot be my disciple.
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Now, of course, Jesus is not encouraging hate. What he's doing is showing that the kind of love that is owed to God is in a class all to its own.
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Comparatively, the kind of love we show to the closest people in our lives almost looks like hatred.
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Such is the purity and intensity of love for God. It's all -consuming.
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But when we situate the first table, recognize what exclusively belongs to God, we also recognize that, therefore, the second table is established, not taken away.
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As we said, the authority of God has a natural outflow to the authority that we respect in all other human relationships.
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And, therefore, sin attacks that very point, that very juncture. The ultimate expression of rebellion against God is a rebellion against authorities that God has ordained.
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The ultimate expression of a breakdown due to sin in God's design for the family is for a child to curse their father or their mother.
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That's why the child that did so was put to death along with blasphemers and idolaters.
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That was how grave the offense was in the Mosaic economy in the sight of God. That's how important this commandment is.
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Now, Jesus uses the fifth commandment. In Mark 7, He uses it to expose the hypocrisy and traditionalism of the
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Pharisees. Traditionalism in all the wrong ways. We read there in verse 10, Jesus says, Moses wrote,
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Honor your father and your mother, and he who curses father and mother, let him be put to death.
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Jesus, notice, is quoting the fifth commandment, elaborating on the penalty for breaking it. But with their traditions, the scribes and the
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Pharisees had found a way to disregard the fifth commandment. Because it was established by their own hands, they thought this is what is right and fitting.
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It was a loophole that they didn't really think of as a loophole, but it ended up being practiced according to the flesh in that way.
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And so Jesus calls them out on this. Moses wrote the commandment, honor your father and your mother. But you say, if a man tells his father and mother, whatever profit you would have received from me, it's
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Corban. In other words, it's gift, it's dedicated to God. Then you no longer let him do anything for his father or his mother.
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So here the situation is, perhaps due to some success in a business venture or some return on an investment, maybe out of piety, a desire to bless
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God, the son says, it is Corban, I'm going to devote this to God now.
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Now, he can live off that, he can use it as he sees fit. When he dies, what remains in that estate will go to the temple.
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It's been devoted to God, dedicated to God. And so he might realize, oh, that was somewhat of a foolish vow.
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My parents are old or they're having this health crisis. I really need to take some of this estate and offer it to them and care for them.
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And Jesus says, you blind guides, you hypocrites, won't allow them to do anything for their father and mother.
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You say you cannot break a vow you've made to God. And so because of a tradition you've imposed, you're not willing to break your tradition, but you're willing to break the fifth commandment, which says honor your father and your mother.
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And so Jesus affirms the fact that the fifth commandment requires absolute care, absolute honor to do things from children for the sake of their parents.
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And so I want to begin there with application for children. So first point, authority for all.
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Second point, application for children. And Paul also speaks to the fifth commandment in this way.
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Jesus affirms parents are to honor their father and mother. Paul affirms children are to honor their father and mother.
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Not that you need Paul. Not that you need anything more than what Moses wrote in the fifth commandment. But again, every time we come across it, it becomes more emphatic.
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It stares us down and doesn't let us wiggle out or drum off some excuses. Children, Paul says, obey your parents and the
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Lord. This is right. Honor your father and mother.
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This is the first commandment with promise, that it may be well with you, that you may live long on the earth.
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So what is required of children? Well, first and foremost, the fifth commandment requires a recognition of authority.
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Recognition of authority. We've already mentioned the effects of the fall. Even as they did not like to retain
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God in their knowledge, Paul writes in Romans 1, God gave them over to a debased mind. What's the result of this debased mind?
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What's the result of human nature falling headlong into sin? To do those things which are not fitting.
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Being filled with all unrighteousness, sexual immorality, wickedness, covetousness, maliciousness, full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, being evil -minded.
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They are whisperers, backbiters, haters of God, violent, proud, boasters.
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They invent evil things. Disobedient to parents. And what does he go on to say?
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Knowing the righteous judgment of God, those who practice such things are deserving of death.
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Not only those who do the same, but even those who approve. You see, we often have disobedience to parents as some rite of passage thing.
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This is just how teenagers are, right? This is universal to humanity. It's kind of like, yeah,
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I know I shouldn't steal, I know I shouldn't rob, I know I shouldn't lie, but, you know, I mean, parents sometimes are just really on your case, on your back.
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They're old -fashioned, outmoded, they don't understand, you know, they're hypocritical, they used to live like this too.
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It's almost like this is what it means to be a teenager, right? If I'm not carving my own path, if I'm not bucking the trend and resisting that kind of parental authority, then
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I'm not even worthy of the name teenager, right? According to every movie made in the last 30 years.
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I was in the line at Walmart some months ago. It was sort of a later night and everything was really slow and there was only one lane open and I had the girls with me.
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So we're all there and they're all in the cart and a few old ladies started lining up behind me.
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And they all commented on the kids, oh, so sweet, and each one of them, one by one, said, oh, they're cute now, you're going to hate it when they're teenagers.
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And I said, oh, no, I don't think so, you know, I'm looking forward to it, you know, by the grace of God.
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And they said, oh, no, oh, no. If only
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I could help you see. And they started going down this path of, you know, well, basically, yeah, my children were really cute, sweet, too, until they became teenagers and we've never had a good relationship ever since.
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So I started talking to them about that. I said, well, what about your childhood? They said, oh, my parents were terrible.
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I have no relation, my father was a horrible man. And without being able to understand the logic that I was trying to put before them, it really struck me, right?
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You have this whole life of rejecting and resisting and resenting your upbringing and the parents that God gave to you and what he required for you to show honor to them and care for them, and you sowed in that way and you reaped in that way.
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And they couldn't understand the connection. They just thought, what? This is just how teenagers are, right?
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Something has happened, irrespective of me, that has just taken over my teenager's mind and body, right?
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It's not the kind of sin in their life, in their hearts, in their thinking, in their nature, that I have in my mind, in my heart, in my nature, that I showed to my parents.
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And so grace interrupts this. It's not a coincidence. We're not dealing with a mild issue.
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This is not some universal tendency that's unfortunate but unavoidable. That's embarrassing to parents, but just the way of life.
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No. Disobedience to parents is straight from the pit of hell. And apart from God's mercy, it will keep you headlong on the path to destruction.
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The culture winks at it. God does not. The culture winks at rebellion against a father.
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God says the ravens will pluck your eyes out. So much for winking. If you can sit in this seat and rehearse what the
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Fifth Commandment requires and not have the slightest alarm of conscience, if you're living in some form of disrespect or dishonor to your parents, you are completely blind to how deep of a spiritual crisis you are in.
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Because when you cannot honor your parents in any regard, it is impossible that you can be honoring to God.
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How could it be that you could know God, who is authority over all, and disregard the authority
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He's given you? Curse the hands that fed you and raised you. It could not be. So the
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Fifth Commandment is about authority, honor, and love. Paul warns Timothy, men will be lovers of themselves.
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Lovers of money, boasters, proud, blasphemers. Disobedient to parents.
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That's what it looks like when you're a lover of yourself. When you're proud, and you won't bend, and you won't consider, and you won't stop and think,
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I'm newborn, I've lived a day, maybe I should slow down and think about people who have been here longer than me, who have no motive but wanting what's best for me, when
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I have all sorts of false motives to do what I think is best for me. And what does that look like?
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He keeps going. Unthankful. Unloving. Unforgiving. Slanderers.
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No self -control. Brutal. Despising what is good. Traitors. Headstrong. Haughty. Lovering pleasure rather than loving
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God. You see? That is a catalog of what this disrespect and dishonor in the
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Fifth Commandment looks like. It's what it leads to. No authority but myself.
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No service or regard for anyone but myself. If anyone goes against me, I cut ties with them.
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They're dead to me. I am my own God. It's the story arc of every
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Disney and Pixar film. Your parents' restraint and authority is what's wrong.
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Your instinct, your heart, your own way is what's right. When they forbid you, don't listen to them.
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They're wrong. Go your own way and guess what? Not only will you be right, they'll admit you were right later on.
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How could we have been so foolish? You were right all along. Will you please forgive us?
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That's the kind of propaganda that this serpentine, godless worldview is feeding our children.
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Pagan myths didn't even sink that low. Pagan myths were basically bedtime stories about why you better follow tradition and the advice of your parents.
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When Icarus was warned, don't fly too high or too low, those wax wings so he could escape, don't fly too high or too low, when
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Icarus was warned of that and he didn't obey, what happened? He plunged into the sea and drowned. At least pagan myths understood if you go against the warning and advice of your parents, things don't end well.
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But now Disney says this is the only way things will end well, is if you follow your own instinct, follow your own heart, and never, ever, whatever you do, listen to your parents, they're always wrong.
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My son, Proverbs 6 says, keep your father's command. Don't forsake the law of your mother.
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In other words, it's as if God is transferring his authority of the law giver, of the one who creates commandments, it's as if he's transferring his authority over to the role of the mother and the father.
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Such that he says, not keep my command or do not forsake my law.
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He says, don't forsake your father's command. Don't break the law of your mother. Bind them upon your heart, he says.
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Tie them around your neck. When you roam, they'll lead you. When you sleep, they'll keep you. When you awake, they'll speak with you.
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What's the counterpart to this later in Proverbs? There's a generation that curses its father, refuses to bless its mother.
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A generation that is pure in its own eyes, but unwashed from filth. A generation, oh, how lofty their eyes, their eyelids are lifted up, just full of pride and self -love.
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A generation whose teeth are like swords, whose fangs are like knives. That's the counterpart.
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How many modern day Esau's live among us? I don't want my father's blessing. I don't want to walk in his ways.
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I don't want his heritage. I'm my own man. I've got my own path, my own desire, my own way, my own code.
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And even if in this life they don't return with tears, not finding repentance, the day will come when they do so.
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We have fallen to this alarmingly low ebb of honor to those in positions of authority.
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It begins in the house. It begins between children and parents. And as goes the household, so goes the nation.
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Stephen Molyneux, who lives up in Ontario, and he's basically this atheist philosopher, just wretched in every sense of that word.
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One of the big things that he pushes, and I remember speaking to a neighbor about this, because he says, I listened to him, because he had a very hard upbringing.
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And so a lot of his life is fueled with resentment toward his parents. And when he found Stephen Molyneux's podcast and radio episodes, it was like finding a stream in the desert.
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This is everything I've always thought. And what Molyneux created through his writings was basically a website that teaches and encourages people to completely break all ties with their family of origin, with their natural family.
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They call it, among the circles that he has influence in, they call it defou. I don't know why.
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Defou. Defou is the process of ostracizing one's own family without warning.
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So a complete turn of the shoulder, a complete disregard, no communication, a complete shutting out.
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And this is what he says. To defou is to disown your family that you may gain freedom.
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He ostracized his own parents, married a woman, Christina Papadopoulos, a psychotherapist.
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Always great when you have those. She rejected her parents as soon as she met them. They married and she's like, yeah,
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I'm done with my family too. Now together they run this organization, really a ministry from Satan, if you will, which facilitates and helps families to ostracize and reject their own family.
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And this is their advice. Champion your inner child. We'll lead you to therapy so that you can reclaim your true self from the destructive prison you have called your childhood.
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Your true self. Somehow your self couldn't be that which has derived from the people that birthed you and raised you.
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Somehow your true self is out there somewhere else in the fog of abstract ideas and you just need the right therapist to help you find it.
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Surely it couldn't be that you have an origin that therefore obligates you to show a certain level of honor and to return care for the care that you were given when you were helpless and in need.
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No. That's a prison. You need to be freed. So completely reject your parents and your family.
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That's the logical extent of what rebellion to the fifth commandment looks like.
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Now you might never go that far. No, no, no. Alright, I'll make a phone call once a year. It's logically, you're on the same path without coming to the conclusion that Molyneux has come to.
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Now I'm sure, speaking of difficult backgrounds, I'm sure that many people are drawn to this deception, this satanic deception, because their childhoods were very difficult.
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Maybe profoundly abusive. Maybe there was such neglect, such violence, that it's incredibly painful and difficult just to be anywhere near in communication with family.
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To somehow state over the evil and injustice that was part of the life that has indelibly marked and shaped your life.
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And this is where, again, the freedom that Molyneux only pretends to offer is a freedom that can only be found in the
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Gospel. And that freedom helps you recognize God is sovereign over all things and He'll return beauty even for these ashes.
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He'll restore what the locusts have eaten away. If my first half of my life, as it were, in darkness, let the second half of my life be in light.
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And let me receive the same grace from God that I will seek now to show to even those who have wronged me.
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Learning from Christ how to do that. The chief exemplar of doing just that.
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Sin has affected every household. It's not easy to keep the fifth commandment even when you had a great childhood because of your own sin nature, because of your short -sightedness and selfishness.
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How much harder it is to keep the fifth commandment, which is no less a commandment when you've been sinned against.
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When you are being sinned against. When wrongs are unacknowledged. When evil is unforgiven.
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This is how sin has affected all of us. But again, however sensitive and however much prayerful counsel and patient encouragement may be needed in such cases,
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I can't give a one -size -fits -all speaking at large to a congregation. That may be something that requires a lot more intensive and personal time and commitment.
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But let me say this, at the end of the day, the fifth commandment does not say, honor your father and your mother as long as they've treated you well.
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The fifth commandment does not say, honor your father and mother if for the most part you had a better childhood than others.
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The fifth commandment simply says, honor your father and your mother. The Christian checks their hearts, and they're guided by the
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Spirit in their very conscience as to how to walk according to this command. They make missteps, they don't press on in areas where they should, or they shrink back from areas that they shouldn't.
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But God will check their hearts and guide their conscience with encouragement, counsel, and prayer.
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And just even in the past several weeks, as we get closer to the fifth commandment, I've had conversations with several people where they said, please pray for me in this.
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I really want to understand how to do this. I know I could do more. I probably haven't done enough.
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It's just really hard because of this and because of that. And that's just music to my ears because that's exactly what it looks like for a
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Christian to try to work these things out. You might feel very discouraged because you feel so convicted about where things lie.
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But you wouldn't feel convicted at all if the Lord weren't guiding you along to be thinking in this way or desiring something more than you have.
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And so be encouraged as you keep wrestling with how to apply this commandment in your life. Even when parents are dishonorable,
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God requires that we honor them. Not just that we honor them by lip, but that we seek to show them honor.
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And so that really is the second point here. Not only do we need a recognition of authority, we need a practice of showing honor.
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We need a practice of showing honor. That's what the commandment says. Honor your father and your mother.
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That verb for honor is actually kabed, which you recognize the noun there, kabod.
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Something weighty, right? There's a certain gravity to it. And so to make light is the opposite of giving weight.
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To honor is to give weight. It's to say I take this seriously. This makes a difference.
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This is not something I don't think about or I cast off easily. It's so heavy that I kind of have to get my hands and my life around it.
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I have hands and feet to the honor that I show. So that means there's no place for the typical whatever,
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I roll, you know, valley girl disregard. There's no place for that. There's no place for disregard, period.
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Honoring your parents is weighty. It's meant to be. There's no place for being wise in your own eyes.
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What's the cardinal sin of teenagers? They're wise in their own eyes. They're old enough to understand all the things that younger children don't understand about the world.
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Right? They just have no idea how things function. Now they have put together a few things about how the world works, but they're completely naive to their ignorance about themselves and how much of things actually are when you start navigating the world.
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And so they're very wise in their own eyes and there's this feeling of invincibility. Mark Twain said, when
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I was a boy aged 14, my father was so ignorant I couldn't stand to have him around.
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But when I got to be 21, I was astonished at how much he had learned in seven years.
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Right? We're wise in our own eyes. Part of what the fifth commandment requires is to recognize there's a lot
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I don't understand about life. There's a lot I don't know about myself. My parents know me probably better than anyone else in the world.
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I should be slow to speak and quick to listen. I should not be wise in my own eyes.
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My parents are perhaps the only two people in the entire world that don't have some false motive in giving me advice or counsel.
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They don't have much to gain. They have a lot to lose if things go off.
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They're not just trying to manipulate or use me for their own gain. I shouldn't be wise in my own eyes.
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I should listen to their counsel. This means also no begrudging of the fact that this is the source of your life.
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This is the womb that bore you. These are the hands that disciplined you. This is the source of your life. You would not be without your parents.
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However wretched your parents may be, that very fact alone is enough to warrant a lifetime of honor.
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I wouldn't exist apart from you. You have brought me into this world. Therefore, I honor you.
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There's a dime -a -dozen trend right now. Publishers can sell these things like hotcakes. It's why they do it.
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It feeds this narrative of sort of the great evangelical exile. It's kind of like they've gone out from us.
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They were never of us. But these things are a dime -a -dozen. I mentioned one even last week, that sort of ex -evangelical expose that is being written left and right.
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And I came across someone commenting, what drives me crazy about ex -evangelical books is how disrespectful to parents every writer is.
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How generally incurious they are about their own past, about the traditions that they were raised in.
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They said, no functional culture would countenance this kind of incurious disrespect.
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So the book won't sell unless they're just like, it was horrible. They made me go to church every week.
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I was brainwashed in the doctrines of the church. It's taken me seven years through listening to NPR to even start thinking rightly.
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What you don't find are the narratives of, you know, I grew up, my parents made me attend church.
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They homeschooled me. They disciplined me. It wasn't always easy. I wasn't always easy for them. They really strongly encouraged me to pursue a vocation or a skill set or go to Christian college.
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Sometimes I really resented it, but I turned out great and I'm so thankful for them. I want to do exactly what they did.
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I hope I can do it as well as they did. You don't read a lot of memoirs like that. Those don't sell.
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I think it's because the people that would write those memoirs are too busy raising those families and seeking to be those parents.
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When you're living in a Manhattan apartment with 18 cats, you can write ex -evangelical exposés. You need a practice of showing honor.
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And what does God do to encourage that practice? He gives us promise. Your days may be long upon the land which the
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Lord your God is giving you. Now, if you want to say, yeah, but that was for them in Canaan as you said. Well, I said that was the immediate reference.
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When Paul quotes the fifth commandment in Ephesians 6, he applies this to the children in the church. He says, honor your father and mother.
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This is the first commandment with the promise. You want to have long days on the earth? Then keep this commandment.
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Now, of course, this doesn't mean that every single child that shows honor or regard for their parents enjoys a long life.
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Neither does it mean that, you know, you're surely going to die young if you dishonor or disrespect your children.
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We see Esau going against his parents' desires for his marriage. He marries Canaanite women, yet he lives very long, 120 years at least.
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Abel honors God in such a way, it's inconceivable that he didn't also honor his parents, and yet he's slain very young.
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So some honorable Christians die young. They're martyred. Their life is cut short. Some wicked people live long, too long.
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And the catechism covers this. It says, the reason that's given for the fifth commandment is a promise of long life and prosperity, but they include this.
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As far as it will serve God's glory and their own good. As far as it will serve
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God's glory and their own good. For some people, it's for God's glory and frankly for their own good, but their life is cut short.
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It sobers them and draws them to Christ in a way that if they had lived 90 years, they wouldn't have. We have wonderful accounts throughout church history.
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I mentioned Robert Murray McShane last week, dead at 29, right? And it wasn't because he was some wicked man who was unfruitful.
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In fact, it was perhaps because he had such poor health, plaguing his life, and had lost his older brother to poor health that he burned so bright and so hot.
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It was for the glory of God and for his own good. And yet, we do have this promise.
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I hope that I'm not the first in a few generations to have a life that's cut short. I'm in pretty bad health comparatively, but most of my grandparents on both sides lived a century.
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99, 103, 102, 93. I don't know if I want to live that long, frankly, but I want to be blessed by God.
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I want to be blessed by God, and so God gives me this promise. He gives me this encouragement. Show honor to whom honor is due.
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Honor your mother and father, and you will be honored as a mother and father. I love what
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John Trapp says. A good child lengthens his father's days, therefore God promises to lengthen his. You're a disobedient child.
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It's like Eli. When his sons rebel, he falls over dead. He's so shocked that the judgment has fallen upon them.
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But when a child is obedient and honorable, it lengthens the parents' days. They're not ebbing away their sleep with anxiety and worry, and therefore their heart's in a better condition and their blood pressure is more stable.
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And so if you lengthen your parents' days in that way, God will see fit to lengthen yours. What about application for parents?
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This is the third and last point. Application for parents. Well, as we keep reading in Ephesians, we go from child to parent.
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And you, Paul says, fathers, do not provoke your children to wrath, but bring them up in the training and admonition of the
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Lord. Do not provoke your children to wrath, but bring them up in the training and admonition of the
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Lord. So what is required of parents? Well, as we saw with children, the first thing is a recognition of authority.
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A recognition of authority. For the child, they are to recognize the authority that God has given their parents.
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They are your parents. Honor them. The fifth commandment requires you recognize their authority.
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But to the parent, the fifth commandment requires that they recognize I have been given authority over these children.
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Not to serve myself, not to meet my immediate needs, but to serve
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God. I've been given authority for their sake. And so Paul says, what are you to do in light of this commandment?
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Raise them, train them, in the admonition of the Lord. And don't provoke them to wrath. Parents, getting back to Van Till, he says parents do not have moral authority merely because they happen to be older or have more knowledge, but rather they have authority in this sense.
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They must require obedience. They must require obedience. It is the parent's sacred task to cultivate in the hearts of their children a respect for authority.
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Remember, as goes the household, so goes the nation. It is the sacred, in other words, a holy calling of the parent to cultivate, to weed, to water, to nurture, to attend to the honor that their children show to their own authority so that their children can learn how to show honor to all other authority in their life.
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Hence, if they fail to demand obedience to themselves, they break down at the start what they should be trying to build.
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As soon as possible, the parent will have to point the child to the ultimate source of authority.
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God. A young child can't conceive of these things. Doesn't understand the nature of the hierarchy over their life.
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But a young child learns, mom and dad have authority. Because mom and dad require obedience, and when
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I disobey, there's a consequence. Why are you doing that? Why are you instilling that?
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So that as soon as possible, you can connect that exercise of authority, that requirement of obedience, to God's authority, and what
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God requires of them. This is how Van Til puts it.
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It's a little wordy, but I love this. Heteronomy must lead to theonomy, lest it lead to autonomy.
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Let me break that down. Heteronomy, in other words, other authority.
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Other sources of authority. Heteronomy. Must lead to theonomy.
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Must lead to the authority of God. Otherwise, it leads to autonomy. Self -authority.
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Self -rule. You see what he's saying? When we fail to steer the authority we've been given to God as the ultimate source, the ultimate arbiter of that authority, then the only other path is they'll become an authority to themselves.
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A God to themselves. All authority among men is delegated to men by God.
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Wherever we fail to recognize that, we actually usurp the authority of God. So the first thing is for a parent to recognize,
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I have been given authority. It obligates me to raise this child in righteousness. Notice the generational logic of Proverbs 4.
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Hear, my children, the instruction of a father. Give attention to no understanding, for I'm giving you good doctrine.
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Don't forsake My law. When I was my father's son, tender and the only one in the sight of my mother,
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He also taught me. And He told me, let your heart retain My words. Keep My commands and live.
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Do you notice what is being said between the lines? What is happening here in Proverbs 4? The father's gathering his children and he's saying, listen now, my children, to the instruction of your father.
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I'm giving you good doctrine you might not realize is good. You need to understand this even though right now you don't understand it.
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It's hard for me to describe this, so let me just put it to you this way. When I was like you, when I was my father's son,
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He also taught me. And I was just like you. Not being quick to listen. Not being sure if it was worthwhile.
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Not really wanting to trust it. But I trusted it and I listened and now here I am asking you to do the same thing.
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There's a generational logic of transmitting this kind of authority. Essentially what
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He's saying is heteronomy must lead to theonomy lest it lead to autonomy. Now what does this require?
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Recognition of your authority as a parent. What does it require? A practice of living honorably.
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If a children recognizing their parent's authority requires them to show honor, your authority as a parent requires you to live honorably.
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To live honorably. Indulgent fathers and mothers might think they're kind, but in fact they're doing a great unkindness to their children because they're undermining the authority that God intends to be exercised in the family.
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And if the authority isn't established in the family, your children will never be able to understand the authority of God over their lives.
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Nor will they even have respect for authority in society. Neil Postman, who was prescient on a lot of these things, writing some decades ago, saw so much of media ecology and where it was all going.
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Neil Postman wrote a very important book called The Disappearance of Childhood. He basically argued the distance that separates parents from children used to be the kind of transcendence that taught children there was something greater, something they needed to aspire to, something they needed to be still and learn from.
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In other words, there was a gap, a distance, a separation. Not just in years, but in a whole way of life.
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Children were children. Adults were adults. You couldn't do things that adults do. You had to be taught and trained to be capable of doing that.
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But he says what's happened is that has all shrunk now. Now there's not this transcendent gap. He says
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American parents are now simply older versions of their children. They wear the same clothes.
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They exercise the same amusements. They're distracted with the same diversions. They talk the same way. You have a 45 -year -old man with a flat cap and Air Force Ones, and he's like, hey, buddy, want to go to the skate park today?
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There's no transcendence there. It's eternal teenager. And so you see this requirement to exercise authority so that the children can show you honor requires that you are worthy of honor.
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It doesn't get the children off the hook. But again, we ought to be a reason that our children can keep this
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Fifth Commandment. We ought to help them in it with our lives being worthy of honor, worthy of obedience.
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In other words, we shouldn't be hypocritical. We need to retain the authority that God has given us and not lose it, not squander it, which means you need to be wise and discerning about how you wield the authority
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God has given you. You need to know when to speak, know when to wait.
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You need to know when to rebuke and sit down and have that sort of intervention. You also need to know when to silently pray, to look from afar with concern.
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However it looks, you must retain this honor by retaining this authority.
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Thomas Watson said in our reading, David spoiled Adonijah, 1 Kings 1. His father had not displeased him at any time asking, why have you done this?
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He was always seeking to appease and please Adonijah. And then what's the result of that?
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Adonijah betrays him. Afterward, he becomes a grief of heart to his father.
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And what does Watson say in conclusion to that? If you would keep up your honor, keep up your authority. Keep up your authority.
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Sometimes children are not apt to listen when parents are apt to speak into their lives.
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It just so happens that when parents are very concerned and want to speak, want to counsel, want to advise, want to steer and say, what are you doing?
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The children are the most resistant. And then a little bit later in life, the children, without ever seeming to be this way, are actually starving for that kind of counsel, starving for that kind of concern and involvement.
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And it just so happens that at that very season in life, parents aren't very apt to steer or to guide. You have a grown son now.
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He's come out of those rebellious years and he's essentially saying, I want wise counsel.
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I want advice. The father feels uncomfortable. You're kind of your own man now. It's kind of out of my hands now.
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Do you see what I'm saying? We need to recognize that there's still an authority that we retain. There's still an authority that we retain.
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So don't forfeit or squander the authority you have now that your children are willing to listen, are hungry for it.
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Paul highlights, of course, that as you seek to steer and guide your children, that you don't provoke them to wrath.
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Again, part of wisely wielding the authority. Look at Paul and the way that he writes letters to very unruly and disobedient churches.
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He never simply makes a bald appeal to his authority. It would be enough for him to say this is what I command.
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This will be the end of it. But he's very persuasive and elaborate. Well, I'm going to come and I hope that when
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I come it won't be like this. That wouldn't be good for you. I want to come like this. Let me encourage you and remind you of these things. He's very persuasive.
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Very admonishing. He's more of a nursing mother as he relates to himself in Galatians than anything else.
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And speaking of that, parents need to be very careful about the dynamics in their household that differ between father and mother.
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Fathers, of course, should not be needlessly strict or snappy. Mothers should not run to the rescue of the children when dad is strict or snappy.
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Because then mothers often feel more bonded to their children than united to their husband. And that creates all sorts of dysfunction in a household.
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That's those moments where you say, you know, kind of secret sign language like honey, tone it down, you know, okay.
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Or hey, oh, can we go talk about this real quick? What are you doing? You wake up on the wrong side of the bed? There tends to be more of a good cop, bad cop dysfunction where, well, dad's really strict so now mom has to be extra gentle.
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Or mom's angry so dad's going to be fun dad today. And the children pinball back and forth.
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And they end up sort of like convicts figuring out how to twist and manipulate the parents against each other. That's not how a household is meant to function.
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You are one flesh. You are united for good or for ill. You need to be a unified front to your children.
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So in other words, you need to protect and retain the authority you have together over your children. Honor your father and your mother.
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Which means you as father and mother exercise the authority and receive that due honor. Thomas Watson also said very wisely, speaking of mothers, he said, the mother is apt to be more slighted by children.
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Partly because she endures more for the child. A mother slogging through the mud all day long with these kids.
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Alicia's commented in times past and I'm sure this is experienced to many of us that I can seem like fun dad for 20 minutes.
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But as soon as I put a couple hours in, it's like I'm getting really short. And she's like, oh, imagine all day.
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So the reality is it's like the mother tends to bear with a lot and the children can disrespect or slight her authority and not show her honor for that reason.
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They're too comfortable with her. And she's too gentle and desiring to cultivate good manners in their life.
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You need to be careful that you don't play into that as a father. Sometimes a daughter sees a certain disrespect that's shown to the mother and she wants to emulate the kind of respect and command that the father has.
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And so she sort of gravitates toward the role of the father. This is just breeding feminism. When you have a slight against your mother, a slight, a dishonor, if it's gravitating you toward your father, there's a rift, a division in the marriage that is not healthy for the home.
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Children, of course, and I love this, Watson used this metaphor, children being young plants. And he says the mother and the father must continually water them in good instruction.
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This means commending them for things they do well. We talked about this yesterday morning. Dry plants that wither because you're on top of every infraction but you never say,
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I'm so proud of you, you've done this really well, or I've noticed you've been doing this lately. That means a lot to me.
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I've been praying for that. I just want to tell you that it's really encouraging. You're going to let your children wither on the vine if you're not learning how to praise them for the good things that is being wrought in and through them.
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Water the plants. Practice living honorably. And as we come to a close, remember this, that promise of the fifth commandment is your promise too.
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It's not just for the children, it's for the sake of the parents. That your days may be long upon the land.
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You recognize your authority, you train your children up in the admonition of the Lord, and what's the result of that? You have long years, but also your children in their long years are showing honor to you, and they're caring for you.
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What did that authority and honor and that responsibility breed in you? You want to build a heritage.
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You want to create a foundation. You want to leave an inheritance. You want to stamp your children and your children's children with something.
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So your life is now filled with blessing because you get to see how this is beginning to form. For as hard as it was,
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I tried my best to use the authority God gave me and raise my children in the fear and the admonition of the
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Lord, and now we have a good relationship and they're seeking to honor me, and I have no concerns that they'll care for me when
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I'm elderly. Right, girls? Please? And now I'm even seeing their children, and I'm seeing this legacy now formed before me, a good heritage, and the things that we've squirreled away and the means that we have, we're just sending it forward.
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And I know that they'll keep doing the same, and God's making this family line fruitful. Maybe you had never had a bud prior to you.
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Oh, praise God, you get to be the beginnings of that. Maybe for some of you, your third, fourth generation of just standing on godliness that you've received, and like everything, as buds continue to grow, there's more and more and more fruit.
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The shoots keep descending. So recognize that this promise is an encouragement for you as well, not just for your children, but for you as parents, that your days may be long, that you may be cared for.
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Eventually, all that care and desire and effort that you've poured into them will be returned to you. When you're no longer able to care for yourself, you'll have children that have been taught how to honor you, taught to show you respect, and therefore, they'll care for you in your infirmity.
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Don't be like the great steel mogul, Carnegie, who, after he sold to J .P.
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Morgan and amassed $300 million in the currency at that time, refused to leave much of an inheritance at all to his children.
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He had one daughter he married very late in life. He just started giving away all of his fortunes as a sort of philanthropist.
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And the point's been made. He did far more evil than good. He was far better as the exacting steel mogul in creating economic productivity for so many workmen.
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And then they could have proceeds and do with it in freedom, but he was one of the champions of the welfare state.
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Basically, he said, you know, the state needs to be the trustee. It needs to take the wealth of the wealthy and redistribute it according to the needs of society.
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In other words, he wanted the state to become the family, the state to be the heir and the distributor of the inheritance.
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Don't be like that. We need to undo that and recognize that this language of heirship, it's part, it's embedded within the
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Fifth Commandment. To honor your parents means that you have been trained by your parents to show them honor because they were trained by their parents to show honor.
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And you'll live, perhaps, to see your parents caring for their parents and you're learning by that how to care for your parents.
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And, of course, you have this matter of the inheritance. Paul says, in 2 Corinthians 12, 14, children ought not to lay up for parents, but parents for children.
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Part of what the inheritance is is you're giving this inheritance and part of that estate is used to care for you.
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Some scholars argue that's why the firstborn son had the double inheritance. He would need that double inheritance in order to care for the parents at the very end of their lives.
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But this means parents are not to squander an inheritance that truly belongs to their children and their children's children.
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A right understanding of the authority of God means I've never served myself with my authority, neither do
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I serve myself with my means. I'm creating an inheritance for those beyond me. It's a wielding of authority for the sake of the good of those that come from you.
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And where do we find that? We find that in the Gospel. Jesus doesn't say the inheritance is all mine. I've been the dutiful son.
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I'm not bearing the curse. This inheritance is for me. I'm the one who's earned it. No, what does he do?
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He bears the curse and then he says, you're all my co -heirs now. Now I freely give you of this inheritance that we may enjoy it together in the presence of the
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Heavenly Father. Luke 15 is such a wonderful picture of this, isn't it? The prodigal son, by demanding an inheritance immediately, so notice you have a father that's honorable, right?
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A father that's honorable. He's stored up an inheritance for his children. We'd like to think that this father trained his children to show the kind of honor that God requires, but for whatever reason, this prodigal son has it worked up in his mind that he's not going to respect his dad.
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So he goes to his dad and he says, you know, I'm ready to break out. I'm ready to find my own path in life. I don't care about your heritage.
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Don't care about your ways. Don't care about your desire, your will. I'm going to be my own man, so give me what's owed me.
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Now, according to the Mosaic Law, what are the father's options? You have a disobedient son.
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You have a rebellious son. Luke 15 could read that the father wept as he dragged his son to the elders at the gate and said, here is my rebellious son.
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Put him to death. He has come to me and said, I wish you were dead, father. Give me my inheritance and get out of my way.
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He would spoil my inheritance, rob from his brothers, poison my name among the tribal inheritance.
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Dispatch with him. Be done with him. Cut him off from the assembly. What does this father do?
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Gives him the inheritance. Son goes out into the far country.
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Lives a profligate life. Spends himself to ruin. That's where being wise in your own eyes will take you, by the way.
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All the thrill of vanity fair. All the machinations of the world that offer everything.
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I don't need your old -fashioned, out -of -tune advice, mom and dad.
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I'm going to go make myself. And when he's eating swine pods, he realizes, well, maybe
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I could at least be a slave. And when he comes slinking back, how do we find the father?
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Now having some time to process all that's happened. My son has disowned me. He's wished me to die.
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He's cut himself out of my life, my heritage, the future of my children.
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What am I to do with him? When he comes back, does he come to an electric fence? Do we find messengers running to intercept the prodigal son and they say, listen, you're not welcome here, but if you work really hard for the next 10 years to show the kind of honor and respect that you have robbed, maybe he'll let you in as a slave.
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You've got to earn it. You better go work really hard to show the kind of honor and you better grovel in repentance if you ever dare see or speak to your father again.
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Is that what happens? We all, like this prodigal, have gone astray.
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We all, like this prodigal, have disregarded the authority of God and therefore refused to show the honor that belongs to God and that has expressed itself, especially in the neglect and the abuse and the resentment and the unthankfulness and the dishonor that we've shown our parents.
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But thanks be to God that because of Jesus Christ, when we come to the
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Father's house recognizing that everything we've walked in has been wrong and ruinous, he doesn't cast us away.
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He prepares a feast. He doesn't say, earn your sonship. He says, come and sit.
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You were dead but now you're alive. You were starving, now I want you to be full.
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We recognize we come to the Father's house as those who have dishonored, have wished him dead, have rebelled against him, were received as sons, were celebrated and cherished as sons.
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That is why we show honor. Do you think the prodigal son would ever have the kind of resentment and unthankfulness and ingratitude that had characterized his life prior?
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Once he was sitting at the feast, amazed that his father was embracing him? That he wouldn't have to be a slave but that he could be a son?
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That even though he had wasted his inheritance, he was somehow still in error? I imagine that that was the beginning of a lifetime of practicing the fifth commandment for the prodigal son.
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And of course, we recognize the truth of what Jesus is conveying in Luke 15, such is the
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Father. In the height of our rebellion, he wouldn't put us to death. But by conviction, when we're led to seek him out, unsure of how receptive he'll be, he runs out to embrace us and receive us as sons and daughters.
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This can only happen because of the blessed son, the son that didn't leave, the son that didn't rebel, the son that never for a single moment dishonored his heavenly father or his earthly stepfather or his earthly mother or any image bearer he ever set path across.
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He perfectly honored every authority, every human relationship he encountered.
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And instead of receiving the inheritance and the blessing and the glory and the honor, he was nailed to a tree on top of Golgotha.
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Instead of having the promise of the fifth commandment, your days will be long in the land, his life was snuffed out, cut short as he died the ignominable death on the tree, cast out from the presence of the father, laying aside all of his perfection, all of his authority to bear our shame.
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You remember that scene in the movie Lincoln, kind of Federalist propaganda, but in the movie
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Lincoln, there's this great scene. It's very well acted by Daniel Day -Lewis. You know, Lincoln, typical lawyer, he's very careful and methodical in how he speaks.
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And for a while, they've been trying to work out how they're gonna acquire votes as the amendment is facing, whether or not it will pass.
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So he's sitting with the council, and it seems like after many hours, the council's quite comfortable. And Lincoln never lets on to this, but they really haven't rightly recognized his authority.
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So because they're throwing around some ideas and kind of saying, what about this, what about that? And Lincoln would say something, no, that would never work because of this.
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It's almost like they're all peers, they're all equal. And they've lost sight of the fact that I'm not your colleague,
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I'm the president. And so when, I think, the Secretary of State will say, that would be impossible, we couldn't possibly have enough time to acquire those kind of votes, and Daniel Day -Lewis slams on the table, and he says,
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I'm the president of the United States of America, clothed with immense power.
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You will procure those votes. And they all hang their heads and get out of the Oval Office.
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Makes me think of the Lord Jesus, who had immense authority beyond description. And what did
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He do with that authority? If ever there was a human being clothed with immense authority, it was the
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Lord Jesus Christ. But what did He do? He was stripped bare. Stripped bare and nailed to a tree.
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This was the cost of our coming home to be embraced by the Father. This is the foundation of why we will always strive to show honor to our
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Father and our Mother. Knowing that our days will be long upon the land our
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Lord is giving us. Not because we've earned it, not because we could earn it, but because He's paid for it in blood.
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And therefore, the Gospel restores the wholeness that the fall ruined. Christ restores the poison in the marriage.
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Christ brings healing to the household. Christ saves us from the punishment that the law demands.
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There's a reason that right before Christ came, if we follow our canonical order of the Old Testament, right before we open the page to Matthew, how do we close the page of Malachi?
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With this great promise. Remember the law of Moses, which I commanded in Horeb. With all the statutes and judgments, behold,
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I'm sending you Elijah the prophet before the coming of the great and dreadful day of the Lord. And what will this accomplish?
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He will turn the hearts of the fathers to the children, and the hearts of the children to their fathers.
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Lest the Lord come and strike the earth with a curse. Jesus has taken that curse.
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It will not strike us. And what does He do? He turns the heart of the fathers to the children.
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He turns the heart of the children to the fathers. This is the result of the Gospel. I close here with John 1 .12.
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As many as receive Him, to them He gave them the right to become children of God.
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To those who believe in His name. Amen? Let's pray. Father, thank
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You for Your Word. Let us be not hearers only, but doers, Lord. Show us the ways that we have thrown off the honor that You require,
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Lord. For all honor and authority belong to You. Lord, all authority and honor begins with You and from You for Your sake and for Your glory.
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So help us in this way. Convict us as mothers, fathers in this room, Lord, for ways that we have not retained our authority, nor walked in an honorable way.
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Let it be not held against us, Lord. Convict us as children in this room of any age of what this commandment requires in our regard and our care and our attentiveness to our parents.
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Lord, help us to honor You by honoring our mother and our father and all those other authorities in this life.