honoring my parents

Children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right. "Honor your
father and mother"—which is the first commandment with a promise— "that it may
go well with you and that you may enjoy long life on the earth." Eph 6:1-2

The first four commandments dealt with our relationship with God.

The last six deals with our relationship with one another. And it is interesting to note that God places our relationship with our parents as of foremost significance in His commands.

Ephesians passage tells us that honoring out parents is the first commandment with a promise. That is to say, first as in foremost, of greater importance and superiority.

The reason why God places such emphasis on this primary relationship between a parent and a child is because our relationship with our parents will determine the sort of relationships we will establish with everyone else around us. The family, in other words, is the building block of all relationships.

In a world full of broken and dysfunctional families nurtured by incompetent parenthood, why are we commanded to honor (i.e., to prize highly, tp care for, to show respect for and to obey) our parents?

What we can learn from God's fifth commandment is this command is not based on qualification of the recipient of that honor (i.e, our parents), but simply on God's authority and His established order in family, life and society.

We honor our parents not necesarily because they deserve it per se, but because God told us so.

To honor our parents "in the Lord" has long been interpreted as in cases which does not conflict with will of God for my life. But that is only a surface meaning. "In the Lord" means in the same way you would God.

In other words, by acknowledging our parents' position in life as ordained by God and not some cruel error, we are ultimately confessing that God did not make a mistake.

So when we honor our parents, despite all their shortcomings and oftimes devastating and painful effect on our lives due to their failure to nurture us in godly ways, we are honoring God Himself as the Author of our lives.

When we honor our parents in this way with this attitude, as difficult as it may be, we receive three blessings.

First and foremost, our relationship with God will suffer no stumbling block. Also, we can relate to others in a healthy way, not having to have to carry the "baggage" of broken parent/child relationship into our own lives. And finally, we are able to break the cycle of what some calls "generational sin," in which we are not bound to make the same mistakes and commit the same failures as our parents when we ourselves are parents.

--from Nakwon EM Feb 25th Sunday Worship Service