14
October 2015 SR
The command to honor our mother and father calls us to
weigh heavily
our parents in every way: their needs, their
opinions, their words and deeds. In the ideal,
honoring parents
teaches us to love and honor God and love and honor others.
In practice, we are commanded to honor sinful and broken
human beings. This is difficult, but it comes with a promise to
you and generations to follow.
Tip the scales towards your parents.
Honoring the Parent
s — Exodus 20:12
Honor your father and your mother, so that you may live long
in the land the Lord your God is giving you.
The father and mother part, well that is pretty clear. We can
expand that to include things like spiritual fathers and mothers,
mentors and the like. But, we cannot simply substitute any of
these in place of our biological parents.
Honor – Weight
What is honor? I heard recently that “if you need it defined,
you don’t have it.” We sort of have a conception of what that
means. In the Greek, it has to do with assigning a high value to
something. In my Hebrew word study, I discovered a new
metaphor and I found it tremendously useful. The root of
“honor” is the idea of weight, like a heavy burden. So my parents
are a heavy burden? Some of you might say “Yeah, I knew that!”
Okay, not exactly. Considering something as heavy, ascribing to it
that property, we can see how the idea of honor develops:
I am going to honor your payment of gold — it is heavy enough.
I am going to honor your word of payment — I ascribe to it a
heavy weight.
I believe you have a lot of honor.
When you say something to me, I weigh it heavily, I consider it
carefully on the scales of my mind, on the scales of relationships.
Even in the medieval, chivalrous sense of honor, the knight’s
reputation had “weight.” So many good deeds, so much accumu-
lated trust, such “Honor!”
Isn’t that crazy helpful? I don’t think I had ever heard that
definition before.
So honor grants weight: or a position of respect and authority
in your life. You weigh (or count) someone’s word more heavily,
you weigh someone’s relationship more valuable.
Honor ps the scales
Honoring — a financial obliga on
This can get ridiculously practical. Before we expand and
explore this commandment, let’s be sure we have the most
straightforward possible applications of this.
First, to children in the household of their parents: Honor your
parents; obey your parents. Weigh their word, their commands,
so heavily in your mind that you simply do them. Simple.
Another practical and primary application of this commandment:
Shoulder, take on, the financial burden of your parents. Weigh
heavily their needs and take care of them. This is social security.
This is the sense addressed by Jesus in Matthew 15: Jesus
addresses a practice the Pharisees had of declaring their
possessions “devoted to God” and thereby dodging their
responsibility to “honor” their father and mother, in this case,
to take care of them financially.
So this commandment sets up a generational Social Security
system, which makes one very practical application of the
Top Ten Words
How Much Do Your Parents Weigh? — Exodus 20:12
Sermon Series by Pastor Dusty Mackintosh, Next Step Christian Church, Thornton, CO
