Exodus 20:12 “Honor your father and your mother, that your days may be long upon the land which the Lord your God is giving you.” This is the fifth Commandment of immutable God’s Moral Law. It was written in stone by the finger of God to be obeyed by all people till the end of time. It is even repeated in Deuteronomy 5:16, “Honor your father and your mother, as the Lord your God has commanded you, so that you may live long and that it may go well with you in the land the Lord your God is giving you.”
God created the “family unit” as a part of procreation in order to provide a health support system; a household, including parents and children - father and mother, sister and brother loving and caring for each other. Parents naturally bond with their children and vice-versa. Blood-relations refers to kin, kinfolk, kindred in a parent/child relationship; a relation by natural descent from a common family; properly by consanguinity or blood, but perhaps sometimes used for relation by affinity or marriage. The parent is a father or mother; he or she that produces young; offspring. The duties of parents to their children are to maintain, protect and educate them. Parents work and provide a safe and nurturing home environment for their children to live and grow. Blood is thicker than water.
When parents are wanting in authority, children are wanting in duty. Children learn from their parents. Proverbs 22:6 instructs parents, “Train up a child in the way he should go, and when they are old they will not depart from it.” The progenies learn about God, Jesus and the Holy Spirit, saints and sinners, right from wrong, and what is good and bad from their moms and dads. The kids learn about caring and sharing, tight-kin family interaction, working together on household chores and upkeep, crafts and cooking, honesty and fair play from watching and listen to their folks. The extended family of grandparents, aunts, uncles and great-grandparents play a role in the healthy development of children. It doesn’t take a village; it takes a family and it takes respect.
Because of “the Fall of Man” (the transition of the first man [Adam] and woman [Eve] from a state of innocent obedience to God to a state of guilty disobedience because of “original sin”), the sinful desires of the flesh (adultery, fornication, uncleanness, lewdness, idolatry, addictions, hatred, contentions, jealousies, outbursts of wrath, selfish ambitions, dissensions, heresies, envy, murders, drunkenness, revelries, and the like) entered the world. Today, unconditional respect of family [children of parents and parents of children] as God intended must be communicated, demonstrated, reinforced and protected. God emphasizes this designed attribute of family dynamics in this Fifth Commandment of His Moral Law – a model to read, know and obediently live by.
The ultimate example of this reality is in the heavenly family of God. John 1:12-13 tells us that, “as many as received Him [Jesus Christ as Savior and Lord of their life], to them He gave the right to become children of God, to those who believe in His name: who were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God.” So, in Matthew 6:9-10 Jesus tells us, “This, then, is how you should pray: “‘Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name, your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.” Creator God is our heavenly father and those who repent of sin, accept and receive Jesus Christ, who sacrificially took their place on the cross to pay for their sins, are His children. Romans 8:15 explains, “The Spirit you received does not make you slaves, so that you live in fear again; rather, the Spirit you received brought about your adoption to sonship. And by him we cry, “Abba, Father.”
Ephesians 4:4-6 proclaims the truth that “There is one body and one Spirit, just as you were called to one hope when you were called; one Lord, one faith, one baptism; one God and Father of all, who is over all and through all and in all.” Respect and obey your parents, both earthly parents and your heavenly Father God.
In Christ, Brian
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