" IN HIS CARE FOR HIS CHILDREN, GOD GIVES THEM PARENTS TO SHOW THEM THE WAY OF SALVATION."

104. Q. What does God require in the fifth commandment?
A. That I show all honour, love, and faithfulness to my father and mother and to all those in authority over me, submit myself with due obedience to their good instruction and discipline,[1] and also have patience with their weaknesses and shortcomings,[2] since it is God's will to govern us by their hand.[3]
[1] Ex. 21:17; Prov. 1:8; 4:1; Rom. 13:1, 2; Eph. 5:21, 22; 6:1-9; Col. 3:18-4:1. [2] Prov. 20:20; 23:22; I Pet.2:18. [3] Matt. 22:21, Rom. 13:1-8; Eph. 6:1-9; Col. 3:18-21.

Scripture Reading:
Exodus 13:1-16
Ephesians 6:1-4

Singing:  (Psalms and Hymns are from the "Book of Praise" Anglo Genevan Psalter)
Psalm 22:8,11
Psalm 48:4
Psalm 34:5
Psalm 78:1,2,3
Hymn 45:3,4

Beloved Congregation of the Lord Jesus Christ!

Why should children obey parents? To put the question differently: why should parents insist that their children obey them? Or, for that matter, why should teachers insist on respect and obedience from the students at school?

The answer is simple, yet critical. Children must obey their parents, and parents must insist on obedience and respect because God said so.

Our culture, however, acts as if heaven is empty; God is not there. It follows: so God did not tell children to honor and obey their parents. If we are the result of evolution, humans have no more right to insist on children obeying parents than chimpanzees do. That, congregation, is why authority disappears in today’s western society. And what shall the consequence be? This: the next generation shall not live long in the land God has given us…. For God is there, and He has spoken.

Over against the drift of modern teaching I open with you all, older and younger, the word of our God in the fifth commandment. In His care and love for His children, He tells children to honor father and mother, and adds the promise that obedience to this command leads to long life on the earth.

I summarize the sermon with this theme:

From the top of the mountain the Lord God addressed the people below, and told them that He was the Lord their God, who brought this people out of Egypt. Their God: what age groups are we to think of? We see in the eye of our mind all these adults congregated around the mountain. Yet that’s obviously incomplete. At the foot of the mountain were also children. They as well as adults were included in God’s covenant and congregation; they were God’s children redeemed from bondage to Egypt as much as their parents.

All ten Words of the Covenant, then, were directed also to the children. Yet one commandment was pitched specifically at the youth, and that’s the fifth: "Honor your father and your mother." The question arises: why did God address the youth around the mountain with this command? Is the parent-child relation really so important for the well being of God’s people that it’s worth a commandment? The answer lies in the task that God had earlier given to the parents of Israel.

What task that was? Before the Lord sent the eighth plague upon Egypt, the Lord spoke these words to Moses: "Go in to Pharaoh; for I have hardened his heart and the hearts of his servants, that I may show these signs of Mine before him, and that you may tell in the hearing of your son and your son’s son the mighty things I have done in Egypt, and My signs which I have done among them, that you may know that I am the Lord" (Ex 10:1f). Notice: one reason for hardening Pharaoh’s heart is that Moses may have something to tell his son and his grandson. Yet the point is not limited to Moses: parents in Israel must tell their little ones of the stubbornness of Pharaoh’s heart; more, they must tell their boys and girls of God’s mighty deliverance from Egypt’s bondage.

The same thought arises in Ex 12. On the night of the Passover the Lord told the people to smear blood around the door of their homes, and then added that they were to repeat this ritual every year when they come into the Promised Land. Why? Says God: "And it shall be, when your children say to you, ‘What do you mean by this service?’ that you shall say, ‘It is the Passover sacrifice of the Lord, who passed over the houses of the children of Israel in Egypt when He struck the Egyptians and delivered our households’" (vs 26f). You see: the ritual had to be reenacted year by year so that parents would have opportunity to tell their children about God’s work of delivering Israel from bondage. That is the task of parents: they must tell.

Ex 13 repeats the point. In the Promised Land the people had to keep the Feast of Unleavened Bread year by year. Part of that feast was the removal of all leaven from the house, and a diet of unleavened bread for a full week. The people were to use the occasion, said God, to "tell your son in that day, saying, ‘This is done because of what the Lord did for me when I came up from Egypt’" (vs 8). So too in vs 14: "So it shall be, when your son asks you in time to come, saying, ‘What is this?’ that you shall say to him, ‘By strength of hand the Lord brought us out of Egypt, out of the house of bondage.’" Here was the obligation of parents: they had tell their children about God’s works of redemption!

In the book of Deuteronomy this task-of-the-parents is drawn out with greater clarity. I think of Dt 4:9f. Said God to the people through Moses: "Only take heed to yourself, and diligently keep yourself, lest you forget the things your eyes have seen, and lest they depart from your heart all the days of your life. And teach them to your children and your grandchildren, especially concerning the day you stood before the Lord your God in Horeb, when the Lord said to me, ‘Gather the people to Me, and I will let them hear My words, that they may learn to fear Me all the days they live on the earth, and that they may teach their children.’" What their eyes have seen? The reference is to the plagues in Egypt and the exodus itself, how God divided the Red Sea and drowned Pharaoh’s hosts. The reference is to God’s care for His people in the desert, how He supplied manna and water, clothing and protection, etc. These are the things the parents of Israel must teach to their children and grandchildren. But especially, says God, parents in Israel must teach their children about the events of Horeb (that’s Mt Sinai), when God made His covenant with this people and gave them His Ten Commandments, and all the laws about the tabernacle and the sacrifices which the people had to bring, etc – all of which spoke of the gospel of redemption in the blood of the coming Savior! That was the task of parents: tell, teach! God’s words, God’s works in the past were not to be forgotten, but to be passed on from generation to generation. And no, not only were parents to tell their children what they had experienced of God’s power and mercy in the exodus and in the desert; they were to tell their grandchildren also.

Nor were the parents and grandparents to speak of God’s works and words only once in a while, or, say, when the atmosphere was sort of religious-like. Dt 6:7: God told the parents emphatically that "you shall teach [My commandments] diligently to your children, and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, when you walk by the way, when you lie down, and when you rise up." "Teach", says God here, and the word that He uses means to impress, to drive the point home through repetition. That’s also why God says that His commandments –be it about the law itself, be it about the tabernacle and the sacrifices and the gospel of salvation embodied in the tabernacle- were to be points of conversation "when you sit in your house, when you walk by the way, when you lie down, and when you rise up," in other words, anytime during the day. They were not to wait for a particularly religious sort of moment, but were to speak of the Lord at any time, all the time. And that’s so understandable: God does not claim or involve Himself only in small sections of people’s lives, but He has authority over every square millimeter of all existence. So it is fundamentally wrong to exclude God from any area of life. In the kitchen and in the bedroom, when you watch TV or play computer games, when you drive down the road or go fishing: always God is with His people, more, always God is actively involved with His people and wants them to remember Him and to speak of Him. And God gives parents the responsibility to set the tone on this point; they have to make a point of speaking about their God and Savior, be busy with His service, any time, all the time (see also Dt 6:20ff).

So there was no place in Israel for so-called neutrality in education! In no way were the parents of Israel allowed to let the children decide for themselves what they would believe about God or how they would serve Him or even whether they would serve Him. Parents were to teach, parents were to tell, parents were to impress the gospel and commandments of God upon their children day by day, morning and evening, at work and at play.

Why? Because, brothers and sisters, these children of Israel were God’s children by covenant¸ as much as were the parents; God loved them! So those boys and girls had to come to know their Father in heaven and His saving work in Jesus Christ. How should they be taught, come to know God? In His love for those little ones, God gave them parents, themselves also covenant children of God who had seen much of God’s power and mercy and care. In His love for those little ones, God told those parents to speak with their children about their God and His words and works. Parents: they are God’s gift of love to His children!

But now a problem. Suppose the children of Israel, the teenagers, the boys and girls, thought their folk were too religious? We can see it happening: Dad speaking with his son about the unleavened bread they need to eat, telling about God’s work of deliverance from Egypt, but Junior’s heard it all before and he wants to go play – whittle a whistle, kick a ball…. So he rolls his eyes, and he taps his fingers on the table…. And Dad’s God-given task to teach –for God wants the next generation to know; it’s His love!- Dad’s God-given task to teach hits a frustrating wall of impatience or unwillingness to listen. Then what? Dad’s task is made impossible by the attitude of the son! And there you have the reason for the fifth commandment! That commandment God spoke specifically to the children of Israel is built upon and assumes the task God had already given to parents. With this commandment the Lord gives the youth of Israel the responsibility to be open to the good instruction of their parents.

What a wonderful display this commandment is, then, of God’s love for His people, also for the children! He is pleased to use parents to guide His youth to maturity in His service –for their salvation’s sake!- and that’s why He tells them to honor their parents. Truly, that is love, that is care. How foolish, then, how utterly, utterly foolish the youth who opt not to honor their parents, who go their own way! At bottom it’s rejecting God’s love! And in the end this dishonoring, this disobedience will hurt, hurt bitterly.

That brings to our second point:

This fifth commandment says more than that children are to honor their father and mother. At Mt Sinai already God attached a promise to this commandment. It’s this: "that you may live long in the land which the Lord your God is giving you."

God had just delivered His people from their bondage in Egypt, and the people were on their way to the land of Canaan. This land, God said, He would give to His people-by-covenant, freely. But the point, of course, is not only that you receive a land; you need also to keep it. And on this point the Lord mentions the fifth commandment. The younger generation would stay in the land that God would give to their parents? The key to keeping the land was that they as youth would honor, esteem, respect father and mother! You see: the children’s future happiness was tied to their obedience today to the fifth commandment!

Why, congregation, might that be so? The answer is not that difficult. The Canaanites had filled up the measure of their sins, and so the land spewed them out (Lev 18:25). If Israel would commit the same sins, the land would expel them also. Yet how could Israel keep from committing the same sins? They could be spared those sins only by serving the Lord faithfully. Yet how shall a new generation learn to know and serve God? How shall a new generation learn to follow not the desires of the sinful flesh, but to do what God wants? That’s the task of the parents! And that is why the attitude of the young people to their parents is so critical; if they are negative to their parents, critical of authority, intent on following their own heads, these children shall end up with a lifestyle as the Canaanites had – and so the land will spew them out. Conversely, if those youth recognize the care and grace of God in His gift of parents, and so esteem them highly, listen to them, learn the way of God from their parents, they shall become godly adults – and therefore be able to enjoy God’s blessing in the land of promise (cf Lev 26:3ff).

Now, it should be added straightaway: when children despise the fifth commandment and do not honor their parents, it is not correct to point a finger first at the youth. Though they most certainly have a responsibility (for the fifth commandment speaks specifically to the youth), it is to parents that God gave the charge to teach the children how to honor and obey. And parents by virtue of their greater maturity have a greater and a primary responsibility before God. Where parents do not insist that their children show them the honor God decreed, if parents do not teach their children how to obey, those parents are themselves the cause for their children’s wickedness. Let this be clear: if children do not learn to honor and obey parents they can see, how shall they ever honor and obey God whom they cannot see? Problems with the youth begin with the parents!

That God meant what He said about His promise to the parented is clear from Israel’s history. Parents were the tools God was pleased to use to teach the next generation the way of the Lord. But generation after generation in Israel did not appreciate the teaching of parents about the Lord, and chose to serve God in their own way or even to serve other gods. The result was, eventually, the exile; the land spewed out God’s people by covenant. The children did not live long in the land that the Lord gave them….

That is why the obedience of our Lord Jesus Christ to His parents is so rich in gospel. Luke tells us emphatically that our Savior "was subject" to Joseph and Mary, His God-given parents (Luke 2:51). He knew: His Father in heaven was pleased to teach Him the way of the Lord through these two people. So He honored them, esteemed them, was obedient to them. The result? He did learn the way of the Lord, learned how to live as God’s child in this world, learned how to obey even at cost to Self.

Does that mean that Jesus lived long in the land God gave Him? No, it doesn’t. For the sins of all those children of the Old Testament against the fifth commandment (and the New Testament dispensation too) were piled onto Him, and that means that God saw Him as Sin personified – and therefore He had Him exiled from the land. That’s why He went to the cross, there to be crucified, cursed, killed. He took the penalty that parents deserve because of failure to tell the children persistently enough and faithfully enough of their God in heaven. He took the penalty that children deserve because of their failure to honor Dad and Mom properly, and their failure to obey all that they say. He took the penalty, so that covenant youth of Old and New Testament alike might live long on the earth – as Paul says it to the Ephesians (6:1ff). You and I, and our little ones, shall by God’s grace live forever on this earth, for the New Jerusalem shall come down from heaven to earth, and here God shall live with man to all eternity.

That, brothers and sisters, younger and older, is the promise in the fifth commandment today: honor your father and your mother because God is pleased to use them to bring you to salvation, to bring you to the New Jerusalem! Eternal life on this earth with God Himself: that is the reward God in mercy is pleased to give to those who keep the fifth commandment, who accept in faith that God has given parents –these parents!- so that He might lead me to life eternal.

So I say it again: how foolish, how utterly, utterly foolish those who disobey or dishonor their parents, who choose to go their own way! The bit of freedom they think they experience now will lead –unless God intervenes- to the eternal slavery of hell. It’s not worth it.

We come to our last point:

The role that God has given to parents in His kingdom, then, is manifestly a critical and most responsible one. How are parents now to carry out that role?

I referred earlier to that passage from Dt 6, where the Lord told the parents of Israel to speak with their children about the commandments of the Lord "when you sit in your house, when you walk by the way, when you lie down, and when you rise up" (vs 7); any time and all the time the parents were to speak with their children of the Lord and His service. Then the question arises: isn’t that overdone? Doesn’t that turn the children off?

It’s a danger, congregation, of which we need to be acutely aware. The answer, however, is not found in taking something away from God’s instruction in Dt 6:7; that command comes from God and so must stand. The answer lies instead in one’s manner of living. You see: if the children sense that in certain activities or parts of the day we live at arm’s distance from God, and yet speak of God all the time, they detect a hypocrisy in us, an untruthfulness, a tension between what we say and what we do – and that will turn them off. To correct the problem we’re not to speak less of God; to correct the problem we’re to live more deliberately and consciously with the awareness that God is beside us all the time. The children, for example, know that we are not to take God’s name in vain. But if they notice parents contently watching programs where God’s name is taken in vain, then to their minds it is hypocrisy for parents to speak about God when the TV is on. And as parents we feel it too and then speaking about God feels forced, artificial…. So the answer is: do not contently watch that program.

This is the sort of thing that Paul means when he tells the fathers of Ephesus not to "provoke your children to wrath" (6:4). The parents’ lifestyle has to be consistent with the gospel, and is not to give a confusing signal to the children. Where the lifestyle gives a confusing signal, where parents say one thing but do something else, or demand of their children more than they themselves do, the children get turned off, fed up, disheartened, embittered with religion, angry. It is the parents’ duty to ensure that this does not happen, and that is why the manner of parenting is so important. And critical to the manner of parenting is that parents are good examples of godliness. Where parents model the gospel when they sit in the house or walk by the way, there the parents have the moral right to speak of the gospel when they sit in the house or walk by the way. The older generation needs to walk with God all the time, and then they are able to talk about God anytime – be it to their children or their neighbors.

Again, it is not just parents who then have the ‘right’ to speak with children about the Lord and His service. I quoted earlier from Dt 4, how the parents of Israel were to tell their children and their grandchildren of the Lord’s words and works. Today too also grandparents have an obligation to those who come after them in the generations. Empty nesters, grandparents, have accumulated so much knowledge of God in their lives, and accumulated too so much experience in the struggles of life and living as God’s children, and these are things they need to speak about with the Lord’s covenant youth – be it their grandchildren or others. That generation gap the world used to talk so much about simply may not exist in the church of God; God uses the older, gives them a task, to train up the younger!

Here is a point that needs consideration. We look at young people in general in the churches, and yes, there is much for which to be thankful. But we also hear things from time to time that gives cause for concern. How much do the young people read? Do their contributions to church and school, to Fairhaven and Eucalypt, etc, show that they understand the need for church and school, for assisting the aged and the infirm? How much at home do the youth feel in this world? If there is a problem with any of these things, the first question needs to be: are the older generations addressing the youth on it? Let us face it: folly is bound up in the heart of the child (Prov 22:15), and so parents and grandparents have an ongoing obligation to speak, always to speak with the youth! Maybe here’s a problem with mothers increasingly joining the workforce: do they have adequate time and energy to speak with their young people (and those of other families) about the service of the Lord? And maybe here’s a problem with fathers being so busy with all kinds of obligations: do they have adequate time and energy to speak with their young people (and those of other families) about the works and words of God? And maybe here’s a problem with grandparents being occupied with coffee visits: do they take time and save energy to speak with their grandchildren (and other youth) about the promises of God – and so share the wisdom they have accumulated over the years? Indeed, do the youth see the older generations sharply focused on God and His service, or do they see the older generations living for today’s comforts – be it with a Christian veneer laid on top?

A related matter comes up in connection with the above. May a parent who is a drunk or lazy or abusive insist upon obedience? Better: does the Lord require that children obey sinful commands? The answer is easy, for "we ought to obey God rather than men" (Acts 5:29).

The matter, however, is deeper. The task of the parent is to show the children the way of salvation. But if a parent lives a life of sin, he sabotages his own ability to carry out his God-given duty. More, he leads his children away from God instead of to God. Then yes, children still need to show honor to such a parent, but No, the parent may no longer insist that the children listen to him when he tries to speak about the Lord. For his life gives the lie to his words.

Here, I submit, is also where others need to step in. Where parents loose the ‘right’ to tell their children about the way of the Lord, how shall these children learn the way of the Lord? For –make no mistake- they need to learn; they are God’s children by covenant! Here the wider family (grandparents, uncles, aunties) needs to offer its help, be it in addressing the sinning parent(s), be it in giving extra attention to the children. Here also is a task for the church community. After all, when a child is baptized, the whole congregation is called upon to witness the event for a reason, and to pray with and for the parents too, and that reason is that we all are out (little) brother’s keeper.

Why should children obey parents? God told them to, told them to because He loves His children-by-covenant, and is pleased to use parents to bring the little ones to maturity in Him. So the task of the parents and the role of the child is very much a matter of faith. We believe God ordained the family, we believe God loves us in Christ, and so we make it our business, in the strength of the Holy Spirit, to be the families God wants us to be. Amen.