God is saying: through no act of your own, I chose you, to show My love to you, in order to show the whole world that I'm a loving God. Welcome to being human again.
IntroductionIt's in that context that we read this scripture: “Honour your Father and your Mother.
Some of us would feel nauseated about that. As soon as we read that, there's this nausea feeling that comes over us; because our parents weren't honourable.
Some of us, our parents were good people; but whether our parents were good people, or not-so-good people, the command is the same: honour your father and your mother.
The obvious question exists: how do I honour someone who wasn't honourable? How do I do that? I hope to give you some things today that will help you with what honour means; and how you can continue to honour your parents, even if they're not honourable people.
Main MessageNobody's parents are perfect. My parents were good parents, great parents actually. My dad is up every single morning at 4.30 in the morning praying for me, for as long as I can remember. When I was a kid he got up about 5.45; then when I was a later kid he got up about 5.30; by the time I was a teenager he was getting up at 5.00; and now he gets up at 4.30. The other day he said something like: 4.15 comes early in the morning; and I thought: dad, if you keep getting up that early, by the time your 80 you're going to eat breakfast the night before! He's up every morning praying for me. It's an honourable thing - but dad wasn't perfect.
Dad was a Vietnam vet, who enjoyed scaring people. He thought it was hilarious to scare us. They were trying to teach me not to fall asleep again, after they woke me up. I'm not a morning person, so mum would wake me up, and shake me, and sit me on the side of the bed. I'd sit on the side of the bed, and I'd get comfortable and fall back to sleep.
So dad decided: I'm going to teach him not to do that; but he didn't tell mum about this, because mum wouldn't have allowed it, Mum just figured he was praying somewhere. He got up under my bed; so mum shook me awake, sat me up on the bed, and I'm sitting there, and he waited for me just to get relaxed - then he reached out and grabbed my feet! That was dad - and $2,000 in counselling later - here I am!
He loved to scare me. One day he put himself in my closet, and my closet opened like this. Kids believe that bogey-men live in the closet anyway, and dad opened my closet, and he put himself in there - and a crucifix. So I get up, it's like 6.15 in the morning, I'm 9 years old. I walk over to the closet to choose my clothes for the day, open the closet - and there's my dad. That was dad. He loved to scare us.
So my dad wasn't perfect, but dad was a good man. Mum was a good woman. She wasn't perfect either. You don't ever tell on mum. Listen, if you're here today: don't ever tell stories on your mum. It's not right! She gave you birth, so just kind of keep her stuff secret. Mum's perfect right. Mum's good!
My parents were great, so when I see “honour your father and mother” I think: okay, that's fair enough. But I know that there are people in this room who've been violated by their dad. I know there are people in this room whose mother left them to drink alcohol. They chose alcohol, over a life with you; and the pain and the brokenness and the empty spots that that left in your soul - to read something like “honour your father and your mother” - it makes you nauseous.
I think central to dealing with this is this question: Is God's way the best way or not? If you could go to heaven without Jesus, would you still follow Him? If heaven and hell wasn't the issue, is Jesus still worth following?
Hopefully the answer is yes. Hopefully you don't follow Jesus simply because He lets you into heaven. Hopefully you follow Jesus because you really believe that His way is the best way to live. Hopefully it's not a fire escape; hopefully you follow Jesus because you really believe that: the best way to receive is to be a giver. The best way to live is: to forgive people who hurt you.