The Big Ten: A Family Affair
In case you don’t know Diane Hudok,
Joe’s description of her is a complete fabrication of the truth. Well we are on
number five of our Ten Commandments, halfway through. Today’s commandment is
Honor your father and your mother, so that your days may be long in the land
that the Lord your God is giving you. God here is using the idea of being
faithful to your parents as a kind of metaphor for
Now this commandment would be super
easy to follow, except for one problem: are parents are all human. Our parents
make mistakes. Do you remember the point at which you realized that your
parents were imperfect? Or maybe the first time your parents had to apologize
to you, because they had messed up? There’s this show one TV right now called,
“My Dad is Better than Your Dad.” And basically, there are four dads with their
kids, and they are given different challenges, involving strength, knowing
about their kid, bravery, and general knowledge. And you know maybe it’s great
for the kid that wins, but I can see it on the faces of these other kids when
their dad loses, and they try to smile and say, “I’m still proud of my dad,”
but you can see it on their faces: I can’t believe my dad didn’t win. And you
can see something inside of them almost dying, like their view of their dad
will never be the same again, and it’s almost heartbreaking. But you know, I
guess that’s life. We all find out sooner or later that our parents are not perfect,
that they mess up.
I found out my dad wasn’t perfect one
year on our way to
We didn’t say anything. We just sat
there, dripping with sweat, our necks hurting from the constant whiplash. And
my mom turns and looks at me and says, “You need to go calm your dad down.” I
said, “Uh…ok.” I didn’t have the fainted idea of what to say. How is a son
supposed to give their father a talking-to? But I didn’t care I wanted out of
that van, which was about to a broiling temperature by this time. I got out,
and I found a Frisbee. And I walked around to the hood, where dad was peering
through the radiator steam. Or it might have been the steam coming out his
ears. And I said, “Dad…want to throw a Frisbee?” At first he looked at me as if
I had totally lost my mind, but then I saw him realize what was going on. He
was supposed to be on vacation. Instead, he had been very tense with his family
in an overheated van for the last hour and a half. Not a great way to start the
relaxation. So he said, “Sure,” and we threw a Frisbee in the parking lot while
the van cooled down. And he apologized for losing his cool, just like the van
did.
That story has become like a legend in
my family. Every time we get together, someone says, “Hey, remember when the
van stalled on the bridge?” And today we laugh about it. But I tell that story
for a very serious reason. You see I love my dad. And when we are children, we
may have this idea that our parents are perfect, but when we find out that they
are not, we all react differently. Sometimes its relief, like we were worried
that we would never be able to live up to what our parents have becomes.
Sometimes we just take it in stride, like it is just another fact of life. But
I think all too often we get jaded, and its like we are disappointed.
I know far too many people who either
have a horrible relationship or no relationship at all with their parents.
Sometimes it is the kid’s fault, sometimes it is the parent’s fault, but
usually the blame can rest on the shoulders of both parent and child. And over
the last few decades we’ve started to get this idea that whatever is wrong with
me is my parent’s fault. If I’m a bad person, it is because my dad didn’t hug
me enough. Or I’m the way I am because it is how I was raised, so it’s not my
fault I’m in jail. My parents messed me up. And it’s almost like parents can’t
win anymore. So we see parents today who let their kids just get away with
anything, partly because we are afraid of messing them up, so we just stay
hands off, and partially because we feel guilty that our busy schedules keep us
away from our kids, so when we are with them, we don’t want to be disciplining,
we want to be having fun. But it’s not getting any better.
Let me tell you something, and this is
not a revolutionary idea, it is just an observation. You know, I hear adults
say all the time, “I can’t believe the way my kid acts,” or, “kids today are so
disrespectful.” Now, that’s not true in all cases, but it does seem to be a
general trend. And we can blame it on all sorts of things, like being too busy
for our kids and not disciplining enough and all of that, but look: every adult
knows that our parents are the strongest influence on who we are today, right?
So let me ask you this, and it may strike a nerve for you: How well are you
honoring your father and mother? Because that’s where they are going to learn
it from. I truly believe that if you want you kids to honor you, you should set
an example for them by honoring your parents. And I realize for some of you,
your parents have passed. When you talk to your kids about your parents, do you
honor them, or dishonor them?
Bear in mind, honoring doesn’t equal
agreeing with. It doesn’t mean worshipping or always getting along with. But
honoring means you have respect for someone, that you place a high value on
their life and what they have to offer.
One of the biggest influences in my
life in honoring my parents has been watching my dad in his relationship with
his dad. My dad and grandpa farmed together for a long time. They often clashed,
didn’t see eye to eye on everything. I know sometimes it was hard for dad to
work with him. But he did it, because he knew grandpa couldn’t do it by
himself, and even when they didn’t agree, grandpa’s words carried a lot of
weight in my dad’s mind.
It has also been important for me to
watch my dad’s relationship with my mom’s mom. After my mom’s dad passed away,
my dad stepped in to help take care of her. He still goes over to her house
every week to help her do whatever chores she needs done and makes sure that
everything is alright with her. He has really honored her.
Your relationship with your parents,
or lack thereof, will have a profound influence on your child’s relationship
with you. Now maybe you are like Joe, and you just feel like your parents are
not worthy of being honored. By the way, I know that Joe definitely does not
feel this way. He has great parents and I’ve seem him honor them very much. But
maybe your parents…aren’t so great. Maybe they are the exact opposite of what
you aspire to be. Maybe they’ve even been abusive. First of all, if that’s the
case, get some counseling, some sort of help, and work through those issues.
But I truly believe that even the worst of parents can be honored in some way,
if for no other reason than just for giving you life. God did not put any
qualifiers on this commandment, liked, “Honor your parents, as long as they are
good parents.” Or “Honor them as long as you get your way” or “Honor them until
they are old enough to go to a nursing home.” He just said, “Honor your father
and mother.” Nobody has perfect parents. There were as many rotten parents back
in the days of Moses as there are today. And the commandment is the same for
all of them, good or bad: honor them.
Now you might have noticed, I added a
few verses from the New Testament in here today, because I think they go hand
in hand. Wives, be subject to your husbands, as is fitting in the Lord.
Husbands, love your wives and never treat them harshly. Children, obey your
parents in everything, for this is your acceptable duty in the Lord. Fathers,
do not provoke, or some translations say, exasperate your children, or they may
lose heart. That was Colossians 3:18-21. Look, just as our children are
watching us in how we treat our parents, they are watching all of our
relationships, and they are more than likely going to imitate them, because it
is what they know. I love these verses about husbands and wives. Wives, be
subject to your husband, husbands, love your wives, never treat them harshly.
Now I want to tell you, and I can say
this because Holly is downstairs, that I am a firm believer that the man is the
head of the household. Every now and then, men, we need to put our foot down
and make a decision. Rarely, though. Hardly ever. Most times, it is best to
work things out together. Now there has been one or two times in our marriage,
I may have shared this before, where I have had to step in and put my foot down
and make a decision. And it usually goes something like this. “Holly, I am your
husband, and the head of this household. And I am making a decision. You are
going to go and sit down, and I am going to do the dishes. And that’s final.” I
have the power! And I say that somewhat tongue in cheek, but that has really
happened. Sometimes as the husband you have to make those calls. We are not the
dictators of the family, we are the caretakers of the family. Our family is our
responsibility. So wives, when you husband tells you to sit down so he can cook
dinner, you’d better listen!
Children, obey your parents, we’ve
kind of been talking about that already. Obedience is a part of honoring. But
this last verse I think is crucial to us today: Fathers do not exasperate your
children, or they may lose heart. And I think we can add mothers into this verse,
too.
A while back our Sunday School class
watched a DVD on Christian parenting, and a guy told a story about forcing his
kid to eat something he didn’t want to eat, but you know how parents are, and
the kid choked it down, made a face, and almost threw up, and he started to
laugh. Well his son got angry and retaliated in a not-so-nice way. First
instinct is, “You don’t treat your father that way!” But he had exasperated his
son, he had put him in a no-win situation. And I think we do this with our kids,
too. We put lots of pressure on them. Grades, sports, activities, earn that
trophy, get on the honor roll, Ivy League schools, and at some point, our kids
get frustrated, they lose heart, they are exasperated. And they rebel. They
stop trying to meet our expectations. And we wonder why. We figure they must
just be a bad apple, maybe the next one won’t be a failure, right? No, we have
caused them to lose heart. We have provoked them to it. The point is this: if
you want your kids to honor you, you have to be honorable. Be honorable in the
way you deal with your parents, with your spouse, with your children, in
everything you do. Your job. If you are an honorable person, it makes it a
whole lot easy for your children to honor you.
And I’ve said to you before, these
commandments all reveal God’s love to us in one way, shape, or form. Honoring
your parents, and your whole family, I believe gives us the closest glimpse
we’ll get here on earth to experiencing the love that flows in the family of
God. Honoring your father and mother especially can give you a taste of what
it’s like to be loved by God. And if you can honor someone who is imperfect and
you can experience the love that reciprocates from them, how much greater will
it be to receive the love that comes from honoring God?
Families are a gift, especially our
parents. They are a gift from God. I’m so thankful that God looked and saw that
it was not good for man to be alone. I’m so glad God created families. I’m glad
God saw that it’s a good idea for children to spend the first part of their
lives in the care of their parents. They are a gift from God.
Look, Mother’s Day is coming up, and
Father’s Day isn’t too far after that. If you haven’t been honoring your
parents, you’ve got some great opportunities coming up. They’ve given you life,
a life that is a gift from God, and a life that is so valuable to God, that he
was willing to sacrifice his own son, just to save you.
Pastor
Dan Metzger
Van
Buren United
Van
Buren, Ohio