Honoring one's parents with true heart
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 11996 |
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May 19, 2013 |
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 the Chinese proverb means that a tree wants to remain calm and still but wind continually blows. It really means that when one comes to understand his parents' hearts and try to honor them they have already passed away. Our parents gave birth to us and raised us. We would not exist without them. Then, what is the blessing given to those who honor their parents?
Ruth was a Gentile from the land of Moab. If we look at her physical circumstances, we would say that she was having a tough life. She married a Jewish man who had left Israel to avoid a famine. But not long after they were married, he passed away and left her without any children.
Her father-in-law had already passed away, and there was no man in the house to support the family. The only other people left in her household were her mother-in-law, Naomi, and her sister-in-law, Orpah. When her mother-in-law, Naomi decided to return to Judah and send her daughters-in-law to their own home, Ruth quickly chose to follow her.
Orpah went back to her home but Ruth wanted to care for her widowed mother-in-law to the end. Because she loved her mother-in-law, she wanted to fulfill all her duties as a daughter-in-law. To do this, she was even willing to give up the chance of finding a new, happier life for herself. Ruth had also come to have faith in the God of Israel through her mother-in-law. We can see her touching confession in Ruth 1:16-17.
"Do not urge me to leave you or turn back from following you;
for where you go, I will go, and where you lodge, I will lodge.
Your people shall be my people, and your God, my God.
Where you die, I will die, and there I will be buried.
Thus may the LORD do to me, and worse,
if anything but death parts you and me."
When God watched her deeds, even though Ruth was a Gentile, He blessed her and made her life prosperous. According to the Jewish custom, she could remarry one of her deceased husband's kinsman, and was able to start a new, happy life with a kind husband and live the rest of her life with her mother-in-law, whom she loved. On top of that, she gave birth to a child named Obed, grandson of King David, and thus her name is in the genealogy of the Savior Jesus.
Exodus 20:12 reads, "Honor your father and your mother, that your days may be prolonged in the land which the LORD your God gives you." This verse doesn't simply mean that you will live a long life if you honor your parents. It means that as much as you honor God and honor your parents in His truth, He will respectively bless you with prosperity and protection in all areas of your life. "Living long" means that God will bless you, your family, your workplace or business from every kind of disasters so that your life will be long and thriving. It was Ruth who received such blessing.
To "Honor your father and your mother" means to obey the will of your parents, and to serve them with sincere respect and courtesy. God gives us this commandment, "Honor your father and your mother," because as He mentions in Ephesians 6:1, "Children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right," He wants us to honor our parents according to His word.
If you happen to disobey God's Word in order to please your parents, then this is not truly honoring your parents. For example, if you're about to go to church on Sunday and your parents say, "Don't go to church today. Let's have some family time," then what should you do? If you obey your parents in order to please them, it's not really honoring them. It's violating the Sabbath day and going towards eternal death together with your parents. Even if you obey them and are in the service of them well in the flesh, since this is, spiritually, the way to eternal Hell, how can you say you truly love your parents?
In 2 Chronicles 15:16, it says, "He also removed Maacah, the mother of King Asa, from the position of queen mother, because she had made a horrid image as an Asherah, and Asa cut down her horrid image, crushed it and burned it at the brook Kidron." If the queen of one nation worships idols, she is being hostile toward God and walking toward eternal condemnation. Not only that, she is also endangering her subjects and the people of the nation by making them commit acts of idol worship and fall into the same eternal condemnation with her.
That is why, even though Maacah was his mother, Asa didn't try to please her by obeying her, but instead he deposed her from her position as queen mother so that she could repent of her wrongdoing before God and the people could wake up and do the same. But King Asa's deposal of his mother from her position as queen mother didn't mean he stopped fulfilling his duty as her son. As much as he loved her spirit, he continued to respect and honor her as his mother.
In order to say, "I truly honor my parents," we must help unbelieving parents to receive salvation and go to Heaven. If our parents are already believers, we must help them to enter into a better dwelling place of Heaven. At the same time, we should also try to serve and please them as much as we can within God's truth, while living here on earth.
Haven't you felt annoyed or talked and acted to your parents in a rude way because you thought their words do not make sense? Of course, conflicts in ideas could occur due to generation gap, education disparity, and each one's way of thinking. But we have to respect our parents' opinion even if it does not agree with our thoughts and opinions. Even if we are right, we should follow theirs if it does not go against the truth. Some people say they find it difficult for them to honor their parents because their parents had done nothing for them. But, it is still a fundamental duty of man to honor parents who gave birth to them.
- Excerpts from Dr. Jaerock Lee's Book The Law of God: Ten Commandments
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