FAMILY MATTERS

Exodus 20:1-17; Ephesians 6:1-4

Dr. Wm. J. Maxwell

First Presbyterian Church, Newport, RI

May 14, 2006

I think you would agree with me in a fairly safe assumption for us to make – that practically every pastor in the country is going to have something to say regarding mothers or family life on this special day called Mother’s Day.

There are so many passages in the Bible that speak of the nature and importance of family life and so many of them will be chosen for this special day. But as we look upon these brief but very succinct verses before us this morning, I believe that we will find a great deal for us to think about when it comes to parenting and family life. Let’s look at these instructions more closely as we consider “family matters” together on this Mother’s Day.

OUR BRIEF PASSAGE BEGINS

WITH A COMMAND FOR CHILDREN.

Children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right.

The children Paul has in mind, of course, are those who are young and still under the care and the supervision of their parents. He is not talking here about children of parents who are “of age” or in their adult years. He is talking instead of children under the care and the authority of their parents.

The first obligation God has placed upon children is that they should faithfully obey their parents. The Greek word here for “obey” means to heed, to respond to, to be subject to and to answer to. In this case, it simply means that children are to do what their parents tell them to do.

This is particularly important because the good order of the family unit depends upon it. You cannot have a family of “parents”, in which everyone has equal place and equal authority. God never designed the family to be this way, because this only brings disorder and chaos into the life of that family unit.

Logically, the parent, by reason of age, education and experience, is far more qualified to direct and guide the life of the child. And the goal, of course, is not to finally be able to be in charge over someone, but rather to seek the genuine welfare of the children entrusted to our care, and all out of the genuine love God has given us for our children.

Several years ago, my family and I joined with some others for a meal at a local restaurant in our community. In the midst of our conversation, my oldest daughter Kristen, a teenager at the time, shared with some others in my hearing that I was her “best friend.”

Now, I’ve been tremendously blessed by having a very close, loving and caring family – we are what some might call a “tight family” as our family bond is quite strong. So, I deeply appreciated what Kristen had said, because it revealed our closeness, and that she and I had some very open lines of communication. I was very proud.

But as I began to think about what she had said, I also became quite alarmed. I became concerned because, while the lines of communication should always be open, deep “friendship” should only occur after the child has become an adult, not during the childhood.

“Why?” you may ask. Because you cannot simultaneously, at the very same time, be both a friend and a parent, when your primary calling as a parent is to govern, direct, correct and supervise the life of your child or teenager. Friends don’t govern and supervise; parents do.

Parents are to give loving, yet firm, guidance, which requires at times saying precisely what that child or teenager does not want to hear and does not want to do! And yet parents are called to say precisely what that son or daughter needs to hear and needs to do.

At the age of adulthood and at the level of their own independence, our children can then live with us more on a level of parity, equality and “friendship.” While every stage of parenthood has its own joys, I must say that at this stage in my life, I am personally experiencing the joy of this level of relationship with my own children.

This way “is right” in the building of strong families, and when strong families are built, so are the communities and the nation in which they are found. As has been so often said by others, the building blocks for the nation are truly found in good, solid families.

OUR BREIF PASSAGE CONTINUES

WITH THE REMEMBRANCE

OF A COMMANDMENT WITH A BLESSING.

“Honor your father & mother” – which is the first commandment with a promise –

“that it may go well with you and that you may enjoy long life on the earth.”

Looking back upon the Ten Commandments, we find that this is the first one with a blessing attached to it. Of course, the first four commandments undoubtedly come with their own blessings. But this is the first one with a specific blessing connected to it.

The blessing is that children become more happy, useful, honest and upright if they submit to their parents’ authority, rather than live on a consistent path of disobedience. For their own benefit, then, children are called to obey and honor their parents. But what does “honor” really mean?

The Greek word used here for “honor” has the idea of fixing a price or value on something or someone. In this case, a high price or high value is inferred. And so, what we owe to good and faithful parents is honor, respect, credit and a sense of tribute.

Thaddeus Stevens practiced this sense of honoring one’s parents. Stevens was one of the most powerful political figures found in our nation during the Civil War. He was a Congressman from Pennsylvania who was a strong voice for the antislavery movement. When he died in office in 1868, he was buried in a Lancaster, PA cemetery that was open to each and every race. It has been said that this was intentionally done “for the reason, as his epitaph declares, that he might bear witness even in his death to those principles which he had advocated through a long life.” [i]

Not only did Stevens give witness to his enduring conviction that all have been equally created by our Creator, but he also gave witness to a deep love and abiding respect for his mother.

As a youth growing up in the state of Vermont, Stevens was feeble and frail, and lame to some degree. But his mother was nevertheless resolved and committed to seeing that her son would never be handicapped in other ways. At great personal sacrifice, she gave him a very good upbringing and the means of a good education as well.

Ever grateful for the love and sacrifice of his mother, the successful lawyer and Congressman honored her. He once wrote: “I really think the greatest pleasure of my life resulted from my ability to give my mother a farm of 250 acres and an occasional bright gold piece, which she loved to deposit in the contributor’s box of the Baptist church which she always attended.” [ii]

After his mother’s death and after his own death as well, Thaddeus Stevens continued to honor his mother. According to his last will and testament, money was set aside to insure that every springtime, “roses and other cheerful flowers” would be planted by her grave. Yes, Thaddeus Stevens understood the meaning of honoring one’s parents.

NOW, AS GOOD PARENTING

IS EXTREMELY IMPORTANT,

ONE MORE ADMONITION IS GIVEN TO US.

Fathers, do not exasperate your children;

instead, bring them up

in the training and instruction of the Lord.

Here, the command is directly addressed to fathers, because of the calling of the father to be the spiritual head of the house. But the application certainly applies to both the father and the mother.

Though parents do in fact have a rightful place of authority in the home, they are not to abuse their authority but are instead to exhibit the kind of character that makes it reasonable and fitting and even natural for children to obey.

Parents must avoid overseeing their children with unreasonable commands and needless severity. Parents should never run roughly all over their children and needlessly make them angry. When this kind of parenting occurs, as I have so often seen, they only end up making their children bitter and resentful, even into their adult years.

One of the ways in which parents provoke their children to deep frustration and even anger – often unconsciously, I think - is by seeking to shape their children into what they are not and in fact cannot be. It begins with the belief that all children come to parents as a kind of blank slate, ready to be programmed, like the hard drive on a computer simply awaiting the software to be programmed in. As parents force their own agenda, and often their own unfulfilled dreams and desires, the children only become deeply frustrated, irritable, and empty inside.

But in fact, children come to us with a certain “bent”, as Charles Swindoll notes so well:

In every child God places in our arms, there is a bent, a set of characteristics already established. The bent is fixed and determined before he is given over to our care. The child is not, in fact, a pliable piece of clay. He has been set; he has been bent. And the parents who want to train this child correctly will discover that bent! [iii]

There are some parents who discover the bent in their children, and who then work with them and encourage them. Max Lucado’s father, for example. He repaired oil field engines for his vocation and rebuilt car engines for a hobby. He was a master mechanic!

Max wasn’t like that, however, not at all. He had no love whatsoever for machines. If the two of were working together on a car, Max tells us that he’d soon fall asleep under the car!

But never once did his father say to him, “Why can’t you be like me and your granddad?” Instead, he watched his son carefully and noticed his love of reading and learning through books. What his father did do was give Max a library card, some books for Christmas, a lamp by his bed to read at night and college tuition to go to school. As a result, Max found his “sweet spot” and has flourished in life.

The now popular pastor and author thus gives the following guidance all parents should consider quite seriously:

Like no one else, parents can unlock the door to a child’s uncommonness. As parents, we accelerate or stifle, release or repress our children’s giftedness. They will spend much of life benefiting or recovering from our influence. [iv]

Now, as important as this is, let’s not forget the last admonition for Christian parents, and that is the obligation to bring children up “in the training and instruction of the Lord.”

Great importance is most certainly to be found in the training of children in how to behave as individuals and in company, in having a good education, and in the use of their own talents and skills. But just as important and in fact even more important is the call of parents to bring their children into a living, abiding relationship with the Lord Jesus Christ: by example, by prayer, by teaching, and by bringing and placing that child into the life and witness of the Church.

We have all heard the questions asked of the Richards this morning during their daughter Nicole’s baptism. Answering these questions not only in the affirmative, but also and especially in actual practice, will not only make a lifetime of difference for a child, but an eternity of a difference as well. Parents, above all else, we cannot fail our children here! Again I say, we cannot and must not fail them here!

In our passage for this morning, we’ve only had four verses for us to consider. And yet there is so much here for us to think about in terms of family matters, so much to prayerfully consider, and so much to apply, in that life of stewardship called parenting.