Honor Your Father and Mother

Our confirmation classes are limping back into motion these days.  All of our WDC 8th grade students are under quarantine because of a close contact with a staff member who tested positive for COVID-19.  But we cobbled together a small group of awesome 7th graders and talked about the 4th commandment: Honor your father and your mother. 

This commandment transitions us from our first three commandments, which address our relationship with God, to the final 7 commandments, which address our relationship with our fellow humans.  And the command about honoring our parents makes it clear that this new set of commands begins in the home with our most fundamental of relationships: the relationship between parent and child.

Along with a healthy relationship with God, living an orderly life must also include a healthy relationship with our parents and with our children.  God commands that this relationship be built on respect, obedience, love, and service. 

Clearly, this is not always easy.  Sometimes our parents do things that frustrate us at best and injure us at worst.  Sometimes, our children seem hell-bent on disobeying us, even when our boundaries are in their best interest.  Sometimes there is strife in our homes so strong that it tears families apart. 

God doesn’t command honor in these closest of relationships because they are easy.  God commands integrity and honor between parent and child because these relationships are both hard and vitally important.  So we dedicate ourselves to seeking honor in these essential human relationships.  Strengthened by God, may children be nurtured and cared for, and may parents be honored and loved – even though these human relationship are imperfect.

As Luther explains this commandment, it is clear that this commandment also addresses our relationship with others who have authority over us.  And we’ll tackle that topic next time.

In the meantime, may God help us with patience, grace, and humilty as we tend to the relationships between us and our parents, and us and our children.

 

P.S. – Join us in the sanctuary!  This Sunday (10/25) is Reformation Sunday and next Sunday is All-Saints Sunday (11/1).  For All-Saints Sunday, we will be ringing the bell, lighting candles, and remembering those who have gone before us – and celebrating the newest saints among us through baptism.  We’re also going to brave the elements and lead a brief service of remembrance in the parking lot at 10am, too!  If you’d like to join us in the sanctuary, sign up by calling the church office or visiting our website: https://www.wadenaimmanuel.org/sanctuary-worship-registration. 

Check out our news page to learn more and for other important announcements: https://www.wadenaimmanuel.org/announcements

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