Geoff Hohneck
The Ten Commandments
Honouring Our Parents
Exodus 20:12
26 March 2017

Emphasizing our duty to both God and man, the fifth commandment reminds us to honour the authority God has given parents. Christ is the supreme example, who honoured His mother even while dying on the cross.

Respect is demanded and deserved. While our culture predominantly disparages authority figures, God has placed them for our good, and commands us to obey. Although being God, Jesus submitted Himself to his parents while he was a child, and held them in honour even until His death. As believers, we are commanded to do no less, and always esteem our parents. Because God has ordained them, to reject them is to reject God.

There is a reward that can be gained. The command of honouring parents comes with a general blessing, "that you may live long in the land the Lord your God gives you." It is not necessarily a promise of old age to every faithful believer, but an obedience that God will reward, whether on earth or in heaven's land. Submission to authority is always pleasing to the Lord.

May we be like Christ, and honour our mother and father.