Fifth Commandment: Honor Authorities.

Honour thy father and thy mother: that thy days may be long upon the land which the LORD thy God giveth thee. Exodus 20:12

I have a little bit different take on this commandment, but I think a valid one.  I would love to hear what you think.

Our parents are the first authority God places over us.  They are to protect us, teach us, and guide us in how to live our lives.  God has placed on them the heavy task of bringing up an eternal soul in the ways he/she should go.  Parents shall answer to God on how well they accomplish this task.

We as children are commanded to honor this authority who God has placed over us.  I wondered what honor in the Hebrew meant so I looked it up and here are some of the definitions.

To make weighty, abounding, chargeable, glorify, very great, heavy, lay heavily, bring to, come to, noble, prevail, promote, be rich.

What our parents say should hold more weight than what anyone else says.  We are to honor their commands to us.  We are to let their commands prevail in our lives.  The only time we are not to obey them, would be when God’s commands are counter to their commands.

If they were terrible parents who neglected their children or abused them, the commandment still holds.  A Christian is called upon to love his enemies, even if that enemy turns out to be a parent.  That does not mean we get all buddy buddy with them.  It means we recognize them as our parents, and not speak badly of them, we do not seek revenge, and we give them help when possible.  It means letting God judge their actions for abusing the authority they were given.  It means forgiving our parents.  I know it is hard.  I have been there.

The promise to this commandment is that our days may be long upon the land which the LORD our God has given us.  Most people talk about this promise as it is given to an individual.  I see it as given to a nation.  A nation shall fall if its children do not honor their parents.

When a nation of children loses a sense of honor to their parents, they also lose that sense of honor to other authorities over them.  They do not honor and obey the laws of the land.  Police, their boss, government officials, and anyone else over them will be seen as people to be reviled and rejected.  God Himself is also rejected by them.  They become their own law on how to live.  They become their own God.

Our parents start us out in life and release us into the world with our first experience of authority.  How we view their authority effects how we view all other authority. If a nation of children does not respect authority, that nation is bound for destruction.  It will be a nation of self-serving,  godless people who will not be willing to sacrifice for others.

God wants us to honor our parents and in so doing, we will learn to honor Him.  We will then be able to have a relationship where we listen to Him and honor Him in our lives.  The first key (but not the only key) to having a loving relationship with God is learning to honor our parents.  If we do that, we shall live long in the nation that the LORD our God has given us.

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