8/14/2019 … “Honor Thy Father and Thy Mother.”... if Parents Were

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… “Honor thy father and thy mother.”... If parents werebad, the best honour the children can render them is tobecome better than they were. So that we may note, oncefor all … that the commandment recognizes it as incumbenton parents to see that their lives and rules are such as

their children can honour, and that their precepts accordwith those of the Father of spirits. …During the earlier stages of life, while needing the

fostering care and sheltering love of the home, implicitobedience is a child’s first duty. … The parent’s preceptsmay be distasteful, even rigid, but if they are right, itis the child’s part implicitly to obey. Honouring parents is the form which obedience will take

when the child is growing up towards manhood. No wiseparent would think of directing a lad of sixteen as closelyas he would a child of six years; at the same time, though

the father may give him more liberty, it may not be eitherwise or right on the son’s part to take all the libertywhich is given. At that age his own sense of honour andright ought to be sufficiently strong to guide him; andrespect and reverence for his parents will create a loyalregard to their wishes when once they are known, and willlead him to deny himself a great deal that might begratifying to him, rather than cause pain to or cross thewishes of those to whom he owes his life. Rude words to aparent … disputing his rule in the house, will be utterlyout of the question where a youth wishes to live in the

fear of God.Supporting them may become a duty. There will come a

time, if the parents are spared to see their children growup in life, when they will lean on the children, ratherthan the children on them. If the children are worthy,they will let their parents lean on them, and will showthem that they can be as faithful to their parents in theirweakness, as the parents when in their strength were tothem.

Becoming an honour to them is another way of honouringthem … by living so that they can feel proud of what their

children are, quite apart from what they do. If a fathercan say, “My son never gave me an uneasy thought abouthim,” that is such a testimony as a son might well wish himto be able to bear. …

We may honour our parents by honouring that holy marriagetie which made them what they were to us. … We may welldesire to honour them by taking on our lips that dear Namewhich gladdened them in life and sustained them in death.

8/14/2019 … “Honor Thy Father and Thy Mother.”... if Parents Were

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Obedience to parents is simply a piece of bare justice.For, consider how much we owe them. When we first cameinto being their care and watchfulness guarded and suppliedus long ere we knew aught. They thought us, perhaps,something wonderful, when no one else thought anything of

the kind, save in the reverse sense. Ought not all this tobe repaid? … It will be no small addition to the joy ofretrospect, if, as we afterwards look back on our homelife, we can think of it as one of filial loyalty on oneside and of parental delight on the other!

The Pulpit Commentary, Deuteronomy p. 95-97, Deuteronomy5:16, (C. Clemance)

Gold Nugget 302A Piece of Bare Justice

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