Honor Your Father and Your Mother

Thank you for that lovely music. Greetings to all of you. Good to be back with you. Once again, greetings to all those on the Cybercast and those on the CD circuit and wherever else. I spoke in Cape Girard Rock two weeks ago, and on Friday I called over and he said, by the way, don't give this sermon this sermon this one because we already heard them. So, thanks. So, created another one. It's always fun when you speak here because it goes out and you don't know where. It kind of uses up your sermon. You can't give it anywhere else. But that's life. My name is Mr. Armstrong. It was the last few years when he was really trying to get the work done. And I'd have a day off where he didn't really schedule anything that day, and he'd say, you're just wasting my time. I need to get busy. Then we'd have two things scheduled in one day, and he'd say, you're trying to kill me. I'm bold. I can't do this. Can't win. So, it's fun. But they have me speaking all the time, not trying to get their money's worth out of me. But it's all about the supposed to help each other. And I appreciate that. I spoke last week in Big Sandy, Texas, and the congregation was back down there again to do some work and work on my house and also work on payroll and some other things that we're trying to transfer back to the home office. So, there's still some tie-ins there. Of course, it's always good to see friends and family in different places. It's funny. My son had a son six months ago tomorrow, so my grandson is almost six months old, shy one day. And it's fun when I look at him, because I think of all the things that I enjoyed when he was born. All you parents know exactly what I'm talking about. And I've titled this sermon, Mr. Griffith. He wanted it earlier, but I didn't have it done. So, I've titled it, Honor Your Father and Your Mother. In the sample prayer that Jesus gave when he said, Our Father, which art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. He was having us honor His Father and our Father spiritually. Like I said six months ago, our first grandchild was born. Grandchild we never expected, because we never expected to have children. And it was a blessing, even though we'd been willing to give up children in service to God. We didn't expect this, and we often misread things that God has for us as to timing. Things that will happen, but we don't always know exactly when they're going to happen. And even if they're going to happen sometimes. But that doesn't change God's plan or what it does. It just proves that we're human. And each of us has to learn those things. There's lessons that all of us are being taught by God that we don't understand as we go through life and wonder why. Every time I go to Texas, I wonder why the day before I leave something bad always happens. I have to quit going there or leave two days earlier. The first time I went there, a tree fell on my boathouse and collapsed it. And then this time, the day before, the bearings went out in the front and right wheeled the car. They started making noises, and so I had to wait an extra day to come home. And also a pipe broke under the sink, which kind of surprised me. But things like that happened. It was a good thing I was there to fix it. But it teaches you that things happen unexpectedly, and you have to look at how do you take care of them. But life is a miracle. It's something very special. It's the greatest gift that God has given to two people physically when they get married to have children, to be able to raise children, to understand what family God is all about.

And all of us who've experienced birth bear witness to that fact that it's something so very, very special in our lives. As I watched my son being born and my son in the C-section, so it was a different experience than it was with my daughter. I mean, because I usually don't like blood, but if I just had something educational about it, or I guess we get something out of it like a son, it's okay. But my wife is a little tougher on her. I remember I was teaching child growth and development at the time, and the kids asked if your wife could get a hold of the baby. And she had an epidural and C-section, and she was kind of shaking. And I said, no, they couldn't give it to her because she couldn't hold it. So I got it. And of course, my son came out blue because he wasn't squeezed through the channel. He was perfectly foreign, but blue. And they had him on the table, baking him a little, getting warm. And you're sitting there trying to breathe for him. You know, come on, breathe. And finally they cry, and it makes you feel real good because life is there. But it scares you at first. But it's interesting now that I get to watch my son, and he watched his son be born. It was a lot easier at birth than his was, natural. But as I watched him, and I thought of Jesus Christ when he talked in John 10, where he said, my sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me. And watching my grandson, the last couple of visits, when he hears his father talk to him, he turns and smiles.

When he hears his mother, he starts licking his lips, which is only appropriate because that's where dinner comes from.

But now he must begin what I learned as a child, when each of us had, in Exodus 20, verse 12. When we read the fifth commandment, where God says, Honor your father and your mother, that your days may be long on the land which the Lord your God gives you.

It's a simple command, it would seem. Turn to Matthew 15, though.

Because it's simple, yet by the time of Christ, even such a simple command had changed in the minds of the people there.

In Matthew 15, verse 1, it says, Then came to Jesus scribes and Pharisees, which were of Jerusalem. And they said to him, Why do your disciples transgress the tradition of the elders? For they washed not their hands when they eat bread. And the answering said to them, Why do you also transgress the commandments of God by your traditions? For God commanded, saying, Honor your father and your mother, and he that curses father and mother, let him die the death. But you say, Whosoever shall say to his father or his mother, it is a gift. By whatsoever you might be profited by me, and honor not his father and his mother, he shall be free. It doesn't have to. Thus you have made the commandment of God of no effect by your tradition. It actually changed God's command. Now, they wouldn't necessarily say that if you ask them. They wouldn't believe they changed it. Verse 7, he continues, There's me with their lips, but their heart is far from me. Yeah, they wouldn't have said that. They didn't know that. They would have said, We're close to God. What does Christ say next? In vain do they worship me, teaching for doctrines the commandments of men. Give me excuses for breaking the commands, so that you can give it to the temple. It's okay. In vain. And then he called them, and he said to them, Hear and understand. Verse 11, that which goes into the mouth doesn't defile a man, but that which comes out of the mouth defiles him. Again, referring back to what they were saying, the washing. They didn't wash their hands. Something that simple. And his disciples came and said, Don't you know the Pharisees were offended by your sayings? A lot of people are offended by the truth when it disagrees with what they want. Sadly, are we that way? Something disagrees with us. Are we offended? Christ said, Every plant which my heavenly Father is not planted shall be rooted up. If it doesn't come from this book, doesn't come from Scripture, is not part of God, it gets torn up. It doesn't last. And he said in verse 14, Leave them alone. Let them be blind leaders of the blind. If the blind lead the blind, they both shall fall in the ditch. For six thousand years, most of mankind has fallen into the ditch. And even his disciples didn't really understand. Peter said to him in the next verse, Declare unto this parable. And Jesus said, Are you also without understanding? Do you not understand that whatsoever enters the mouth, goes into the belly, and is cast out? It goes to waste. But those things which proceed out of the mouth come forth from the heart, and they defile the man. Spiritual things. For out of the heart proceeds evil thoughts, murders, adulteries, fornication, thefts, false witness, blasphemies, all those come from the heart. All the bad things start with a thought. They come from within. And that's what we have to control. To honor God, we have to be as He is and keep His commandments. Are we like God the Father? Are we like the God of this world? Satan the Devil. Turn to 2 Corinthians 6. God wants to be our Father. He wants us to look to Him and be like Him. And to truly honor Him, especially in our choices that we make. 2 Corinthians 6.

Begin in verse 14. Spas be you not unequally yoked together with unbelievers. For what fellowship hath righteousness with unrighteousness? What communion has light with darkness? They're opposites. To be in God's presence, we know we read that sin cuts us off from God. To be in God's presence, you have to be in the light, keeping His commandments and righteousness. Verse 15. What concordest Christ with Baal? Or what part has He with He that believes with an infidel? And what agreement has the temple of God with idols? And we are the temple of God. For you are the temple of the living God. As God has said, I will dwell in them and walk in them, and I will be their God, and they shall be My people.

You indeed are a temple. Do you honor God with your temple? Wherefore come out from among them and be separate, says the Lord, and touch not the unclean thing, and I will receive you. And I will be a father unto you. In verse 18. And you shall be My sons and daughters, says the Lord Almighty. We are God's sons and daughters.

If we can stay away from those things. Be separate. Again, we're in the world physically. It doesn't mean that. And you should be a light shining for those people. But don't partake the things they partake. That's honoring God. All of you know when your fathers and mothers told you, don't do this, don't do that. When you did it, you knew you weren't honoring them. You knew we were going to obey. Same thing when we break God's law. We know we're not honoring God.

Over in 2 Corinthians 7, verse 1. Having therefore these promises, dearly beloved, let us cleanse ourselves from all filthiness of the flesh and spirit, perfecting holiness in the fear of God. Perfecting holiness. What a concept. What a difficult thing. Turn to John, chapter 8, if you would. Perfecting holiness is difficult. But it's what he's asking us to do. It's a big challenge. And it often comes with self-deception. So many people deceive themselves, like the Pharisees and the Sadducees, who thought they were obeying God and creating their traditions and things, trying to make it even tighter and not realizing they were watering down God's commandments by the things that they thought were appropriate.

And like the innkeeper in Chris Rowlands, could have done those things in the sermonette. You can be deceived. But to honor God, we must really know the Father. You have to understand Him. And not just think we know Him, because people thought they knew Him all through the centuries. John 8, verse 39, Christ answering them said to them, they answered Christ, said to Him, Abraham is our Father.

We have Abraham. He's our Father. We know Abraham. Abraham, the Father, the faithful. We know God, therefore. Jesus said to them, If you were Abraham's children, you would do the works of Abraham. A lot of people claim a name and don't do what that person said. But now you seek to kill me, a man that has told you the truth, which I have learned of God. This did not Abraham. Abraham didn't do this.

He didn't learn from God. He actually learned from Christ. You do the deeds of your Father. And they said to Him, We are not born of fornication. We have one Father, even God. So they accused Him. They belittled Him. Said something that was untrue, something that would hurt all of us to be called things that were not true. But Jesus said to them, verse 42, If God were your Father, you would love Me. If truly God were your Father, you'd understand what I'm saying, and you would love Me. For I proceeded forth and came from God, neither came I of Myself, but He sent Me.

Do we see that Christ has been sent for us? And He said, verse 43, Why do you not understand My speech? Even because you cannot hear My word. You are of your Father the devil. I'm sure they bristle at this. Just as you might if someone said something like that. Just like when we do something wrong. But you are of your Father the devil, the lust of your Father you will do. He was a murderer from the beginning and a bode not in the truth, because there is no truth in Him.

It's interesting. Satan was a murderer, and these very people that he talked to ended up murdering him. And like they said, they did the deeds of their Father. When Satan speaks a lie, he speaks of his own, for he is a liar and the father of it. But because I tell you the truth, you believe Me not. Which of you convinces Me of sin? They couldn't convict Christ of anything, because He hadn't sinned and didn't sin.

If I say the truth, why don't you believe Me? He that is of God hears God's words, and therefore you don't hear them, because you are not of God. You don't truly honor your Father and your Father, you don't keep the commands. Let's get down to verse 55. Yet you have not known Him, but I know Him. And if I should say I know Him not, I would be a liar like you.

But I know Him, and I keep His sayings. Do we keep the sayings of God? Do we keep the things that we know to do? The way that we should do them is difficult. Christ, when He was talking about that, knew how Satan acted, how Satan deceived, what Satan did. Ezekiel 28, 12, turn there. Let me read about that, how Satan was deceived, how he was set up, how he quit honoring God. Ezekiel 28, verse 12.

It talks about the fall. It says, Son of man, take up a lamentation of the King of Tyre and say to Him, Thus says the Lord God, You seal up the psalm full of wisdom and perfect in beauty. If you think you have wisdom and beauty, here He had it greatly. Did it help Him? You have been in Eden, the Garden of God. Every precious stone was recovering. The sarda, topus, diamond, barrel, onyx, jasper, sapphire, emerald, carbox, gold. The workmanship of your tabaret and of your pipes was spared in you in the day that you were created. He was created perfect and beautiful.

You are the anointed carob that covers, and I have set thee so. You were on the holy mountain of God. You walked up and down in the midst of the stones of fire. You were perfect in your ways from the day that you were created, till iniquity was found in you. He was perfect. He was beautiful. He sounded great. Till iniquity was found in Him.

He corrupted His beauty. He filled the earth and the universe with sin and with destruction, unfortunately. Why? Verse 17, Your heart was lifted up because of your beauty. You have corrupted your wisdom by reason of your brightness. I will cast thee to the ground and lay you before kings, that they may behold you. Those kings that will behold Him will be us. We are to be kings and priests if we honor our God.

Satan quit honoring God. His wisdom and His beauty, he thought, were better than God's. Isaiah 14, a parallel description. O Lucifer, who became Satan. Isaiah 14, verse 12, How are you falling from heaven, O Lucifer, Son of the morning? How are you cut down to the ground, which did weaken the nations? Teach people to think of themselves before others, to not esteem God, their Father. For you have said in your heart, I will ascend into heaven, I will exalt my throne above the stars of God.

I will sit also upon the mount of the congregation on the sides of the north. Verse 14, I will ascend above the heights of the clouds. I'll be like the Most High, or I will be the Most High. He thought he could be the Father. No longer able to have the humility that He needed, He is a created being, created perfect, but rising up in that perfection to think He was more than He was.

Satan did not honor His Creator. He did not obey God. He looked at Himself. He became entitled in His own mind. I am so beautiful, I am so perfect. He thought He could provide for Himself. Sadly, humans often think that. They think they can provide for themselves. When everything we have is temporal, our physical life is temporal, everything we build, everything we do, in moving you collect a lot of junk that you find out you really don't need, you end up throwing it away, things that were so precious at one point in time you couldn't do without it.

You think about how much money you'd have now if you'd never bought all those things that you threw away. Yeah, a lot better off. That's what we accumulate. But I've seen people think they can provide for themselves spiritually. People who think they understand God, think they have humility, perhaps. But somehow they get entitled and think that they're entitled to something that God doesn't have in store for them.

And He's going to give us things and do things to us to find out where we stand with Him. Turn to Matthew 6, if you would. Who does provide for us? God provided everything in creation for us. When I look at our young men and young women, look at the church, look at my son and his wife providing this physical and spiritual needs for his family and each of you with yours and the many children we have in this congregation, I see God our Father providing for me and for you and for each of us.

Matthew 6, verse 25. Therefore I say to you, take no thought for your life. Hard to do. Very hard to do. What you shall eat, what you shall drink. We all think about what we can eat and drink. Nor yet for your body what you shall put on. Is not the life more than meat and the body more than raiment? It is important you dress appropriately, but it's not to show off or others.

It's not about pride and vanity. Verse 26. Christ says, Behold the fowls of the air. They sow not. They don't reap. They don't gather into barns. Yet your heavenly Father feeds them. He takes care of them. Are you not much better than they? Which of you, by taking thought, can add one cubit to his stature?

And why take ye thought for clothing? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow. They toil not. Neither do they spin. And yet I say to you, even Solomon, in all his glory, was not a raid like one of these. Wherefore, if God so clothed the grasses of the field, which today is, and tomorrow is cast in the oven, shall not he much more clothe you?

Oh, you of little faith. Do we lack that faith? Yeah, sometimes I wish I was a little child again. Little child, your dad picks you up, throws you in the air, and you know he's going to catch you. And you don't even think about it. Unless we get older, sometimes we lose the faith that I think we should have in God, to realize that he catches us. Always. There's 31, therefore, take no thought, saying, what shall we eat?

What shall we drink? Who shall be clothed? For all these things the Gentiles seek. They do. For your heavenly Father knows you have needed them. What is our goal, though? Key Scripture, you've all memorized. 633. Seek you first the kingdom of God and His righteousness. And all these things shall be added to you. All of them. Whether you're the widow of Elijah, or the cruise of oil, lasts all the long time, or the meal and the bread. God takes care of those who seek His kingdom and His righteousness. But He doesn't give it to you at the wrong time.

He gives it to you when He needs it. To teach you the things you need to learn, just as you give your children things, when they need to learn them. Therefore, take no thought for the morrow, for the morrow shall take thought for the things of itself. Sufficient unto today is the evil thereof. In this world there's sufficient evil. To think about. It's hard not to think about tomorrow with a certain amount of concern. Am I concerned about United? Yeah, certainly.

When I took this job as treasurer, with everything that we've gone through, it was scary. There's no question. You had to think about how is God going to provide? What's going to happen? Especially when you hear of men who have left us, stating one from the pulpit guaranteeing that United wouldn't exist in two years, which I intend to write in a letter two years from now. It's sad. Sad that they would say something like that. But at the same time, you're wondering, okay, what is God?

What are you doing? And always looking at yourself, as you always should. I always looked at myself. Every time I got chewed out for anything, I'd say, what did I do wrong? Sometimes it was me, sometimes it wasn't. But you always looked that way. But God has blessed us in so many ways already. One of the things he did recently, which was shocking to me, was we put a million-dollar faith line in our budget that we knew we needed to do next year.

And he's already provided three-quarters of that. A little over three-quarters of it, actually, through a special will that we knew nothing about, with the stipulation and the will of something that we changed in December, because we had a resolution that would have kept us from getting the money, that we changed in December. And then we find out, because we changed that, we are blessed, because we're trying to put God first, as our Father.

And so, do I think about it? Yes. But do I worry about it? No. Because I know God does provide for all of us, because He loves us and we love Him. And He loves all of us. And to honor our Father, we have to be like God, like God is. Turn to 1 John 4. We must be like God, and we have to love the way that God loves, all of us. 1 John 4 and verse 7. John. It says, Beloved, let us love one another, for love is of God. We truly have appropriate love. It's of God. And everyone that loves is born of God, and God knows.

And He that loves not, knows not God, for God is love. Everything He does. My mother-in-law is a problem with God of the Old Testament, because He always did all these things that she thought were evil and wrong. And everything He did was in love. We may not understand it, just like our children don't always understand correction that we give. Unfortunately, in this society, with those who don't know God, sometimes a correction is not done in love, which is sad, because it makes that child not understand God.

If you truly love your children, and you correct them in love as they get older, they understand that, and they understand how God works. But Satan wants to destroy that. Verse 9, and this was manifested the love of God toward us, because the God sent His only begotten Son into the world that we might live through Him. He gives life, just like parents give life to children. Here in His love, not that we love God, but that He loved us, and His Son to be the propitiation for our sins.

Beloved, if God so loved us, we ought to also love one another. Kind of like Chris Rowland said in the sermon, God's matching plan in love, giving out love. But love doesn't mean you let things go. Unfortunately, in the world, they don't understand love. In fact, you cannot let things go, because if you let things go, it breeds sin, when you think it works. Over the decades, I've seen many people become bitter. Many people think they were doing the right thing, when in fact they were not. Sometimes they took things in their own hands.

Sometimes they acted too soon. Maybe with proper intentions, sometimes they acted too late. Usually we don't have all the facts, or we don't temper our love with wisdom. To understand. Turn to 2 Samuel 18, if you would. I'd like to look at one example in the Bible. A father that loved his son. A son so dear that even though he did somebody thanks to harm the father, he still cried in his death.

He didn't let his love be tempered with proper correction, unfortunately. He didn't follow Proverbs 22, where it says, Train up a child in the way you should go, when he's old or not depart from it. Look at the love King David had. 2 Samuel 18 for his son Absalom. We'll start in verse 33 of chapter 18, 2 Samuel. It's after the battle. It's after Absalom had taken the throne. David had had to flee. David had been cursed by Shammai.

And the day David reacted to that is so different. In verse 33, after Absalom had been reported killed, Then the king was much moved, and went into his room, over the door, weeping and saying, Oh, my son Absalom, my son, my son, my son Absalom, if only my life might have been given for yours, O Absalom, my son, my son. How did he feel toward his son? The son who was after him to kill him. He loved his son. So much that it actually harmed the rest of Israel, the people who supported him. Verse 19, verse 1, Word was given to Joab that the king was weeping and sorrowing for Absalom.

And the salvation of that day was changed to sorrow. This great deliverance of victory was changed to sorrow for all the people. For it was said to the people, The king is in bitter grief over his son. And the people made their way back to town quietly and secretly. What do we do after a war when you win? Come back in parades and banners and ticker tapes and all these things. And hear what they're doing. They're coming back into town quietly and secretly. Because those who are ashamed to go secretly when they go and flight from a war, when you've been a coward or you run away, they had won.

But the king, covering his face, gave a great cry, O my son Absalom, my son Absalom, my son, my son. Verse 5, Joab came into the house of the king and said, Today you have put to shame the faces of your servants, who even now have kept you and your sons and your daughters and your wives and all your women safe from death.

You shamed these people. For your haters, it seems, are dear to you and your friends are hated. For you have made it clear that captains and servants are nothing to you. And now I see that if Absalom was living and we had all been dead today, it would have been right in your eyes.

David loved his son, but it wasn't. He hadn't trained him properly. His son had not learned to honor his father and his mother, and not kept the commandments. And God loves us just like David loved Absalom. However, God in His perfect wisdom controls the events and the times to make them happen the way He wants them.

God was in control of what happened with David and Absalom, and even though David loved his son and didn't temper it, God took care of things for him. 2 Samuel 17. Turn back a few pages. Let's go to 16, verse 23. It's interesting because Absalom went for a counselor named Ahithophel. Verse 23 of chapter 16, it says, And the counsel of Ahithophel, which he counseled in those days, was if a man had inquired at the oracle of God.

So was all the counsel of Ahithophel, both with David and with Absalom. Here's a man who is truly smart, truly wise. He's giving counsel to Absalom now, as he had David. Verse 17, verse 14. Just look at that. What happens? Because Ahithophel had given counsel, if you read the chapter, to go take David now. He's on the run. Go slay him. But God worked it out. So Hushai and David. In fact, in chapter 15, verse 31, it's interesting because, And one told David, saying, Ahithophel is among the conspirators of Absalom.

And David said, O LORD, I pray you turn the counsel of Ahithophel into foolishness. David knew the man was smart. In verse 14 of chapter 17, Absalom and all the men of Israel said, The counsel of Hushai, the arkite, is better than the counsel of Ahithophel. For the LORD is appointed to defeat the good counsel of Ahithophel, to the intent that the LORD might bring evil upon Absalom. God was restoring the throne to its rightful owner, because David did honor God. He honored his father. It's interesting. Look at how Ahithophel acted when his counsel wasn't taken.

Verse 23, When Ahithophel saw that his counsel was not followed, he saddled his ass and arose and gave him home to his city, put his household in order, and hung himself and died. Now that's truly not liking people that don't take your advice. And obviously there are many things you can probably think about Ahithophel, being as wise as he was.

Maybe he knew because his counsel was defeated that God had gotten involved and that he would be killed. Who knows exactly why, but that was the way he reacted. It wasn't a proper reaction, but it was his reaction, unfortunately. And people react to things in different ways.

They don't always seek the wisest route. He'd been better off to seek repentance and prepare to go back to David and apologize and change. That's not the way of someone who truly honors his father, would do. We look back at David while he was on the run being cursed by Shimei, and his soldiers say, Hey, this man's cursing you. Let's go kill him and cut out his tongue like a dog.

And David says, No. May God give me a blessing for the curse in this day. It was David's reaction. It's a reaction that was more like Jesus Christ would give, as he was being tormented. God often directs things in a way that we don't understand. David would not have done this. David would not have destroyed his son. But that was the best thing for Absalom, in God's sight, for what he was doing.

Knowing the future, and Absalom will come up in the resurrection and have a chance to understand, like anyone who doesn't have the truth. But God directs things. As fathers, we also have to direct our children in the way that they should go, in things that they may not understand.

We need to ask God for the wisdom to do that. Do you ask for His wisdom to show you how to love your children? Turn to Hebrews 12, because they probably won't understand most of what you do. Children often don't understand. Hebrews 12, verse 5, And you have forgotten the exhortation which speaks unto you, as unto children. My son despies not the chastening of the Lord, nor faint when you are rebuked of Him. We go through trials and trauma. Do we faint?

Do we despise it? Or do we learn from it? For whom the Lord loves, He chastens. You are the sons of God. He loves you. And scourges every son whom He receives. If you endure the chastening, God deals with you as with sons. For what son is it? He whom the Father doesn't chasten. Only the ones I know, the ones who desert their children, are not there for them.

God never deserts us. But if you be without chastisement, for of all our partakers, then are you bastards and not sons. Furthermore, we've had fathers of our flesh which corrected us, and we gave them reverence. Shall we not much rather be in subjection unto the Father of spirits and live?

How much more shall we honor our Father in heaven, that our days may be long? Verse 11, Now no chastening for the present seems to be joyous, but grievous. Nevertheless, afterwards it yields the peaceable fruit of righteousness, unto them which are exercised by it. Verse 14, Follow peace with all men, again, and holiness, without which no man shall see the Lord. We have to be becoming holy, our thoughts, our actions, becoming love like God. Verse 15, Looking diligently, lest any man fail of the grace of God, lest any root of bitterness spring up trouble you, that you may be defiled. I've seen bitterness spring up in people.

It does defile them. Sometimes they think they're having righteous indignation, and all of us can have that thought. We have to examine ourselves closely and make sure we're humble before God. And God is love. And truly we honor our Father, and we show love, love to Him and love to each other. Turn to Romans 5, verse 6. Love is shown by action. When you feed your children, when you clothe them, when you take them and give them opportunities, and you send them to school, you teach them, train them. That's love. Romans 5, verse 6, When we were yet without strength, in due time Christ died for the ungodly, we could do nothing for ourselves as far as spiritual life.

For scarcely a righteous man will die once, excuse me, for a righteous man will one die. Yet, peradventure for a good man, some might even dare to die. But God commends His love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. We weren't worth dying for in our own eyes, but God saw our potential through His Spirit and His Son. Going back to verse 1, Therefore being justified by faith, that's what it takes.

Faith. Faith in God, our Father. Honor your Father and your Mother, that your days would be long. Justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom also we have access by faith into His grace wherewith we stand, and rejoice in hope of the glory of God. Not only so, but we glory in tribulations also, knowing that tribulations works patience. Tribulation works patience. When things aren't going right and you stand through it, you work patience.

And patience works experience, and experience hope. As you go through those things, we're learning patience and hope and having faith. They all go together. You can't say you have one without the other. It takes the experiences to have hope. The reason teenagers are more successful at suicide than older people is they haven't had experiences to show that there's life beyond your last boyfriend or girlfriend, or your last trauma with your family, or whatever. There's hope. And as you go through more of those things, you start to recognize and learn there's a purpose. When we go through experiences, these teach us patience. To let God work so we can honor Him and what He is doing.

We give our children experiences to teach them. My family and my children, I took them around the globe to different countries so that they know what the world is and reduce prejudices and they can understand other peoples. They didn't always want to go. They did as they were little, and then they became teenagers and wanted to go with their friends all the time. But I still took them. But now they say it's the best thing that ever happened to them. Because of the experience now as an adult, being able to relate with people of all nations.

And they've learned patience because they didn't get what they wanted. And patience is probably the hardest thing that anyone has to learn. We all want it now. We all want what we want. We want it when we want it. And we're often not willing to wait for God's greater purpose. Why was Abraham the father of the faithful?

Look how long he waited for a son. And God promises me a son. I figure it's going to come right away. He waited decades. He was willing to wait for God's purpose. If you don't wait, it creates poor decisions. And I've seen a lot of poor decisions of the people who didn't wait. It's funny, baby's needs are met now. I think earlier in my experience with God, there were more needs met more quickly.

The older I got, it seems the longer it takes to meet some of those things that I think are needed. And when I realized they're not needed, I realized, well, I didn't need them after all. There's another purpose. But children, just like God with us, as they get older, each of us as parents require more patience of our children. Little child that's three or four, just wait till lunchtime. That's an eternity for them. Teenager? Well, next month. That's almost an eternity for them.

Get in college, get out in spring break, you know, summer or whatever. As we get older, I wonder sometimes God doesn't do the same with us. Help us understand in a different timeframe, different purpose. Luke 15, we have the parable of the prodigal son. His father loved him. Turn to Luke 15 if you would. But the father there let his son make some unwise decisions, which God lets us make decisions.

He tells us to choose life, but he lets us choose. Sometimes we don't choose everything that we should choose. In Christ relating that parable, talk to them in verse 11, he said, The certain man had two sons, the younger of them, said to his father, Father, give me the portion of goods that falls to me. And so he divided them, his living. Not many days after the young son gathered everything together and took his journey to a far country, and there wasted his substance of the riotous living.

He drank and be merry. He was following all the ads on TV. Man, you owe it to yourself? Go do it. So he went and did it. And when he had spent all, there rose a mighty famine in the land, and he began to be in want. Didn't lay up. Didn't follow the principles God had sent.

And he joined himself to a citizen of that country, and the citizen sent him to feed the swine. He'll keep the pigs. And he would have fainted and filled his belly with the husk that the swine ate, but no man would give him anything. He was hurting. But he came to himself, verse 17, and said, How many hard servants of my father have bred enough despair, and I perish with hunger?

So he had to swallow his pride and recognize his mistake. I'll arise and go to my father, and I'll say to him, Father, I have sinned against heaven, and before you, I haven't honored my father and my mother. I haven't kept that commandment. And I am no more worthy to be called your son. Make me as one of your hard servants. Just let me be a servant. A different attitude than you had before. He had to be brought to that attitude, and it's often that God sends us through things similar to bring us to an attitude that we need to have.

And the father said to his servants, Bring forth the best robe and put it on him in a ring in his hand and shoes on his feet. He didn't have shoes. He was in pretty bad shape, no question. And bring the fatted calf and kill it, and let us eat and be merry. For this my son was dead and is alive, he was lost and is found, and they started partying. A good time. He had repented. The elder son was in the field working, doing his duty, doing everything his father told him to do, honoring his father and his mother.

Verse 25, When he came near to the house, he heard music and dancing, and he called one of the servants and asked what this meant. When the servant said to him, Your brother is calm and your father has killed the fatted calf because it received him safe and sound. Oh, man, the brother said, This is wonderful news. It's so good. And happy, right? No. Verse 28, He was angry. He wouldn't even go in.

I'm not going to that party. He wasted his living. He did all his stuff. I'm the good kid. His father came out and treated him. And he answered, His father, Lo, these many years I've served you. I didn't transgress. I honored you. At any time, by commandments, I kept them. And yet you never gave me a kid that I might make merry with my friends. Perhaps the father should have done some of that. Maybe not enough.

But he didn't in this parable. But as soon as this your son was come, which has devoured your living with harlots, you've killed him for him a fatted calf. All these wonderful things for him. Didn't seem fair. The father said to him, Son, you are always with me. You didn't go through what he went through because you did obey and honor me. You didn't have to go out and feed swine and want to eat what the swine were eating. You didn't have to do any of those things. He had to go through. You didn't have to learn some of the hard lessons in life. You probably don't have any venereal diseases because you've been good.

Some of the price you may have paid in those regards, like some today do with AIDS, or it means their life and their future. And all that I have is yours. Explain this to his son.

It was meat that we should make Mary and be glad, for this your brother was dead, is alive, is lost, and is found. We should be very happy when anyone returns to the body of Christ, anyone who leaves. Our brothers, our sisters. It doesn't always seem fair. In the church, I've seen a lot of things that didn't seem fair. I expect him to be fair because this is God's church, and God runs his church, and therefore everything is wonderful and right.

No. No. From the time I remember, from the age of three, on, life hasn't been fair. But it's been an education. It's been a wonderful experience. It's taught me an awful lot. And I can choose to be like the brother of the prodigal son, but the things I didn't do, and, hey, I should add a fatted cap. I didn't go do those terrible things. Or I can wreck into the fact that I too am human, because the brother wasn't perfect either, even though he did a lot more things better than his younger brother, and recognize that Christ died for me too.

And recognize I didn't have to pay some of the price of some of those who didn't do it as well. And others who did it better than I, pay less price than I. God knows what sin does to us, and God accepts us when we repent, just like that father accepted his son back. Each of us needs that acceptance, so we wouldn't be here, because we've all sinned. The father didn't go chasing after his son, didn't keep him locked up in a box.

God knows us by our choices, and he teaches us by those choices that we make. He lets us learn, and he wants children who choose, and who choose wisely, even after they've chosen poorly, perhaps. The father or the prodigal son love both his children. Do we love each other? Or are we the prodigal son, or are we the brother of the prodigal son? Each had a problem, solved in different ways. And there are pitfalls with both roles. There really are, because it doesn't seem fair.

And oftentimes, well, that wasn't fair. You didn't evaluate me right. I'm going to go do my thing now. I've seen that all too many times in families and in churches, with groups. Turn to John 4 and 1 John 4, if you would. Because Christ died for both those sons, and our Father loves all of us.

And we need to love Him. 1 John 4, verse 7, Beloved, let us love one another. For love is of God, and everyone that loves is born of God and knows God. He that loves not knows not God. You think you have love, but you don't. You don't know God, for God is love. And this was manifested the love of God toward us, because that God's sin is only begotten Son into the world that we might live through Him.

He paid the ultimate sacrifice, giving His Son for us. Here in His love, not that we love God, but that He loved us, and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins. Beloved, if God so loved us, we also love one another. We have brothers and sisters, and we see things that don't seem fair. Do we help them? Do we love them? Do we rejoice because a fatted cap was killed? I hope so, in the right way. After repentance, obviously. It wasn't something He did while the Son was out in Marietas living.

But we need to be encouraging one another. We've got lots of problems, and the world's going to get tougher before the Millennium and before Christ returns. It's interesting. Studies have shown that it takes positive comments to undo one negative comment. Are you negative or positive? In the classroom, I try to be positive. I try to be positive with my kids. Sometimes it's hard to be positive when they're not doing things quite like you wanted, when they're spilling the milk, breaking the bottle, and whatever.

But you have to give those positive comments. Why does God call us His sons? We haven't made it yet. But He wants to see us as it can be. Yes, we should. It's interesting how easy it is to get down and how hard it can be to pick someone up. And we're susceptible to all this. Our children are, and we are, as children of God. What do our children see in us, though? Are we role-modeling what God, our Father, is to make it easier for our children to see us and see what God is? Turn to Ephesians 4, verse 29. Do we set the right example of the fruits of God's Spirit in our lives?

Do our children see God in His family, in His way of life, or do they see the world and the God of this world? Ephesians 4, 29. Let no corrupt communication proceed out of your mouth. Do we use the right words in front of our others, especially our children? For that which is good to use of edifying, that it may minister grace unto the hearer? That's what our kids hear helpful to them. What others hear of us, helpful to our brothers and sisters, our spiritual family. And grieve not the Holy Spirit of God, whereby we are all sealed into the day of redemption.

Our common unity is God's Spirit. Verse 31. Let all bitterness and wrath and anger and clamor and evil speaking be put away from you with all malice. Anything that's wrong, then you'll be close to God. You'll be honoring your father and your mother. Verse 32. Be you kind one to another, tender-hearted, forgiving one another, even as God, for Christ's sake, has forgiven you. We need to have that kindness and develop it. Kindness tempered with wisdom again. 2 Corinthians 1.3. We want to comfort one another, and we must comfort one another in wisdom, in love. 2 Corinthians 1.3.

Blessed be God, even the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies. He's merciful to us, the God of all comfort. He will comfort us. But not until we learn the lessons He wants us to learn, and the way He wants us to learn them, who comforts us in all our tribulations. The word tribulation is not a comforting word. It's God who says, comforts us in all our tribulations. So there is a comfort He gives in understanding the truth.

If this is temporary, Christ knew He was going to die. That was temporary. He saw beyond that. That we may be able to comfort them, which are in any trouble. Why do we suffer some things so we can comfort others? You can say, I've been there. I've done that. I understand. By the comfort we are with, we ourselves are comforted of God. We share that. We help each other.

Our life experiences are to learn and to grow and to serve, to help others, our family, physically and spiritually, our brothers and sisters. God is our Father. He says the Church is our Mother. What is the Church? It's you and I, our brothers and sisters, family. Do we honor God? Do we honor our Father? Do we honor the Church, each other? Do we honor our Mother? What did Christ say?

Love God with all your heart, First Commandment. Love your neighbors yourself. Honor your Father. Honor your Mother. 1 Peter 5. You turn over there quickly. Verse 2. We have to help each other. You're not going to make it alone. 1 Peter 5.2. He says, Feed the flock which is among you, taking the oversight thereof, not by constraint but willingly, not for money, but out of readiness of mind, neither as being lords over God's heritage, but being examples to the flock.

You're in a leadership position, which all of you are or will be. Are you an example to whoever it is that you serve? Your flock, your family, your deacon, an elder, the Church. Verse 4. Why, when the sheep sheaf sheafed shall appear, you shall receive a crown that glory that fades not away?

Likewise, you younger, submit yourselves to the elder. Yes, all of you, be subject one to another. We're all on the boat, helping each other, and be clothed with humility, for God resists the proud and gives grace to the humble. If something's going wrong, perhaps your pride's in the way. People have gotten in trouble with pride, but He gives grace to the humble. And I pray we stay humble in united, so we will be here two years from now. Because in humility, God blesses us. Because in humility, you honor your father and your mother. Verse 6. Humble yourselves, therefore, under the mighty hand of God, that He may exalt you in due time.

Why? Because He knows when you're ready. He knows when you can handle it. Casting all your cares upon Him, for He cares for you. We have to be there for our children and for each other. To be a type of God the Father to them, so that they can see it. We have to make sure they don't forget our spiritual Father and what He does for us.

Turn to Deuteronomy 8, if you would, for a minute. As we get ready to close out here. To make sure that we don't forget our spiritual Father and what He does. Israel never really learned that lesson. Deuteronomy 8, verse 5. You shall also consider in your heart that as a man chases his Son, so the Lord God chases you. Isn't that what Christ said and what Paul wrote? Therefore you shall keep the commandments of the Lord your God, to walk in His ways and to fear Him. All of them. And today we're looking at honoring your Father and your Mother.

In the spiritual sense, as well as the physical. To walk in His ways and to fear God. Verse 7, for the Lord your God brings you to a good land, the land of brooks and water and fountains and depths of springs and valleys and hills of wheat and barley. What's God bringing us to? A spiritual land of eternity. Cities of gold. Streets of gold. Gates of pearls. That's what we're looking for and He's bringing us to that. If. If.

Verse 10, when you have eaten in her full, then you shall bless the Lord your God for the good land which He gave you. Beware, verse 11, that you'd forget not the Lord your God in not keeping His commandments, His judgments, His statutes, which I command you this day. Lest when you have eaten in her full and have built good houses and dwelt therein, and when your herds and flocks multiply and your silver and gold is multiplied, and you have multiplied, then your heart be lifted up and you forget the Lord your God, which brought you out of the land of Egypt.

I think of this country, which came out of England, started in the blessings and how it's become rich and forgotten God, and it's all being taken away. And we're in debt now. It's all changed from what it was. Verse 17, when we think you're rich and you say in your heart, My power and my might has gotten me this weakness, which gives me this wealth.

That's your weakness. You start saying in your heart, I've gotten this. Isn't that what Satan, Lucifer, did? He said in your heart, I'll ascend to the throne of God, I'll be like God, pride and vanity. When you get rich, you tend to think you have privileges. No, you have responsibilities. Verse 18, you shall remember the Lord your God, for it is he that gives you power to get wealth, and he may establish his covenant, which he swore to your fathers to this day. And it shall be if you do at all forget the Lord your God, and walk after other gods, and serve them and worship them.

I testify against you this day that you shall surely perish. And if you don't follow God your Father spiritually, you will surely perish, eternally, not just physically like Israel did. This world has abandoned God altogether, and turned to the gods of materialism, and the false religions that choose themselves good and evil. And in choosing, this world calls good evil and evil good. In an email I looked at this morning, where I talked about some of the rabbis and ministers who have supported gay marriages and things that are totally contrary to Scripture.

And God of this world has indeed turned this world upside down. I talked about that on Pentecost. We're here to turn the world upside down to make it right-side up. And we are called to help it be right-side up. And if we honor our Father in Heaven, we can help do that. He's called us to that. We have to be the ones to teach our children the fear of God, that that is the beginning of wisdom, that life begins with honoring. Your parents, your spiritual parents. We have to shape their view of God, our Father, in the choices that we make so they can grow up to understand who God is. We have to let God and His Spirit shape us, as God wants us to be, in good situations and bad situations, to teach us also to honor, trust, and obey our God, that our life may be long in the land He's going to give us. You know, we never leave or forsake our children, because we love them. And no matter what they do, we always love and pray for them. We always want what's best for them. And we ask God to do what is best. Turn back Deuteronomy 4, verse 1, a couple pages from where you are. Now therefore, Harken, O Israel, to the statues, to the judgments, which I teach you, for to do them, that you may live and go into the land, and possess the land which the Lord your God of your fathers has given you. You shall not add to the word which I command you, neither shall you diminish from it, that it may keep, that you may keep the commandments of the Lord your God, which I commanded you. Are we doing what it takes to possess the land of eternity, the land that God offers his spiritual children, where our days may be long in the land that God offers? Verse 6, Keep therefore and do them, for this is your wisdom and your understanding in the sight of the nations, which are here these statutes, and say, Surely this nation is wise in understanding people. Obeying God is wise in understanding, honoring your Father in heaven, his wisdom.

Verse 9, Take heed to yourself and keep your soul diligently, because when you get wealthy and you're blessed, what happens? Lest you forget the things which your eyes have seen, unless they depart from your heart all the days of your life. Teach them to your sons and your sons' sons. My son has a son. I'm told to teach him. I intend to do that. Especially the day that you stood before the Lord your God in Horeb, when the Lord said to me, Gather me the people together, and I will make them hear my words. And they may learn to fear me all the days that they live upon the earth, that they may teach their children. What did they hear on Horeb? They heard the Fifth Commandment, Exodus 20, 12. Honor your Father and your Mother, that your days may be long upon the land, which the Lord your God gives you. We have to hear that spiritually. To honor our Father and our Mother, God our Father, His Son, our brothers and sisters, the Church, our Mother, that our days may be long. We have the same promise spiritually that God gave Israel physically. Death has no power over that spiritual promise. In John 10, 27, to honor God is to hear His voice and to obey it. My sheep hear My voice, and I know them, and they follow Me. And I give unto them eternal life, that they shall never perish. Neither shall a man pluck them out of My hand. My Father, which gave them to Me, is greater than all. My Father in Heaven is greater than all. And no man is able to pluck them out of the Father's hand. I, my Father, are one. Christ is there making intercession for us. And the Father is going to make sure that you're not taken. If you don't have the pride and the vanity that Satan inculcates into this world, we will learn to hear the voice of our Father. I pray for my little grandson, Jason, that he will hear His Father. More so, that he'll understand how to honor his Father and his Mother, and his spiritual Father and Mother. That he can be taught in a world that's very difficult to learn in. In God's way, which is hard to practice against the grain in this world, that they can be parents, as God is our parent. That they indeed can teach him to honor his Father and his Mother, that his days will be long on the earth. And more importantly, that we can all honor our Father in Heaven. That our days may be eternity together in the Kingdom of God. I look forward to eternity with you, as each of us honor our Father and our Mother.