Colossians: The State of Our Submission to God
Ministry Associate Calvin Chu preaches from Colossians 3:20-21, read for us in Hindi. Discussion points: God does not relate to us as a “because I said so” authority, our primary responsibility to our children is to raise them to know and love God, as adults we continue to honor our parents in the Lord.
-
Scripture reader: Good morning church. Our scripture reading today is taken from Colossians chapter 3, verse 20 to 21. I will be reading from the Hindi Holy Bible, and you can follow along in the English version. When I finish reading, I will say, this is the word of the Lord, and we will all finish by saying, thanks be to God together.
Children, obey your parents in everything, for this pleases the Lord. Fathers, do not provoke your children, lest they become discouraged.
This is the word of the Lord.
Preacher: Morning, church. I have to admit, you all read it, I'll, and, you know, unless you also speak Hindi. But you, you all read, and I'm gonna reference the passage, but obviously we've got a lot going on here, both kind of the parents and children, and for me when I was preparing for this message and when, when I think about this, just even like in my own reflections. I gotta admit to you, I'm actually really bad at both sides of this kind of picture.
I, like many of you, am a millennial, and in many ways, that means I'm a bit of a bridge generation. And so what do I mean by that? I'm a son of immigrants, but most importantly for this morning's purposes, I'm a son of boomers, which means I grew up with the assumption that the parents were the authority and the children obeyed, and if I asked why the answer might simply be: Because, because I said so, exactly. We, we have a shared experience. I'm glad we're all here together. And so then my responsibility was to obey. There was no need for an explanation.
But now, I'm raising children in what feels like a very different culture, right? The one that's taught us to listen to children, to validate their emotions, explain our decisions, and give their preferences a much greater place in in family life. And so like the concept of like a yes day, if I'm not sure you guys know what a yes day is if you have kids, you kind of know what it is. If you don't, then you might not. Yes day is like where like parents are like we're gonna give, we're gonna say no, we're not gonna say no at all today. Everything's gonna be a yes and like that concept would be just totally foreign to my parents that they would not know what that word kind of even means, in the sense of the request that I'd be asking them. It would have never crossed their mind.
And so sometimes I look back at like the parenting that my parents got to experience, with a little bit of like envy because it's like they had this luxury of justifying their requests and commands with only because I said so. And then just walking away. And there was, there was an expectation to sort of that I would blindly obey. They were royalty, and I was the subject.
Meanwhile, my role now feels more like a consultant. Presenting a slide deck to a well thought out and calmly delivered options for my children, the clients whom I'm supposed to serve. To that they kind of help them decide and choose between all these perfectly valid options. And so my because-I-said-so card is collecting dust in a box in the basement, because I never get to use it.
Of course, I'm, I'm mostly kidding. Actually, I do think a lot of what's changed in parenting is, is genuinely good, but I do think that I've sort of inherited this interesting problem where, again, I was raised in a world where parents were not questioned, they were the central authority, and that shaped me as, as I was a kid who grew up to become a parent with this, you know, my formation was with that type of parenting. And now as this parent with bringing that sort of expectation, that sort of background, as some would call it baggage, I'm now raising children in this world that's, you know, where children are actually often treated as the center of the family. So I, I feel like I missed it, right? Parents were the center of my parents, and then now my kids are kind of the center. It's like, where's my chance to be the center, and it's never gonna come. It's OK, it's all right.
So then. So thankfully, thankfully God doesn't operate in this way, right? God does not, you know, have this. God actually in this passage gives us a lot, and I, I'm going from a bunch of other passages to, but really, we're gonna see from this passage and others, what can we gain from the understanding of parent-child relationships, like how are they supposed to actually work, and what does that teach us about God's design for all human relationships, not just parents, and, and children. Because I, you know, I know that not everyone here is a parent, and you know, I make no assumptions, maybe not everyone here is a child, and I totally get that. So with that being said, thanks on the three of you who got that one.
Let, let's pray, and we'll, we'll look to these passages are talking about. Father God, I just thank you, because obviously we are all children and, and we, but we all know that we come from different places and not even just like physical locations but the, the upbringings that we had, the generations that raised us, the, the family makeups, parents who were there, parents who were not, parents who were, we would consider good, parents who would consider not so great and complicated relationships and.
And so Lord, I know that we, we may bring a lot of baggage with us in this topic. Maybe we don't really like thinking about it or talking about it, but God, would you help us see that it is a part of your scripture, and so it can inform us, and, and even if we're not parents, it can inform how we can, approach all human relationships, but knowing that we are all children, then maybe it'll also help us form and think about how we relate to our parents as well. And Lord, we thank you, that you hear our prayers and pray that you'd be with us as we look at your word and pray all this in Jesus' name. Amen.
OK, so, one of the core premises of, of, of, the morning's kind of reflections on, on scripture is, we obey our parents, right? We see that in the first verse, and our parents refuse to provoke us, right, the second verse, because these relationships reflect the state of our submission to God. So how we relate to our children and how we relate to our parents is, is very often a reflection of how we are in our, the state of our submission to God.
And so clearly Paul gives us commands here. Children obey your parents. Fathers don't provoke your children. But before we get into that, I think it's really important to take a step back and really ask us this fundamental question of why. Like, because we can jump into it, and I, I could give us, we could do parenting tips, we could do, you know, how to, how to become adult, parentified children. Oh, we could, we could do the whole thing, but that's not really what we're here for. We're really here to understand our relationship to each other in this larger, you know, relationship with God.
And so to get to that, we have to really ask ourselves why. Like why should a child want to obey his parents, right? Why should a parent care about whether their approach discourages their children or not? And why should we obey any command that comes from God that we read in scripture, right? Because that question why can be asked of every command that God gives, every command that we read in the Bible can be asked why.
And so, so, again, to, to kind of put it around this, this section of, of the Colossians specifically, you know, maybe you don't remember, but verse one of chapter 3 says, if then you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is seated at the right hand of God. If you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above where Christ is. If you were raised with Christ, seek the things where Christ is. And then verse 17, which was before, right before this. And whatever you do in word or deed, do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through Him. So whatever you do in word or deed, do everything in the name of Jesus.
And Paul is describing what happens to a person when he or she has been raised with Christ. Jesus becomes the central driving force, this hub of your life. So that you no longer organize your life and orient your life around the old self.
See, before the Holy Spirit came and opened up our minds and our hearts and our eyes to see our sin and our need for Christ, we naturally organized our lives around us. What do I want? What makes me happy? What makes me comfortable? What do I think is right? Before Christ I was the why. Before Christ me was he or she. Before Christ, before the Holy Spirit changed us fundamentally, we were all about ourselves. And now that we've been changed, it's now about him. And as we grow closer to Christ, this mentality of this old self begins to fade. And so then we can, you know, grow in this way that Paul calls us to live.
Whatever you do in word or deed, do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus. Whatever you do. Not just what you do at church or a community group. We're serving, you know, in meals ministry. It's in everything that you do. Not just the obviously spiritual parts. But in your marriage, at work, in your friendships.
And as Paul makes very explicit here, how you relate to your children and how you relate to your parents. Which brings us to verse 20. Children, obey your parents in everything, for this pleases the Lord. Take note here, Paul does not say, Obey your parents because they know better than you. It does not say obey your parents because they are always right. Obey your parents because they're smarter than you. It does not lay any of those grounding for the understanding. It says because it pleases the Lord, for this pleases the Lord. God, God's pleasure is the ultimate reason for obeying our parents. And so essentially, you and I obey our parents ultimately, because you want to please the Lord.
An astute reader might notice, go, wait, hold on a second, Calvin. Yes, it says that verse 20 says, obey your parents, for this pleases the Lord. But it doesn't actually say anything. There's no actually parallel statement for the parents. There's actually a whole other set of reasoning. But again, we find the same motivation even in the, the section where, where Paul is talking about kind of ordering your household, ordering your, your, your home. Again, verse 17, I already read that whatever you do in word or deed, do everything in the name of the Lord, giving thanks to God the Father through him. Verses 23 and 24, after this, whatever you do, work hardly as for the Lord, not for men, knowing that from the Lord you will receive an inheritance as a reward. You are serving the Lord Christ. And verse 4:1, masters treat your bondservants justly and fairly, knowing that you have a master in heaven.
And so if all those things are true and all these other human relationships that we fall underneath this ultimate authority. Whatever authority parents have over their children, that sits underneath God's authority. You have been entrusted with children. If you are a parent here, you have been entrusted with children. And your authority over them is ultimately an assignment from the Lord. That means, yes, the parent, you as the parent have authority, but not absolute authority. And that means a child owes you obedience, but not ultimate allegiance. Because both parent and child are standing underneath the same Lord.
So what does this mean like practically, like theologically, OK, like, like we get it here, OK, God is above all, God, you know, orders these things and and puts them in place. But what does it actually mean like in the day to day? It means that in your relationships with your children or with your parents. That relationship is one of the primary places where your relationship with Jesus actually gets lived out. Not everyone will have a romantic partner, not everyone will have a spouse, not everyone will have children, but everyone will be a child. And everyone will have a parent.
And so how we understand that relationship, how we navigate that, how we show up in that family relationship is a reflection of your love and submission to God. And so then if, if, if pleasing God is the central piece of all of that, then I think the natural question is, well. Why should I want to please God? Right, it's not lost on me that this can sound like obey God's commands because it makes him happy, so just do it. Like almost like the, the, the, the God version of because I said so. Right, it's like, well, God said so, so we just gotta do it, right? And so, OK, well then I'll just obey you. I'll, I'll follow the commandments and, and then all everything that God tells me to do.
I think there's, there's so much, there's so much more here because I, I think if we were to approach it that way, I think it'd feel hollow. And I think that there are actually a lot of people who in the, in the name of Jesus or, or, or they, they think they're following Jesus do hold a perspective of following God's commands in this very shallow understanding that says, OK, well you said it, so I'm gonna understand it.
I was listening to, a, a sermon last week, Tim Keller's sermon was on First Peter, which actually, I, it definitely informed some of my thinking here, but he's got a really great, illustration. He says people will come up to him and say, Pastor, I wanna take God, following God, really, really seriously. He's like, Great, that's amazing. And they go, very often the first question is, so I read in the Bible that tithing is really important, and so like, you know, we, we understand that to be like kind of like 10% of, you know, my, my, my money, and so Pastor, should it be like pre-tax or post-tax?
And then Tim Keller, you know, his, his response was. Isn't that like a funny way of looking at it, right? It, it is, it kind of scratches this sort of hollow, shallow understanding of love and appreciation of God's, you know, grace and God's mercy and God's generosity. It says like, what's the best thing for my taxes? Like what's Fidelity gonna choose here, right? What's, what's my financial consultant gonna think is better here? And it's going to these short end of the stick to God view. When the perspective is kind of not really there, understanding that everything that is ours is already God's.
And so you know, I, I understand that some of us may even be there right now, and, and we may even feel like, OK, well, God, you're, Calvin, you're, you're, you're, you're telling me that God is calling me to, you know, to, to obey Him. It, it almost feels like conditional love. what we read in the Bible, he talks about unconditional love. Right, and there's nothing in the scripture that says we have to earn his love, and, and, but when I hear this, I, I feel like I almost have to do things, obey Him so that I can win his favor.
And I think especially if we carry a lot of baggage with from our parent relationship with our parents who maybe did do that, they maybe had the expectation that we would earn their love, that it was conditional, that it could be taken away, sometimes we carry that into our relationship with God too.
Growing up, my mom was a, a a furious parent. She was incredibly impatient, incredibly short tempered, like everything set her off. When I was young and I didn't like finish like, like some bits of my food, I would be like, oh, like, do you, do you want like this piece of, you know, whatever, steak or chicken or whatever. And she'd say to me, in Cantonese, like, I don't wanna eat your leftovers. Like, oh, [Cantonese] like I don't want, I don't want the, the, the, the, the ends of your saliva basically like kind of translated. It's Cantonese, is just a fun language. And so then I remember one day where she like didn't finish her food and she was like oh do you want again it was all kind of like it was all cool like it wasn't whatever. And I said back to her that phrase and I, I remember it being like fun but maybe I don't know I was not the greatest kid so maybe I was there was a little bit of barbs there, but she got so angry. Cause she was like, you're talking back to me, and she got so mad, she took the bowl of food, she slammed it on the ground, it broke and like a a shard of the bowl cut my dad's leg and had to go to the hospital. Like she would fly off the handle, like she would be really, really mad.
So needless to say, I finished every bite of food in my house. You know, from that moment on. But growing up with a mom like that, like I got really good at submitting to her authority, right? Like I, I did what I was told, but it wasn't out of love or desire to like please her. It was a desire to placate her, to avoid her wrath. Right? I mean, I, I praise God that God changed her heart. You know, when we healed our relationship before she passed, but I, I, I, I share this with you as an example of sort of like not what God is calling us to. God does not want us to have a view of him, God does not wanna have a view of our parents that is like that, where it's more driven by fear and, and wrath avoidance than anything.
Christian obedience isn't about trying to get God to love us or about avoiding his wrath, it's actually quite the opposite, we obey because we've already been loved. Peter puts it beautifully in in first Peter one, verses 14 to 15, which says. As obedient children, do not be conformed to the passions of your former ignorance. But as he who called you is holy, you also be holy in all your conduct. I'll give 16 too. Since it is written, you shall be holy, for I am holy.
And when we hear holy, we often think moral. But Peter is not quoting, in, in, in Peter here, he, he's, he's quoting Leviticus. He's not thinking about morality. He's not thinking about moral. He's, he's actually talks about how in that part of Leviticus it talks about these items, these, these, these like bowls, they were made holy. They were holy. And what that means is they were set apart for a specific purpose. And so what makes something whole is that it's been, but something is holy is that it's been set apart for God's purposes. So when we read, you shall be holy, for I am holy, it says, you should be set apart for my purposes. Like I am set apart for my purposes. I am entirely other and I expect that you will also be entirely other because you are loved by me. You belong to me. Right?
I don't know if you had this when I was growing up we had like. So, growing up in an immigrant home, like, you know, we're kind of multiple cultures, right? So my parents were from China, like southern China, Taishan, and then, Hong Kong, and so then they, they're carrying all their culture with them, and obviously some things were being left behind, family, memories, all that stuff, and they came here and then they would like slowly like, become integrated into the American culture. Right, and so, it, it would play around in different things and being kind of like bicultural, like we just did, we were. Like BTS wasn't a thing when I was growing up, like, like being Asian is like way cooler now than it was then. Like they're like Asian stand-up comedians, like an Asian stand-up comedian would have been like, would just it would have been very. Margaret Cho, she would have probably the only one at the time, you know, I'm not trying to go all there, but.
We gathered different aspects of American culture. And so one thing that we had gained through, I don't know where my parents got this idea, but they're like we should have fine china. OK, and we should have a dining room set. I will tell you, friends, we never used our dining room, and I understand that's also kind of American culture. Like no one really uses their dining room or whatever. But we, we, that I, that fine china is probably still in that like the cupboard, you know what I'm saying, that like the cupboard with the door and like the special drawer. I don't know. I don't even know what it's called, but we had it and it just collected stuff, and we just never used it.
But had we used it, that fine china would have been holy to an extent. It would have been set apart for a very particular use. It would have been set apart for a very specific purpose, and it wouldn't have been used for any other thing, but only that specific purpose. And my hope, my prayer, friends, is that you will be holy. Not sitting in a cupboard. A china cabinet, I think that's what it's called, a china cabinet. Just collecting dust.
Because God has set you apart. He says, be holy, for I am holy. And so the call for you, my brothers and sisters in Christ is to be holy, be set apart, accomplishing the purposes that God has for you, and a part of that is obeying him. Not to get in, not to be on the inside, not to be then become special, you're already special. Jesus already died for your sins. So then go and be the special that God has set you apart to be. Because you're already God's child, live like one. He's given you this new identity, it came first, now the behavior follows. And so then out of that, you can say I love and trust the Lord. I belong to him. Therefore I want my life to please him. And again part of this is obeying our parents.
Or put it another way, 1 Corinthians 6:19 says, or do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, whom you have from God? You are not your own, you were bought with a price, so glorify God in your body. That is exactly what Paul is bringing into the family in Colossians chapter 3, verses 20 to 21, and honestly the whole thing. A child obeys because he, this pleases the Lord. The parent refuses to provoke his children or her children, because this is how someone who belongs to the Lord exercises authority.
This parent passage shows us that the parent-child relationship reflects the state of our submission to God, which is why we should actually want to obey it. Not just tolerate it.
And so then like. How does it actually look like to live this way? I, I think this is where the, the, the Christian vision like of this differs from kind of the extremes that we, we can touch upon so far. The answer isn't put the parents back into the center. We need to go back when parents had real authority and children knew their place, nope. Nor is it we need to make the children the center. Everything they want, their happiness is central to everything, build everything around them. Children are the center, no. I think the, the Christian answer, and this will feel a little bit like Sunday schooly, but the answer is to put Christ at the center. Christ needs to be the center of our family relationships.
So I, I wanna start here with a, a kind of brief word focusing on parents, and I know that not all of those are parents, but this is clearly a responsibility that parents have to establish first, right? A child cannot initiate obedience and then parents fall in line to, to, you know, not frustrate their parents, their, their children. So the foundation starts with us, for those of us who are parents, right.
So then if Christ is the center of the parent-child relationship, then the goal of parental authority is to help form children into people who know and follow the Lord. Right? The, the, the, the, the reason that God gives parents authority over their children is so that they can help form their children into people, adults who know and follow the Lord, not just simply children who comply, and not, not even just you know, compliance to us as a parent, but also again, not this blind, hollow, shallow compliance to God's commands. It is a true following of Him that we're called to.
If my kids only obey me when I'm standing in the room, which is a very, very regular occurrence, by the way. That if I only do that, then I've only taught them compliance. I've only taught them to work hard when the boss is looking. And then they'll apply that to their relationship with God, so they're gonna be great in church. They're gonna be great in the youth group. They're gonna be great when whoever from church is around, but once they're gone, they're gonna be something else entirely. Where they gradually learn to recognize what is good, desire what is good, and eventually choose what is good, even when I'm not there. That's much closer to what scripture calls maturity.
That is my call, that is my command from God is to raise children who do that. Which is why Paul immediately follows the command to children with the command to parents, do not provoke your children lest they become discouraged. God knows how easy it is to get this wrong. Catch a mom or dad on the wrong day, you'll see them frazzled. You'll see them very short. They're super nice at church, incredibly friendly. Passing the peace is amazing with them. Catch them on the wrong day with their kid. Oh yeah. God knows how hard it is, so that word provoke sort of means it has a sense of like irritating or embittering and discouraged carries a sense of losing heart or losing motivation.
So this verse essentially is about parents guarding the inner life of your children. Creating an environment where they can see possibility, not just failure, or an impossible standard to meet. If we don't do this, they may carry that excess baggage into their relationships, even their relationship with God. Ask any pastor, ask any, you know, counselor who has a, a, a, a biblical world who, who can openly talk about that. Many people carry that baggage into how they see God. That is your charge as a parent. Is to help your children become adults who know and follow the Lord.
But then there's another side to this, parents. It's not just about making your kids feel good all the time, which is a real temptation if you're on social media and you follow parenting Instagram or TikTok reels or whatever, you can see that I gave my kid this and he's so happy. That is a real pressure that parents feel, and there's a keeping up with the Joneses of how happy are my kids compared to how happy are your kids. But that is not the goal either. Sometimes parents need to say no. I know that's hard, that might be controversial. Sometimes before a child can, even before, sometimes a child can really understand why.
A toddler's not going to grasp electrical currents. And so when they get the fork and they're trying to plug it into the wall, you say no, bad, don't do that. You can try to explain, you can do your best, and I'm sure it'll be great. Right, it'll be fantastic, but they're just not really gonna go., they're, that's just how kids are. So some that, that's your responsibility, and then, and if you take the fork away, you just, just try it. Find a young kid to if they're trying to do something with them that's kind of a little off, take it away. You will see them tears, crying, slamming head, punching, all of that. And if you, if you buy into the idea, well, no, my baby's feeling bad, he or she's not happy. I need to make, OK, well, here, here's the fork back. Oh, you look how much you love Daddy. Look how much you love Mommy.
Right, what's the, what's the more loving thing? What's the more loving thing, saying yes and harming your kid or saying no and protecting them? So a boundary isn't a failure of gentleness. It's a part of formation. And so one question I, I think is helpful as we're thinking about like navigating this is, is my decision for my child to follow Christ, merely reinforcing my own control, or simply protecting my child's happiness at all costs. In the moment they can all feel like all valid. But if you're a follow Jesus, only one of them is the goal. Only one of us in the goal. Which is that we were forming them to follow Christ.
Spend time talking with the parents, thank you non-parents for being patient. Let's talk to you now. What is this, what, what does, what does this actually mean for us, because most of us aren't living in our parents' place, right, and the, and the kind of being under their roof, being under their authority. Right, so then I, I think sort of the thought process is, do I still have to obey my parents? Like, you know, I, I, I don't have to know if that's the right question to ask. I think the right question to ask is what does it mean for me to relate to my parents now that I'm an adult.
Because don't leave here being like Calvin told me I need to obey my mom and dad, and so they, they told me that I should quit my job. I'm gonna, I'm gonna put my two weeks in on Monday. No, please do not do that. Calvin said I gotta obey my parents, and they, they want me to, to break up with this person. So listen, I'm gonna text you right now. My mom and dad said we can't be together anymore. That's not what I'm saying, OK? Please don't do that because your, your, yeah, your, your, your loved ones will come find me.
So, so I understand that relationships with parents are complicated. I myself have understood that you've seen a little bit of that. And some of you have like really amazing parents. Some of you have parents who are super wise, they love the Lord, they've given you good counsel, you go, you, you have a weekly call with them, maybe even more frequently than that now, and you love it. And when they speak into your life, you probably are gonna really weigh it as an option.
Some of you have much more complicated relationships with your parents. Maybe they're not Christian, maybe they're not emotionally mature, maybe they made some serious mistakes. Or maybe they weren't around that much at all. Or maybe in a room with this many people for some of us. Maybe they used their authority in genuinely sinful or abusive ways. And if that's you, I, I wanna kind of say very plainly like. It's probably really hard to hear things like obey your parents or honor your father and mother. Like that's not lost on me. I, I totally get that. Cause it feels like I'm almost kind of making you relive a painful history.
And if that's what you're at, like that's OK, like, you know, maybe I've already lost you and that's OK, but tune out the rest of this message that, and then, but I would hear this if that's where you're at. And you haven't like talked with like a a counselor or a pastor about that like I would really encourage you to. Because if, if you want to, you know, whether you're in, maybe you're in a romantic relationship now, maybe you want to be in the future, maybe you have kids now, maybe you want to have kids in the future, I'm, I'm gonna tell you that that stuff follows us along. And a counselor could really help you navigate that and I think our church has resources for exactly that and I, you know, would love to connect you if that's where you're at. There's no shame. There's no admitting defeat if you are reaching out for that sort of assistance. I said, if anything, that's very brave and very wise. So please, I, I hope that you would, you know, explore that.
But then kind of practically for for the rest of us, what does this actually look like? I think it's really important that Paul gives us two different commands, not one, right? We have obey, and then in, in Ephesians chapter 6 there's actually a parallel passage in Ephesians chapter 6, which talks about, it says, oh, you know, obey your parents. But then he also goes on to say honor your father and mother. And I think that's really, really helpful to understand because. Sometimes it feels one and the same.
I know my parents definitely felt that, you know, growing up in, and again I, I don't, I talk a lot about my, my like culture today. I don't always do that. Sometimes I do. Being Chinese American, we have a really unique, maybe it's not unique, it's unique to me because that's the only culture I, I knew. I was never raised, you know, any other culture. So, it was, it was really interesting because like I'm kind of still the kid if that makes sense, even though there's like multiple generations or I guess one generation after me.
And, and this is embodied because, my grandma, so here, so look at this right. My mom in Cantonese was calling me Ah-jai, which means like son or like kind of like basically like son. But then my grandma would also call me Ah-jai, and so like, but there's not like a grandchild, and then, but the thing is my grandma would also call my uncle Ah-jai and so that there'd be like interesting family hey Ah-jai, and then they'd be like, yes, I'm like, oh they're not talking to me, they're talking to the other one, even though like my uncle's like pretty significantly older than I am.
And then like with my kids, maybe this is like a Chu family thing or yeah or whatever when my kids were when Miles, my, my eldest was born, they'd call him up B as in BB like but they they like calling it short, but then when, my Silas, my youngest was born, they call him Sai B, which means like little baby, like the smaller baby, and I forget what they call my nephew, but I think it's like extra small B like. And so, like these, these monikers never really leave us, if that makes sense. And so we're kind of always seen as like children.
And so, I, I think that the, the, the factor that's kind of here is. I think my grandma definitely, although I'm I'm a bit older now and she's much older too. I think that she kind of thinks, you know, honoring her would be obeying her if she would ask for something that that I would go do it. But Paul breaks it down that this actually those are not exactly the same. Obedience is not the same as honoring. And so I put it this way: Obedience is listen and do. Honor is listen and consider. Cause obedience, I think that belongs to childhood, to a season where you generally don't yet have like the wisdom, or the insights or the, the, the, the vantage point that your parents have, and so they're teaching you, right? Electricity, bad. Not electrified good, that's hard for a toddler to understand, so they should obey.
But I think honor is broader and I actually really think it extends beyond, in, into the rest of your life and the rest of their life. It doesn't disappear when obedience ends. And so I think if my grandma were to tell me, hey, can you go get me this. I'm not doing it out of like, oh, this blind obedience, I'd have to do what my grandma tells me. I do it because I think it would honor her. I do it because it shows that I care, it shows that I love her. And so it's less that she's making me do it, even though I, I definitely felt that way when I was younger, I'm not, you know, for sure. But when I do it now, it's because of love.
Same with my dad. My dad is like obsessed with, he's just really started like he's really into like racket sports right now. He discovered pickleball, so like he got to me. He's like, Calvin, can you order me a pickleball paddle and a pickleball bag? And oh, we have, I have a, I have a, this is totally aside, not planning. I have this bag. It's like a small little bag. I'm, Oh Dad, I have a bag. He, he looked at it, he goes, Oh no, no, can I get like a real pickleball bag? So anyway. And so my dad makes these Amazon requests. All the time. I don't do it because like my dad, dad, oh I hate you so much, no. It's it's, it's because I know we have this established relationship now. Where I, I, I, I could say no and he would be kind of OK with it, but I wanna say yes. I wanna be able to, with the years that we have left together, do something for him, to honor him, so that he has memories of his son not fighting him about buying, you know, badminton racket.
And I think that's what honor looks like. I think it means that you take your parents' counsel seriously. You take their requests seriously. You don't dismiss them reflexively and just be like, quiet you, just because you're an adult. But I think it does mean humble enough to say, maybe you don't, you see something I don't. Maybe you need this help because you actually can't do something. Maybe I can. I think it means there's a sense of gratitude and respect and care for them as they age. And this may be the hardest part, but maintaining a relationship. You know, assuming that that relationship can be healthy and possible.
But I, again, it's not the same as obedience, it's not the same as unlimited access, it's not the same as unlimited trust, it doesn't mean sugarcoating and pretending harm wasn't there for those of us who have that. It doesn't mean obeying sinful command just because it came from a parent. It doesn't mean staying in a relationship that continues to wound you. You could tell the truth about your parents' failures and still refuse to let bitterness define you. You can set a boundary and still speak respectfully. You can forgive someone without handing them the same access to your life that they once had.
On the other side though, if your parents like are wise, are faithful. Then I think honor means don't let like this, this thing in the air, the ether, that says like, I don't need to listen to you because I'm old now, I'm grown now, so I don't need to care about you because I could do my own thing. I know better. You know, I don't think maturity is refusing your parents' counsel or refusing your parents' calls. I think maturity is being able to receive it but not be ruled by it.
And I think the reason that both of these are possible throughout the entirety of our life is because God is the one that's there. The parents are never your ultimate authority. Christ is. Children, obey your parents in the Lord. The phrase is so important. And Paul is placing this parental authority inside the lordship of Christ, the real authority, the ultimate authority. And all the stuff that comes from the parents is delegated, it's accountable, it's limited. And so, you know, your life, your decisions, your obedience is never theirs ultimately to hold, it's his.
As I wrap up here, I, I think there's actually a really interesting reason that Paul kind of puts it all under Christ, and not just because it's a Sunday school answer. But in the relationship with Jesus and the Father is a reflection of us and our parents, right? I get not one for one necessarily, but Jesus, who was equal with the Father, Scripture tells us that he learned obedience through what he suffered. He did nothing on his own accord, but only what he saw the Father doing, which is the basis for him to do what he called the Father called him to do. He submitted, giving his life, dying on a cross. Being made new again in submission to the Father. But he didn't do it so that he could earn the Father's love, he was already loved, and that's why he did it because it was a reflection of his love to him. But the Father did not do more than was necessary to save us. It's not like the Father said, I'm gonna crucify you 12 days every single year for the rest of eternity. He didn't do more than he needed to do. He did the bare minimum and it was enough, and then it was declared it is finished.
And of course we cannot be Jesus, we cannot be the Father in our parent-child relationships. But know that is the ultimate authority, the ultimate authority who sits over us is the ultimate authority who not just gave us an example in Christ, but through Christ's sacrifice made it possible for us to obey. Because left to our own devices, and I think we can all maybe admit this, some days easier than others, but left to our own devices, we would never choose to obey. Because we are always gonna wanna orient our lives around us.
So if you're here, my friends, brothers and sisters in Christ, maybe you know Jesus, you've known Jesus for a long time, maybe this is not really the call. To ask ourselves, who is my ultimate authority? Is it Jesus? Is it my partner? Is it my boss? Is it my friends? Is it society? And I hope, I pray, that for yourself and if you're a parent for your children. You are continually, perpetually orienting your life around him, so that you can make yourself someone that knows and follows Jesus better or creates an environment for your children or your future children to do the same. Let's pray.
Father God, this is heavy for me to preach because I know that later today I'm gonna mess this up. I'm gonna lose my temper, I'm gonna be impatient. I'm, I'm pro, I might even be mean to my dad. God, I know that I fall so short of the goodness that you have shown me. But Lord, I thank you that there is forgiveness for when I fall short. The blood of Christ which makes it possible for me to obey, also washes my sins, washes me clean, makes me whole, makes me new, restores us. So we can continue to work and to grow in this way.
And so for every single one of us here, would you move us to grow in this way? To trust and submit to you knowing that you are the ultimate authority who loves us, cares for us. Regardless of how good or challenging our parents were, regardless of how good or challenging our children relation, the relationship with our children are. And God, may we continue to grow in trust and faith in you. And pray all this in Jesus' name, Amen.