#268 Where it Leads

9 “‘Anyone who curses their father or mother is to be put to death. Because they have cursed their father or mother, their blood will be on their own head. Leviticus 20:9 NIV

Just as the law dictates that parents not sacrifice their children to Molech, nor provoke their children to wrath, it also holds and maintains that the child honor the parent. No one creates themselves and therefore the claims of the body fall back to the Creator, and the pro creator is to be respected as that authority between you and God. Parents are not here for the perpetual, life time care of those that would not show honor to father and mother by trying to support themselves. They are not here as easy targets, since all have sinned and have been weakened by such, to be mocked by their "enlightened" offspring. What does it gain a man to put down his father or his mother? Perhaps all this can be taken to an extreme, where we are expected as children to agree with what is logically and morally wrong, because the parent says so. This is not the case in Scripture, for above the parent is still God, and above that is no one. The other extreme is the one that America now embraces, a culture of disrespect. I have talked with parents who slam their counterpart while their children are present with us. Tell the truth, for there should be none else, but the malicious assaults that beg a child to hate one parent versus the other, you are teaching them break the laws of God. Surely we have broken both sides of this under this time of grace, and so it will be God as our judge. 

"For not even the Father judges anyone, but He has given all judgment to the Son, 23so that all will honor the Son even as they honor the Father. He who does not honor the Son does not honor the Father who sent Him. 24"Truly, truly, I say to you, he who hears My word, and believes Him who sent Me, has eternal life, and does not come into judgment, but has passed out of death into life.…John 5:22-24

Then some Pharisees and teachers of the law came to Jesus from Jerusalem and asked, 2 “Why do your disciples break the tradition of the elders? They don’t wash their hands before they eat!”

3 Jesus replied, “And why do you break the command of God for the sake of your tradition? 4 For God said, ‘Honor your father and mother’[a] and ‘Anyone who curses their father or mother is to be put to death.’[b] 5 But you say that if anyone declares that what might have been used to help their father or mother is ‘devoted to God,’ 6 they are not to ‘honor their father or mother’ with it. Thus you nullify the word of God for the sake of your tradition. 7 You hypocrites! Isaiah was right when he prophesied about you:

8 “‘These people honor me with their lips,

but their hearts are far from me.

9 They worship me in vain;

their teachings are merely human rules.’Matthew 15:1-9

For the sake of gain through gifts to the temple, the law of God is waived by those who stood to gain, whose allegiance to a building was greater than to the words of He, who made all things. The laws and interpretations of men must always be checked against the words and heart of God. Men are corruptible because we are born corrupted. Majority rule does not repair this, for the majority can often be corporately corrupt, and give way to mob rule. I prefer right over might, and here Christ is explaining to these Pharisees that a gift to the church did not release one from the care of their parents, but rather, their human law encouraged against the very spirit of God's law. He wasn't too popular with them.