Reading: Ephesians 6:1-4
"Children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right." Ephesians 6:1
The first people we all relate to are our parents. Even if we are orphaned at an early age, or,
worse still, abandoned, parents (or their substitutes) shape us at the deepest level as we grow into
becoming human. No wonder the Bible gives them near-divine status. Not because they're
perfect, but because they do the work whereby God creates us to be who we finally are.
The Biblical word for faithful response to parents is "Obey." That word's not fashionable
nowadays. It signals the servile, the oppressive. Not so the Bible's perspective. Obedience is
"right", says our text. The root meaning of obedience signals the rightness. It's "ob-audience,"
with the root word "audio," listening, in it. Ob-audience is "listening in the right direction."
The "right" way to obey parents is to affirm their role as God's agents for creating and nurturing
us. That's faithfulness in this primary relationship. But, of course, this relationship has its
thorns. Ask any parent; ask any child.
Not until parent-child connections are "in the Lord" are they finally really "right." For his own
mother, here paradoxically "orphaned" by her son's death, Jesus cares. For us in our fractured
parent-child roles with thorns that pierce and scratch, the same is true: he cares. Faith in him
grounds fathfulness in all our relationships with significant others.
Prayer: Lord, increase our faith that we may be "right" in what we hear and "right" in how we
listen to the primary persons you've placed around us to carry out your work on us. Open our
eyes to behold our parents as Jesus does his mother in his last words to her. Amen
"Children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right." Ephesians 6:1
The first people we all relate to are our parents. Even if we are orphaned at an early age, or,
worse still, abandoned, parents (or their substitutes) shape us at the deepest level as we grow into
becoming human. No wonder the Bible gives them near-divine status. Not because they're
perfect, but because they do the work whereby God creates us to be who we finally are.
The Biblical word for faithful response to parents is "Obey." That word's not fashionable
nowadays. It signals the servile, the oppressive. Not so the Bible's perspective. Obedience is
"right", says our text. The root meaning of obedience signals the rightness. It's "ob-audience,"
with the root word "audio," listening, in it. Ob-audience is "listening in the right direction."
The "right" way to obey parents is to affirm their role as God's agents for creating and nurturing
us. That's faithfulness in this primary relationship. But, of course, this relationship has its
thorns. Ask any parent; ask any child.
Not until parent-child connections are "in the Lord" are they finally really "right." For his own
mother, here paradoxically "orphaned" by her son's death, Jesus cares. For us in our fractured
parent-child roles with thorns that pierce and scratch, the same is true: he cares. Faith in him
grounds fathfulness in all our relationships with significant others.
Prayer: Lord, increase our faith that we may be "right" in what we hear and "right" in how we
listen to the primary persons you've placed around us to carry out your work on us. Open our
eyes to behold our parents as Jesus does his mother in his last words to her. Amen
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