8th Commandment – Respect the Property of Others

Posted on February 23, 2019 by dkoop

# 8 Exodus 20:15 “You shall not steal.”

“Steal” – to take the property of another without permission or right (Webster)

Let’s start by taking a little informal survey. Have you ever had money stolen? Ever had a car stolen? What about having something stolen from your car? One time someone broke the window of Niki’s car and stole three CD’s.  It cost more to fix the window than what was taken.   Have you ever had your home broken into? There is something intensely personal about having an object stolen. It is a violation and we feel hurt, confused and angry.

Stealing creates victims. As we have suffered at the hand of a thief, we feel exposed, vulnerable and exploited.

There are 138 synonyms for synonyms for stealing.  Here is a partial list:

Deceit – charging for work not done, adding to expenses, false advertising

“The Lord hates dishonest scales and dishonest weights” Prov. 20:23

When a repairman makes unnecessary repairs, a doctor makes unnecessary tests, a salesman skips over the fine print, when a car is sold and the problems are not shared this is form of stealing.

A law firm threw a surprise birthday party for one of its lawyers, on the cake was happy 80th birthday.  The lawyer said.  “I’m only forty, where did you get 80?”  “Oh your secretary must have added up your billing hours!”

A salesman dies and is given a tour of heaven and hell, heaven looks nice, beautiful scenery, people picnicking, but in hell he sees people partying, getting drunk.  He thinks that looks like more fun.    He chooses hell.  Next thing he knows, he’s being poked with a hot pitchfork and tormented.  He exclaims this is not what I chose, the Devil says, “Oh, you must have seen the demo”

Seize. Using without permission, using and abusing another’s possession

They covet fields and seize them, and houses, and take them. They defraud a man of his home, a fellowman of his inheritance.  Therefore, the LORD says: “I am planning disaster against this people, from which you cannot save yourselves. Mic 2:2-3

Defraud – to deprive of something by deception

Insurance Fraud

More than one-third of people hurt in auto accidents exaggerate their injuries, adding $13 – $18 billion to America’s annual insurance bill. (Rand Institute for Civil Justice)
PA’s Insurance Fraud Prevention Authority estimated that insurance fraud cost the average American household over $5,000 year in the form of higher premiums and higher prices for goods and services.

Employee Stealing
In a 1999 book, Michael Mortiarty said, “Workers around America frankly admit that they spend more than 20 percent of their time (seven hours a week) at work goofing off. That amounts to a four-day work week across the nation.  When an employer is paying for our time and we come in late, leave early, take three coffee breaks and a long lunch it’s a form of stealing.
Almost half of Americans admit that they regularly call in sick when they’re not. One in six Americans regularly drinks or uses drugs on the job.

I read about one young man who went to look for a job at a place where they really weren’t looking to hire anyone. The conversation went something like this. Manager: “I’m sorry I can’t hire you, but there isn’t enough work to keep you busy.”  Applicant: “You’d be surprised how little it takes.”

Embezzlement:  The American economy loses $40 billion annually from theft on the job.

Withhold – hold back or deny

“‘Do not hold back the wages of a hired man overnight.” Lev 19:13

If we owe someone money we need to pay it back.

Taxes

This is also why you pay taxes, for the authorities are God’s servants, who give their   full time to governing.  Give everyone what you owe him: If you owe taxes, pay taxes; if revenue, then revenue.”  Rom. 13:6-7

Tax avoidance is good stewardship.  There’s no reason we should overpay on taxes. Tax evasion is illegal.  God says it’s stealing,

A man who had cheated the IRS out of hundreds of dollars developed a guilty conscience so that he couldn’t sleep. He wrote a check for $500 dollars and enclosed a note that said, “I underpaid my taxes last year and I’m feeling guilty. Please accept the enclosed payment I owe you. And, if I still can’t sleep, I’ll send you the rest that I owe you.”

Borrowing with no intention of paying back

‘The wicked borrow and do not repay” Ps 37:21

A lot of people have no intention of paying back.  The worst loans are made to friends and relatives.  This applies to anything, not just bankruptcy.  Anything borrowed:  Tools, skies, punch bowls.  What is it in our garages you need to go home and return to somebody?

Thief – one who takes illegally by secret.

“A thief is disgraced when he is caught.” Jer 2:26

Billions of dollars are lost every year in this country over the theft of goods and services. One estimate says that 1 out of every 52 shoppers carries something out of the supermarket for which they haven’t paid. According to the U.S. Department of Commerce, 4 million people are caught shoplifting every year.

A couple in Chula Vista, California went on a shoplifting spree at a local discount store, swiping a variety of items from the store’s shelves, and hiding them in the baby carriage they were pushing. The haul got so big that the carriage finally collapsed, spilling couple’s baby onto the store floor, along with the loot. The baby wasn’t injured, but the commotion attracted the attention of store security officers, who made a quick arrest.

What’s shocking is that only 10% of all shoplifters come from low incomes. 70% are middle class and 20% are classified as wealthy.

America is a country of thieves. One new hotel reported that in their first ten months of operation they lost 38,000 spoons, 18,000 towels, 355 silver coffee pots, 1500 finger bowls and 100 Bibles.

Rob -to take illegally by force

True story from our dim-witted criminals department: A man walked into a convenience store, put a $20 bill on the counter and asked for change. When the clerk opened the drawer, the man pulled a gun and asked for all the cash in the register. The man took the cash from the clerk and fled, leaving his $20 bill on the counter. So how much did he get from the drawer? Fifteen bucks.

“They practice deceit, thieves break into houses, bandits rob in the streets; but they do not realize that I remember all their evil deeds. Hosea 7:1-2

A guy walked into a little corner store with a shotgun and demanded all of the cash from the cash drawer. After the cashier put the cash in a bag, the robber saw a bottle of Scotch that he wanted behind the counter on the shelf. He told the cashier to put it in the bag as well, but the cashier refused and said, “Because I don’t believe you are over 21.” The robber said he was, but the clerk still refused to give it to him because he didn’t believe him. At this point, the robber took his driver’s license out of his wallet and gave it to the clerk. The clerk looked it over and agreed that the man was in fact over 21 and he put the Scotch in the bag. The robber then ran from the store with his loot. The cashier promptly called the police and gave the name and address of the robber that he got off the license. They arrested the robber two hours later.

Robbing God

In the Old Testament, the prophet Malachi writes: “Will a man rob God? Yet you rob me. “But you ask, ‘How do we rob you?’ “In tithes and offerings. You are under a curse” Mal 3:8-9

God says if I’m not tithing then I’m paying my bills with stolen money that belongs to God.

We’ve taken what was supposed to be spent on God’s work, and we bought toys and trinkets, and bought houses and clothes and gone on vacation and bought computers with it and God says “I’ve been robbed”

I asked earlier about how you feel when you realize that you’ve been robbed.  How would you feel if it was someone you knew, someone you trusted someone you loved, and someone you thought loved you?  How much more would it hurt? Can you imagine how God feels when his own children defraud him?   What if I came home with $100 dollars and I said, Kaleb you have been a good boy so I give him 90.  Then all night he is mad because there is still $10 in my wallet.  So he sneaks in while I am sleeping and takes the other $10. How would I feel about a son like that?

Cheat –conspire or sneak        “Cursed is the cheat” Mal 1:14

In 1969, 58% of high school students let someone else copy their work, In 1989, 98% did so Almost 80% of college students admit to cheating at least once.

Pirate– copy illegally – any thing that is copy righted  

It is our church policy to be legal in all we do.  That’s why we pay an annual sum to CCLI, which gives us permission to print and display songs.  We also have a CCVL, which gives us permission to show movie clips in church.  For all small groups we either buy a book for each participant or we copy if we have permission.  When someone says, “Let’s just buy one book for the small group and make copies.”  That’s stealing.   If they were to say, “It will save the church money!” Is that what we are all about?   If that’s what we’re all about lets shoplift the donuts and coffee we need for Sundays! It would be a lot cheaper.  Let’s shoplift the paper we need for bulletins!  Let’s heist the sound equipment we need!  While we’re at it, forget the offering let’s just rob the bank.  It’s not a matter saving money or  not getting caught, it’s wrong.

If you make a copy of a DVD or CD for a friend so they don’t have to buy it, it’s stealing.

It’s estimated that 400-600,000 copies of films are traded digitally every day. Many movies are available on the Internet before they hit the theaters, thanks to illegally copied pre-release versions which are offered to the press.
A cover of a U. S. News & World Report has a picture of an All-American teenage boy wearing a pair of headphones –looking pretty much like millions of teenage boys in any city and town in America. The caption says, “Wanted.” And in smaller letters, asks “Got a digital pirate in your house? Got a lawyer?”

Notice That with Stealing God Will Take Action

With some sins, God gets involved.  On the verses listed, we see that “God remembers”, “God will repay”, I am planning disaster, “they are under a curse”  The Hebrew word for curse means to “take away” It’s not voodoo or anything.  God chooses to bless and when he curses he removes his blessing.  Like the in the Garden of Eden, it’s a garden, everything is blessed, it’s great, When Adam says I don’t think I’ll obey you.  The ground is cursed, the blessing is removed.  It makes things more difficult.  Things will grow, but so will the weeds, thistles and thorns.   When we choose to go our own way and disregard God’s way.  We live in the absence of his blessing.  It makes things a lot harder.  We are living cursed instead of blessed.

When it comes to stealing, I’ll leave us with this statement: “I can live blessed or I can live cursed.”   Which will we choose?

Darrell

www.Upwards.Church

 

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7th Commandment – Honor Marriage

Posted on February 19, 2019 by dkoop

#7 “You shall not commit adultery” Exodus 20:4

In a New York church’s Sunday School children were studying the Ten Commandments.  Each week the children would bring home an illustrated card that dramatized one of the Ten Commandments. The first week showed people worshiping at church. Another week, to illustrate,  “Thou Shalt Not Kill,” the card pictured Cain in the act of slaying Abel.

Some parents began to dread the picture that would come home the seventh week. They anxiously wondered how the publishers would illustrate the act of adultery. But fortunately, tact prevailed. Under the caption, “Thou shalt not commit adultery” was a picture of a dairyman, leering villainously, as he poured a huge pail of water into a can of milk. And this illustration wasn’t too far off the mark for, adultery is anything that weakens or contaminates the exclusivity of our marriage vows.

The Los Angeles Times (March 1, 1998) published the following definition of adultery submitted by one of it’s readers:

“Adultery is when you participate in the type of close behavior with someone who is not your spouse, and you would not want your spouse to behave likewise with someone else.”

I like that because in my opinion, adultery is much more than improper physical relations with someone other than your spouse. Adultery is anything you do that threatens your spouse’s trust of you. Any behavior that weakens your relationship with her or him; it is any action that gets you closer to another person than you are to your mate.   Internet relationships would fit into this category.   Also Pornography.

God is no kill-joy.  God invented sex.  But like everything it must be controlled.  He wants us to use it not abuse it.  All of God’s gifts have limitations on them.  God has given us the gift of water.  We can’t live without water.  But too much of it and we’ll drown.  God has given us fire.  Fire can either warm us or burn us.  It’s how we handle it.

God has given us a sex drive.  Properly controlled and expressed within a marriage it’s beautiful and fantastic.  But outside of marriage it is destructive and detrimental to your health as a human being emotionally, spiritually and in every way.

How To Respect My Marriage

  1. Invest In My Marriage

“Husbands and wives must be faithful to each other.  Heb. 13:4

At Yellowstone, they have a world famous geyser, “Old Faithful”  Why is it faithful, at a specific time period it erupts, day after day, month after month, year after year.  What if old faithful stopped doing this?  It wouldn’t be faithful any more, it would just be “OLD”   Same is true of marriage, we must remain faithful.  Continue to be as loving and kind as we were when dating or courting.  It doesn’t end after we say “I do.”  It’s like any product, if you bought a car and you wanted power windows, power locks.  What would happen after a few months and the power windows went out.  You wouldn’t be happy, because that’s what you thought you were getting.  You might call the car a lemon.  Well in dating and courting, we sometimes try to sell more than we can deliver.

  • Am I the same person my spouse married?

 Are you cultivating a friendship?  Spending time together?  It takes a lot of energy to get a friendship going, but not as much keeping it and maintaining it.  The goal we have in our marriage is to be best friends.  I heard Mary Alda, the wife of Alan Alda, the actor, one time say, “It’s real easy to leave your spouse.  It’s not easy to leave your best friend.”  We heard a pastor one time say that each of us should keep our lawns so green that it would make everybody else’s look brown by comparison.

Dr. Willard Harley says every couple has a love bank and we are making investments, committing loving acts, meeting the needs of our spouse or we are making withdrawals.  An unloving act, a selfish act is a withdrawal.

Willard Harley, a Christian psychologist, director of a network Mental Health clinics in Minnesota has spent the last 27 years as a marriage counselor.  He’s interviewed thousands of couples and discovered the ten most important needs of husbands and wives.  They are discussed in his highly recommended book His Needs/Her Needs, of studies of thousands of couples over a 27-year period:

The top five needs of most men are:                    The top five needs of most women are:

  1. Sexual fulfillment                                         1.  Affection
  2. Recreational companionship                    2.  Conversation
  3. An attractive spouse                                   3.  Honesty and openness
  4. Domestic support                                        4.  Financial support
  5. Admiration                                                    5.  Family commitment

Did you see any similarities between those two lists?  No.  No wonder we have so much trouble adjusting in marriage.  Men come in to marriage thinking for some strange reason they’ve married someone very much like themselves so they set about trying to meet the needs they have in their wife and feeling very, very frustrated when she does not respond the same way he does.

Most women come into marriage thinking they’ve married someone very much like themselves.  They set about to meet the needs that they have in a man and cannot understand why he does not respond the same way she does.

Solution:  Get serious and get down to the full time business of learning what it is that your spouse needs and determining that you’re going to meet those needs to the very best of your ability even if they are not necessarily your needs or you don’t have them in the exact same way.  This will go such a long way in protecting our marriages.

  • Am I investing or making withdrawals?

Our choice is to invest and build or marriages or to let them go by the wayside.  It will take energy to invest in any relationship, your marriage, better to invest in your marriage.

According to Dr. Lana Staneli, author of a book on marital triangles,  “of those who break up their marriage to marry someone else, 80% are sorry later, 70% get another divorce. Of the 25-30% who stay married, only half of them are happy.”   So adultery is anything but a route to happiness and bliss.

God has given us this command is to protect us from all this pain but, it is also the way to experience the greatest joy and satisfaction!

An intimate relationship between a man and woman committed to each other as husband and wife for life far outshines all other forms of intimacy.  There is a misconception in the world today that monogamous Christians are somehow sexually repressed; that sex within God’s guidelines is somehow not as “FUN”

That if you follow God’s rules and regulations in this area you miss out in some way. But this is simply not true. Obeying God in this arena provides us with the purest form of pleasure—and this makes sense! After all God designed these “earth suits” including their sexual systems. God created us in such a way that husband and wife can experience a oneness which is impossible for a man and woman otherwise. His will is that husbands and wives would enjoy a vital, regular, and mutually satisfying physical relationship. If you doubt this then read the Song of Solomon!

The latest research by social scientists is confirming over and over again that this is true. A study published by the University of Chicago (1994) came up with the following conclusions:  married couples reported being the most physically pleased and emotionally satisfied.

Redbook did a sexual survey that involved 100,000 women, (on Sexual Satisfaction) even more astonishing than the # that responded was the results.  They included a section that had religious involvement.  Categories:  Religious.  The least religious were the most unsatisfied.  The most religious were the most satisfied sexually.  The most religious were the most orgasmic.  

Again and again there has been independent confirmation like this by social scientists that God’s plan for our sexuality really does make sense. It really is the best. His detour signs don’t bind us! They liberate us to experience intimacy in it’s most fulfilling form.  The best sex is “unadulterated”

  1. Commit to God’s Way

In the past fifty years, we’ve gone from a culture in which TV programs were not permitted to show husbands and wives sleeping in the same bed to the soap operas of today in which 94% of every sexual activity is between partners who are not married or not married to each other.

Newsweek, 7/20/92, published a study made of 104 leading television writers and executives conducted by the Center for Media and Public Affairs, the study found that Hollywood’s views run far from the mainstream of public opinion. Though 85 percent of Americans believe adultery is wrong, only 49 percent of TV writers and executives do.

Our culture has come to the point that it glamorizes, defends, and promotes adultery. Katie Roiphe writes for the New York Times Magazine and says,  “Women’s magazines practically recommend [adultery] to their readers as a fun and healthy activity, like buying a new shade of lipstick or vacationing in the Caribbean.”

“How can a (person) keep his way pure? By living according to…” culture.  No!   By living according to your Word.”   Ps. 119:9

  • What determines our view of right and wrong?
  • Is it easier to believe the views of television and movies?
  1. Think Through the Cost of Unfaithfulness

Adultery literally hurts people, but we rarely hear that in the world these days.  Satan is very much like an unprincipled used car salesman who will do anything to get us to purchase a car that we cannot possibly afford. When it comes to adultery he doesn’t want us to think beyond “now.”

He doesn’t want us to consider the painful cost of our actions. He doesn’t want us to think about the consequences or look down the road we will travel if we ignore this detour from God. He doesn’t want us to calculate how many payments we will be making for the rest of our lives: payments of loneliness and regret….payments of destroyed families and shattered marriages. He would rather not have us understand the pain that will come with this sin.

One experienced marriage counselor took the time to actually list the agonizing consequences of yielding to the temptation of adultery. Here’s what he came up with:

“I will inflict untold hurt on my wife, who is my best friend and has been faithful to me. I will lose her respect, love, and trust. I will destroy my beloved daughters. All their lives, they will hurt if I do this. I might lose my wife and children forever. I will shame my family….my parents….my siblings. I will destroy my example and credibility….others may follow my example and yield to this sin. I will lose my own self-respect. (Though God could forgive me, could I ever forgive myself?) I could form memories and flashbacks that plague future intimacy with my spouse. I could cause a pregnancy that would be a lifelong reminder of my sin.”

You possibly can think of things to add to this list because the road to adultery is a road to unbelievable pain and anguish.

Lets’ be faithful in our marriages.

Darrell

www.Upwards.Church

 

 

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6th Commandment – Respect Human Life

Posted on February 19, 2019 by dkoop

#6 Exodus 20:13  “You shall not murder.”

Have you ever seen the Ten Commandments posted on a display or wall?  Niki and I have a Ten Commandments wall hanging that someone gave us as a gift. They probably thought we needed to follow them better!  VI reads “Thou shalt not kill.” This is from the King James Version.  Thou?  King James causes my spell check to go crazy!  Now I’m not down on the King James Version because that translation was used by my parents and grandparents and theirs before them.  This version has helped many people, me included.  I must point out that like any translation, there are strengths and weaknesses.   One weakness of the KJV Bible is the way that it translates Exodus 20: 13.  “Thou shalt not KILL.”   This overarching word “kill” has caused much confusion.  We take it to mean “kill” anything.  Hebrew is considered a relatively primitive language.  Even as primitive as it is, the Hebrews had a word for murder, (this is the word used here in Exodus 20:13.) An accurate translation would be, “You shall not MURDER,” which we find in the NIV. Hebrews had a word for murder, they had a word for killing animals for food, killing animals for sacrifice, and for capital punishment.  So the Hebrew language is not the one to blame here it is the King James English translation.

Murder According To The Bible

  • Hebrew word: “ratsach”
  • Murder is when one individual takes it upon himself to end another person’s life

What Is Not Considered Murder

1.   Killing animals…

  • for food (Hebrew word: “tabach” )

“Everything that lives and moves will be food for you.  Just as I gave you the green plants, I now give you everything.” Gen. 9:3

You can be a vegetarian.  But be honest enough to be for personal reasons not Biblical reasons.  You have no biblical basis.  We have recorded that Jesus ate fish and that he ate the Passover meal, which included lamb.

  • for sacrifices ( Hebrew word: “zebach”)
  1. Death Penalty (Hebrew word:  “muth”)

“The murderer shall be put to death.”  Num 35:16-17

  • The Death Penalty is the government’s responsibility – to provide justice.

“Everyone must submit himself to the governing authorities, for there is no authority except that which God has established… He is God’s servant, an agent of wrath to bring punishment on the wrongdoer.”  Rom 13:1-5

That is, you have to provide indisputable evidence that the accused is actually guilty. You can’t just say, “I know he’s guilty, just kill him!” In our country, a person won’t be pronounced guilty if there is even a “reasonable doubt” he’s innocent.

Vigilantes are rarely as generous. Nor do they seek any evidence beyond their own opinions. No one should be put to death on the basis of someone’s opinion, but only on the basis of proven facts.

Due process is an effort to guarantee that only the truly guilty will be punished. Which is another difference between vigilantes and what God intended as a justice system within the government.

The Bible contains very careful guidelines for the legal system:

Legal System in the Law – Deuteronomy Chapters 16-19 

(16:18-20).  Local judges

 (17:8-13)  A Supreme Court.

 (ch 18) Qualifications of government officials

(19:1-14)“Cities of refuge. To protect..

 (19:15) We see it also in the requirement for more than one witness to establish guilt, and in the (19:16-21)  penalty for perjury It is better to let a guilty man escape punishment for lack of conclusive evidence than to take a chance that an innocent man might be wrongly condemned.

We have a similar legal system as well.   Let’s look specifically at one example of a vigilante verses our legal system: On April 19th 1995, Timothy McVeigh blew up the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City. 168 people died in that blast, including 19 children.

McVeigh murdered 168 people. He believed he was fighting for justice. He thought the U.S. government had taken the lives of innocent people in Waco, TX.  And whether or not he was right about that, he didn’t have the right to take vengeance.   Not only did he not have the right as an individual, but there was no due process. No one went on trial. No evidence was brought forth. And it was not the guilty who were punished, but the innocent.

Whatever our government did right or wrong in Waco or anywhere else, 19 children in daycare shouldn’t be killed for it. Not to mention others who had nothing to do with what happened there.

Timothy McVeigh murdered the people in the Murrah Federal Building. But he himself was not murdered. He was brought to justice by the government, who had a right to do so. Massive evidence was presented. Due process was observed. He was punished as the  actual perpetrator of the act, not just someone who had the same skin color or was associated in some other equally insignificant way.

Do you see the difference between murder and the death penalty? You may be for or against the death penalty, but please recognize that there is a difference between it and murder.

For someone to be put to death, there needs to be:

  • The involvement of a legitimate government
  • Due process – the presenting of evidence
  • A commitment to punish only the guilty, not the innocent.
  1. War

“…There is a time for war…”  Eccl. 3:8

  • War is the government’s responsibility to maintain peace.
  • John the Baptist talking to men of war says…

“Then some soldiers asked him, “And what should we do?” He replied, “Don’t extort money and don’t accuse people falsely– be content with your pay.” Luke 3:14

John could have said, “get out of the military,” but he didn’t. A foreign country occupied Israel when the NT was written.  They were in a struggle, 63 BC they were invaded, 70 AD the Jews revolted.  Jesus, Paul and the other New Testament writers never spoke against soldiers or the government’s responsibility to maintain order.  Jesus healed a centurion’s servant,  a Captain over 100 men.  He told the people to carry a soldier’s pack not 1 mile but two.  He used war in a parable.

Now enough of what this command DOESN’T say….what DOES it say? What message or principle is God trying to get across to us in this text?

Well, basically God is saying ONE THING and this is it: In giving us this law God is saying respect human life.

What is murder?: Suicide, homicide, genocide, infanticide/abortion and euthanasia.

  1. Suicide:  The CDC found that 47,000 Americans took their own lives in 2017—2,000 more than recorded in 2016. The national suicide rate has increased 33 percent between 1999 and 2017, according to the CDC’s National Vital Statistics System data. What’s worse, a broader Associated Press analysis of government records indicates that American suicides are now at their highest point.  It’s now the second-leading cause of death for Americans under the age of 35.
  2. Homicide: By the time the average American child finishes elementary they have already witnessed over ten thousand murders on television.  They have watched over 100,000 acts of violence on television.  We live in a violent society.  Every 22 minutes in America somebody is stabbed, shot or beaten or strangled to death.  More kids die from violence than they do from illness.
  3. Abortion: 26% of all pregnancies in America now end in abortion, one out of four!  Americans have been killed through abortion, that’s more than all of the wars put together.  In the 30 years since ROW v. WADE legalized abortion in our country over 57 million unborn children have lost their lives in this manner. Their names would fill the Vietnam Veteran’s Memorial wall over 1000 times. And 97% of those 57 million lives were ended simply because they were an inconvenience to their parents. These children were not conceived as a result of incest or rape they were perfectly healthy and the pregnancy did not threaten the life of the mother.  More baby girls are being aborted than boys now that you can find out the sex, where is the feminist outcry?  Bumper sticker:  “Support unborn women’s rights.”
  4. Euthanasia (Ending a life early)
  • God decides when my lessons are learned and when I go home.

“All the days ordained for me were written in your book before one of them came to be.  Ps 139:16’

More and more people these days say that, if life becomes too difficult to live they should be allowed to end it all through euthanasia.

  1. A Hateful Attitude According to Jesus

“You have heard that it was said, ‘Do not murder, and anyone who murders will be subject to judgment.’ But I tell you anyone who is angry with a brother or sister (without cause)… Matt 5:21-22

So I have broken this commandment and I’m there has been a time when we all have.  We are all murderers deep down inside. We are lot like the Pharisees of Jesus’ day in that we would rather deal with externals but Jesus is not satisfied with that. He wants to deal with INTERNAL things. He wants to talk about what is happening in our hearts. He knows that long before I would murder someone, I would begin the process with my thoughts.

I read this week that the majority of the Bible was written by murderers.   Moses wrote the first five books of the OT, all the law was given by a murderer.  The one wrote you shall not murder, had in his past.

David a murderer wrote the book of Psalms.  Paul who wrote 2/3rd’s of the NT was murderer!

So the lawgiver the worship leader and the apostle were all killers in their past.  But look what God can do in these people’s lives!  God can do that with you.

Let’s respect life.

Darrell

www.Upwards.Church

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5th Commandment – Honor Your Father and Mother

Posted on February 18, 2019 by dkoop

#5 Exodus 20:12 “Honor your father and mother, so that you may live long in the land…”

If our family ties are weak then other relational ties will be weak as well. Even the sequence of the Ten Commandments underscores this truth.   The first four commands basically tell us how we are to relate to God. Then the fifth commandment tells us how we are to relate to our parents. And the five that follow tell us how we are to relate to our fellow man.

So, this command about honoring parents is placed squarely in the center of these two categories of commands. If you had the Ten Commandments written evenly spaced on a sheet of binder paper and folded it in half, top to bottom, the fifth commandment would be right at the fold. I don’t think this was an accident for these words are central to the other commands and even to life itself. Our obedience to this command affects everything about your life and mine. Just as the fifth commandment would appear at the fold of the piece of paper so it also appears at the fold of our lives.  In many ways our destiny hinges on how we respond to this command. It affects our future. It affects how we process the past. It affects our right now. Healthy relationships in the home affect all of our lives. This is true because the home is really “a laboratory for living.” It is within the home that each of us develop our formative character traits. This is where we all learn to discipline ourselves where we develop our moral code. One learns, or fails to learn how to live harmoniously within society in his or her home.

  • It’s more about the position parents hold than the perfection they hold.

All of us have weaknesses and faults and inconsistencies, mistakes.  Only God is the perfect parent.  Even the best parents have made mistakes and sinned.  The Bible says, “We’ve all sinned.”  As a result we’re all warped.

There are many parents who are unworthy of honor.  They were abusive, manipulative, neglectful.  What is God telling me to do?  Am I supposed to ignore the pain, put on a happy face and pretend everything is great?  No, you’re not.  But God is saying I want you to honor the position of parenthood.

 Home is where respect for authority begins.

Authority is the  basis for an orderly society.  God wants us to honor the position of parenthood regardless of the personality behind it.

When we go to a judge and you say, “Your honor” we’re not making a value judgement about that guy or gal’s character — he or she may be a jerk.  We’re saying “Your honor”, and showing respect for the position.  God says He put parents in a position of authority over us in our early age.  So we are to respect it.

 How I relate to my parents will affect every other relationship

It is the major forming factor in our lives.  Our style of relating is set at home.  Even today, as a grown up, when we act in ways we don’t understand and can’t figure out our behavior, many times it’s because we’re still living out what we lived with our parents.    Niki said; it was good for me to grow up in a home with a strong take-charge dad.  I needed that, and it was good, but in other ways I can do things like my dad that are not good.  Many marriages have been ruined because a spouse has never resolved a relationship with a parent and they’re taking it out on their husband or wife or kids.  They say things like “You’re just like my mom.”  Surveys have shown that people who get along with their parents have far less stress in their lives.

What’s great about this principle of honoring parents is that Jesus as our example.  He is our model.  He says honor father and mother and he did just that.  He who was the Savior of the world spent ten elevenths of His life in a village home. 30 years old, Tradition teaches us that Joseph, Mary’s husband died young, so Jesus, the eldest son, His mother’s first-born, took upon Himself the burden of the support of Mary His mother, and of His younger half brothers and sisters. He faithfully and dutifully discharged His duties to His home and to His mother and apparently did not begin His earthly ministry until His half-siblings were old enough to take over.  His first miracle was because his mother asked him to do so.   One of his last words on the cross was for John to take care of his mother.

It’s easy to take parents for granted.  Some of you had super parents and it’s easy for you to appreciate them.  For some of us it’s a little more difficult.  I would suggest that there are at least two things we can appreciate about our parents regardless who they were:

We can appreciate/honor their effort.  Parenting is a difficult, time-demanding, energy draining job.  As a parent myself I have a new appreciation of what my parents went through.  It takes incredible energy just to corral my kids, much less teach them anything.  Have you ever considered how much easier your parents’ life would have been if they hadn’t had you?

We honor our parents for the simple reason that they have done so much for us — starting at the very beginning of our lives. You know all animal babies are somewhat defenseless at birth but a human infant is dependent upon adults for nurture longer than any animal. The moment we popped into this world they kept us warm and fed us and protected us changed hundreds of dirty diapers! and many years passed until we were old enough to care for ourselves — so of course we should be grateful!

They say they can tell the stress in the different years of a tree’s life if you cut it and look at the rings.  Certain rings are real small, those are years of crisis and stress.  I would say that for many of us, our lives growing up could be seen in our parent’s grey hair.  When was the last time you thanked your parents for just putting up with you?  Who else would have?

A boy who was talking to a friend at school. He said, “I’m really worried.” And his friend asked, “What are you worried about?” He said, “My dad works hard to provide for the needs of our home. Mom washes the clothes, prepares the meals, and keeps the house clean.” His friend said, “Well, what in the world are you worried about?” The boy replied, “I’m afraid they might try and ESCAPE!”

We  can appreciate their sacrifice.  Parenting is expensive.  The economics today alone are staggering.  If you’re a parent today it will cost you to raise a child to maturity about a quarter of a million dollars.

Could be easy to see Kaleb and Noel running toward me and me think., “there’s half a million dollars!  You better honor me!”

Somebody said a father is somebody who carries pictures where he once carried money.  Posing for the family portrait:  the dad said “Why don’t you have my kids put their hands in my pockets so it will look natural.”

When a couple chooses to have kids they are choosing to do without some other things.  So we should appreciate the sacrifice.  What could your parents have afforded if they hadn’t spent that money on you, and your clothes, your school, your doctor bills?

For many parents, growing older, the older they get the less respect they get.  All of their affirming friends start to die off.  They are no longer wanted in the market place for their skills and wisdom.  Their grown children are busy with their own families.  They lead lonely lives.  Our parents have a great need, a desperate need, to feel and to know that they made some kind of positive contribution in your life.  They need affirmation.  God says He wants you to affirm your parents for the rest of your life as long as they’re alive.

Affirm your parents now.  All the flowers in the world at their funeral won’t do them one bit of good.  The flowers at the funeral are for your benefit, not theirs.  If you’re going to give them flowers, send it to them while they’re alive, not when they’re dead.

The Bible says that the way you treat our older, elderly parents is the demonstration of our true faith.

“Anyone who won’t care for his own relatives when they need help, especially his own family, has no right to say he is a Christian.  Such a person is worse than the heathen.”  I Tim 5:8

There is a shameful tragedy in our society today where busy families are abandoning the elderly and the aged to die all alone.  The Bible teaches when our parents or our grandparents become too old to care for themselves it is not the government’s responsibility, it’s ours.  This is the cycle of the family.  As time passes, the rolls reverse.  Where, at one point in life, they fed you, bathed you, and cared for you, and took care of you.  As they grow older, people are living older, longer, the roles are reversed.  And it may be that we will need to feed them, and bathe them, and care for them.

Let’s honor our fathers and mothers.

Darrell

http://www.Upwards.Church

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