Deuteronomy 5:16 Bible Study | Episode 857

January 21, 2025

Hope Alive: Applying God’s Word to Your Daily Life

Deuteronomy 5:16  Bible Study | Episode #857

I am Chad Harrison, and I am the teaching pastor of Lake Community Church and had been serving as a pastor for 25 years. I'm also a practicing attorney. This podcast is designed to help you study God's word and find God's will for your life. The purpose of studying scripture is that you might know the character of Jesus Christ, and that you might see the world from the Father's perspective. That you gain wisdom that changes your life. I pray in the name of Jesus right now that God would open His word to you and allow you to see Him and to know Him. To know His will, that you might glorify Him and that you might walk in faith and power each day, especially today. In Jesus name.

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Transcript

This is Chad Harrison and you're listening to Hope Alive, applying God's word to your daily life. Hi, this is Chad Harrison and I am the teaching pastor of Lake Community Church and have been serving as a pastor for 25 years. I'm also a practicing attorney. This podcast is designed to help you study God's word and find God's will for your life. I pray in the name of Jesus right now that God will open up his word to you and allow you to see him and to know him and to know his will, that you might glorify him and that you might walk in faith and power each and every day, especially today in Jesus name. Well, good morning and welcome to Lake Community Church's morning Bible study. We are in Deuteronomy, chapter 5, verse 16. Oftentimes when we're doing a Bible study, we come across passages that are very interesting. This passage is interesting, but, but sometimes the interest is not what the passage says. Although we ought to always be interested in what God says. Sometimes it's interesting where it says it, where, where it's put in the Bible where God places it. And this one is not in a spot that you wouldn't expect. In fact very much so you would expect that this would be in the spot that it's found in. The interesting part is where it's found in the context of what's being said. And remember this whole story, the whole book of Deuteronomy is Moses telling the children of Israel the story of their parents coming out of Egypt and headed toward the promised land and all the things that their parents did in rebellion against God, not willing to do what God had asked them to do, but doing, doing their own will in their own way. And finally to the point where they refuse to go into the land and God refuses to let them go in the land after they say that they don't want to go into the promised, which was the whole reason for God delivering them. Now you go, well, didn't he deliver them for his glory? Yeah, he did deliver him for his glory. But the whole point of the glorification of God is that we become spirit filled, mature, powerful believers that do God stuff. And the best way for me to say that is that way God wants us to do God's stuff. And we are so broken and unable and unseemly, unable to be able to even approach that. And yet God fills us with Himself, His Spirit and he and he redeems us from sin and death and then he gives us giftings and power and he sends us out by faith to trust him. And we begin to do big things, life changing things, world changing things. And sure, is it the power of God that's at work in us? Yeah, it is. But we're doing it. These broken vessels are actually able to do something powerful. And that in its unique and most wonderful way, is the way that God glorifies himself with humanity. And so God honors himself and his greatness by taking the brokenness that we are and making Himself known to the world through us. And so the children of Israel that were, that were delivered out of Egypt refused to go into the promised land. And those people are the parents of the people that Moses is talking about. And so this commandment in, in the context, not out of place, it's, it's the same that we find in Exodus 20. But it is a, it is interesting in its context because the people that are before them, their parents did not honor God fully. They refused to trust him and they refused to go in the promised land. And boy, that's a little bit of an issue right there, isn't it? That's a little bit of a problem. And the reason that is a little bit of an issue, a little bit of problem is because they're not in the promised land now because of their parents. And most would say that that would not be an honorable thing. It's not their parents, their parents were failures. Well, contextually, that, that gives us that understanding. But the truth is that that's been the truth since Adam and Eve. Adam and Eve's children had parents that were broken and flawed. And parents are broken and flawed throughout history. Many, many parents spend their early adult life worried, concerned and not sure about themselves because they realize that their parenting is imperfect. And as their children grow up, they worry that their imperfection is going to permanently mess up their children. And I know that from good parents all over the world, from good parents that I've dealt with throughout the many, many years of my ministry, that parents really, really are concerned that they're not going to be good parents. And those usually are the best ones. The ones who care and have a realization of their flaws are the ones who are usually doing the best job. And, and so this is a, this is an important, it is an important commandment. It is not only important commandment, it is a commandment that God gives to his people with a promise. It's the one commandment that has a promise, direct promise, that's given to the people who do it. And so he says, honor your father and mother and the word for honor can be translated glorified. But it doesn't mean it totally that. It means really in its rudimentary, fundamental way, it means to give weight to, it means to give them their due weight. And parents deserve their due weight. Even the worst of parents take care of their children. They, they, they nurture them, they love them when, when they are totally defenseless. I guess some of them don't, but I'm talking about the ones who are actually trying to. And you go, what are you talking about, Pastor? There's parents that don't do that. Sure. There's parents who have addiction issues and, and have mental issues that, that absolutely just can't be parents. Uh, that there's nothing, there's tho. Those are sad, sad situations. Sadly, I do deal with those a lot in my legal profession. But, but those parents, oftentimes you say, well, they're just terror. You feel, you know, you want to, you want to just be so angry with them. Well, when you're really around them, what you really feel is pity for them because they are there. It's just pitiful, really. And so I don't, I don't, I don't feel anything negative toward them. I hate that they're either in addiction or mental illness and just really can't enjoy the opportunity to be a good parent, to be a parent. They struggle with that, and that is so heartbreaking for them. But most parents desire to be good parents, even if they're terrible at it. And aren't we all just really terrible at it? Uh, and so they, they, they give their, their very, very best effort to love their children, to, to give them skills and opportunities, to give them the good things in life that maybe even they missed out on. And even in their just flawedness, they do their bestest, you know, and you say flawedness and best are those words. Well, you know, when we're talking about children and parents, probably. So they, they are, they are, they are. We're all flawed and we're terrible at it. And when we do our very best for our children, the truth is God saying you ought to give weight to them. And there's a good spiritual reason for it too, by the way. If you're able to honor, give weight to your parents, give them their due weight in your life. If you're able to give flawed individuals due weight in their life, then you'll for sure learn to give God his due weight, which is everything. So if you're able to figure out how to give your parents honor their due Weight for their love and service to you. If you're able to do that well, you're going to be able to. To do the work of. You're going to be able to do the work of trusting and honoring God a lot better. And it's going to make. It's going to. It's going to give you a permanent route. It's going to give you an anchor for your life, an anchor really for your soul, and give you an opportunity to really understand what it is to love and to love something that really can't help itself. And so when. When we love our parents for doing that for us, we. We really put ourselves in a position to. To love ourselves in the midst of our struggles, and we give ourselves an opportunity to really understand the goodness of God. Because God does it perfectly. So he says, honor your father and mother as the Lord your God has commanded you. Notice he's not saying honor your father and mother because they're great. He says, do it because I told you so. In that so parenting of God to do that. He's saying, honor your father and mother. Why God? Why we got to honor God? Honor our father and mother because I told you so as the Lord God has commanded you. That's so good, isn't it? I mean, it's powerful almost when you read it. Honor your father and mother. Wow. I. My youngest daughter, that was her favorite word till she was 27. Why? But it's a good word. In fact, I think it's the greatest word you can say to God is why? Because God wants to tell you why he has all the answers. And he sure wants you to know. He wants you to know him because he is the answer. And so why is a great answer. Honor your father and your mother. Why? Because the Lord God has commanded you to do so. Hmm. Now, there's a whole lot more to it, and we've already discussed it this morning, but sometimes you just do it because that's what you're supposed to do. You know, sometimes in life we do things not because they seem like they're logical at the moment. Sometimes we do things in life just because that's what God said and that's the best way to do it sometimes. Sometimes learning to trust God when we don't know makes it really, really powerful when we trust God because we do know. And eventually we will know. He says that your days may be long. This is the promise. And that it may be well with you in the land. Notice the promised land is the place where. Where God's you doing God's best. You're walking in the power of the spiritual, walking in the fullness of his love. You're walking in the. In the unve of his purposes and his nature and his will to you. You get to know God and understand God. God says he wants that to be a long process for you, a long life for you. And that he wants you to dwell in the land for forever. Really, even past death, the spirit filled Christian life is, has its fullness. In fact, really death is the end of the physical life. And the full completeness of the spiritual life is had right at the moment you pass away. And so God says, I want you to live a long life in the land of promise that I've given you. And that's why I want you to. I want you to know the fullness of it. And you really can't do that until you honor those who have. You give weight to those who've gone before you and helped you, even if they didn't go into the promised land. Notice these people are given this commandment and their parents did not go in, refused to go in. So are we to honor our parents who maybe even lost or maybe, maybe do not get it and really haven't walked with God? Yeah, we're supposed to honor them too. Are we supposed to honor parents who are flawed and maybe even some people watching this today had a parent that had addiction issues and really wasn't a good parent? Yeah, we sure are. We're supposed to honor parents who are evil. Yeah, aren't we all? And if we're willing to do that, we're sure enough willing to honor parents who really did their best to. To raise us. And then we really learn how to honor God who has been the best for us. And that's where life is found. That's where life is found. Found in finding God. And God says this is one of those avenues to go down to really find my best to honor your father and mother, give them weight, give them importance. It's a good thing to think about right here at the holiday season also, isn't it? And it's a good thing to remember for those who've lost their parents. As you go today, I pray that the Lord will bless you and keep you, that he'll make his face to shine upon you and that he will give you hope and peace today in Jesus name.