01.09.04
Authority and Submission Part5   
 
“Children, obey your parents”
Eph.6:1-3  
________________________________________________________________________ 
 
Summary: Children obey (listen like Jesus and honor) out of loyalty to Christ, and you will enjoy long life, heaven and the blessings of salvation now. 

Children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right. 2 "Honor your father and mother"-which is the first commandment with a promise— 3 "that it may go well with you and that you may enjoy long life on the earth."   
4 Fathers, do not exasperate your children; instead, bring them up in the training and instruction of the Lord. 
Introduction
We are studying the book of Ephesians verse-by-verse, and before the holidays we left off at the end of ch.5. In the middle of ch.5, in v.18, Paul threw a big boulder in the lake, and the ripple effects of that go all the way through the end of ch.5 and half way through ch.6. The boulder was that pivotal and foundational command: Be filled by the Spirit.  From that verse on we have been studying what the Spirit-filled life looks like. 
Paul goes on to give 4 descriptions of what it looks like when someone’s life is filled up by the Holy Spirit with the fullness of God. It’s a life of joy, worship, thanksgiving and submission to authorities. When you hear people talk about what it means to be filled by the Spirit, you might hear them talk about the first three of those - joy and worship and maybe even gratitude, but you really don’t hear much about the 4th one - submission to authorities. And yet, that’s the one Paul emphasizes the most. Those first three descriptions get a combined total of two whole verses. Submission to authorities gets the next 22 verses. Having a submissive, respectful attitude toward authority is a very important part of the Christian life. It’s not on the periphery.  Anyone who claims to be filled by the Spirit, but who is not submissive to authority is deceived. 
So in v.21 Paul gives the general statement. And in the verses that follow he zeros in specifically on submission in the relationships within the home. First he calls on wives to submit to and respect their husbands. (Then gives instruction to husbands about how not to abuse their authority. Husbands are to love their wives.) Now, at the beginning of ch.6, Paul does something that may come as a bit of a surprise to a lot of people – he starts speaking to children. That’s the first word in the chapter: Children. Adults are allowed to listen in. You don’t have to leave the room. But this section is directed specifically at children.
            The word children, as Kurt pointed out last week, doesn’t signify age as much as relationship. If you have parents, you are a child – regardless of your age. The children that Paul primarily has in view in this passage, however, are children who are still being raised. (We see that in v.4.) So this passage applies most directly to kids from birth up to college age or so.
A High View of Children
It’s worth noticing that children are addressed as responsible members of the congregation.  It doesn’t say, “Parents, make your kids obey.”  or “Parents, pass this command on to your children, because I know they won’t be hearing this.”  Paul sent a letter that he expected to be read in the churches as Scripture, and he fully expected that the children would be present in the room when it was read. Not only that, he fully expected that the children would be listening and responding to what was read. The reason I point that out is because I think the church today has taken a low view of children. This passage makes some interesting assumptions about children. It assumes:
1)      They are present in the worship service
2)      They care about God’s commands
3)      They are able to follow Paul’s reasoning
4)      The phrase “In the Lord” means children are to obey their parents as an outgrowth of their commitment to the Lord.
So Paul is assuming they already have obedience to the Lord as a priority
5)      When Paul gives the motivation (which is a promise of blessing), he is assuming that the children are so spiritual that they will actually be motivated by God’s promises
Scripture takes a very high view of children, and we should as well. It’s possible for a church to fall into the error of thinking children’s ministry is just for the purpose of babysitting and amusement.  They hardly teach their children anything except for the most basic things about behavior – basically the same things they learn in kindergarten anyway. We tell them to be nice and share and we add a few Bible stories, and that’s pretty much all they get in their first grade Sunday school class, and second grade and third, and when they finally get into senior high youth group, that’s still pretty much all they get, except now they get to play fun games and go on trips. Churches hire youth “pastors” and pile so much work on them that they are lucky if they can study 4 or 5 hours a week. Or they get lay people to teach the youth who study even less than that. We put our kids on a starvation diet until they graduate from high school, and then we expect them to survive the attacks and onslaught of temptation at college. I think the reason that kind of thing is so common is because of that low view of children. People think children aren’t capable of really being interested in the things of God. Youth workers think there is no way a middle school student could ever be interested in theology or doctrine. And so they give them stupid stories and inane human wisdom instead. At Creekside we have tried to structure our ministry based on a high view of children. If the children Paul wrote to 
·         were present in the worship service
·         cared about God’s commands
·         were are able to follow Paul’s reasoning
·         had obedience to the Lord as a priority, and 
·         were motivated by God’s promises of blessing…
Then there is no reason we shouldn’t assume all that of our children too. And when they get into the youth group, I believe a Sr. High student is really at the adult level when it comes to being able to understand biblical principles. That’s why when we hired a youth leader our #1 priority was to find someone committed to expository teaching. If you sit in on the youth Sunday school or youth group meeting, you won’t hear a bunch of stories with a little moral lesson on the end. You won’t hear a stand up comedy routine with Bible verses sprinkled in to make it spiritual. You will hear the same kind of thing you hear in our adult ministries – careful, verse-by-verse expository teaching that rises out of many, many hours of in-depth exegesis and study each week.
An important command
So Paul addresses children and gives them a command. And the message is pretty simple: Children Obey your parents. This is a little stronger wording than what he said to wives.[1]  This is a very, very important command.  Look down at v.2.
 
which is the first commandment with a promise[2]
 
Not only is it one of the 10 commandments – and the only one of the ten that comes with a promise.  And it appears in a key place in the 10 commandments. It’s commandment #5.
 
The Motive for Obedience: Honoring Christ
A Mark of Loyalty to God
The reason that’s important is because the first half of the 10 commandments are about our relationship to God. (No other gods before Me, no idol worship, don’t take the Lord’s name in vain, and don’t violate the Lord’s Sabbath). The second half are all about our relationship with other people. (Don’t murder, don’t commit adultery, don’t steal, don’t’ give false testimony and don’t covet your neighbor’s stuff.) But right in the middle of all those is #5 – honor your father and mother. Scholars debate about whether it goes with the first half of the second half. Usually Christians have taken #5 to go with the second half – the ones that have to do with our relationships with other people. But Jewish scholars have tended to take it with the first half – the ones that focus on loyalty to God. And I think there is a lot to be said for that view. Obviously obeying your parents involves other people (your parents), but if we have to put it in one category or the other, it seems to me it fits better in the category of expressions of loyalty to God (like #1-4). All human authority is an expression of God’s authority, and so obedience and submission is first and foremost an issue between you and God. That’s why in the OT, disrespect toward one’s parents got the death penalty. Whenever Scripture speaks of disobedience to parents it speaks in the most severe terms.
 
Deut 21:18-21 If a man has a stubborn and rebellious son who does not obey his father and mother and will not listen to them when they discipline him, 19 his father and mother shall take hold of him and bring him to the elders at the gate of his town. 20 They shall say to the elders, "This son of ours is stubborn and rebellious. He will not obey us. He is a profligate and a drunkard." 21 Then all the men of his town shall stone him to death. You must purge the evil from among you. All Israel will hear of it and be afraid. 
 
And it doesn’t get any softer in the NT. Disobedience to parents appears in contexts that describe the bottom of the barrel of the world’s sinfulness. In the downward spiral of sin in Rom.1 mankind hits bottom around the time children become disobedient to their parents.
 
Rom 1:28-32 Furthermore, since they did not think it worthwhile to retain the knowledge of God, he gave them over to a depraved mind, to do what ought not to be done. 29 They have become filled with every kind of wickedness, evil, greed and depravity. They are full of envy, murder, strife, deceit and malice. They are gossips, 30 slanderers, God-haters, insolent, arrogant and boastful; they invent ways of doing evil; they disobey their parents 
 
2 Tim 3:1-2 There will be terrible times in the last days. (Listen to how bad it will get) 2 People will be lovers of themselves, lovers of money, boastful, proud, abusive, disobedient to their parents
 
So you can see this is a very, very serious issue to God. If you are disobedient and disrespectful toward your parents, and you are not sorry or repentant about it, you do not love the Lord.
In the Lord
Notice it doesn’t just say, “obey your parents.” It says Children, obey your parents in the Lord. It is because of and in accordance with your close association with the Lord that you are to obey your parents.[3] It makes good sense even for a non-Christian to obey his parents, since parents are older and more experienced and smarter and they love you and all that, but none of those are the main reason you are to obey. The main reason to obey your parents is because of your relationship to the Lord Jesus Christ. Obeying your parents is part of how you obey Christ. We saw this back when the submission principle was first given in v.21. We are to submit to our authorities out of fear of Christ. Wives, submit to your husbands as to the Lord. Slaves, do your work as unto the Lord. And children, obey your parents in the Lord. When you obey them, you’re obeying the Lord. When you honor them, you’re honoring the Lord. When you dishonor them, or rebel against them, or disrespect them, you’re dishonoring, rebelling against and disrespecting the Lord. So whether or not you obey your parents really is a mark of whether you are loyal to God – it really does fit with the first half of the 10 Commandments. So if your mom tells you to clean your room, you should respond exactly the same way as if God came down and told you to clean your room.
This is Right
That’s why when he gives the motivation, he says: Children, obey your parents in the Lord for this is right. That word right is the same word sometimes translated “righteous.” You should obey because of righteousness. Again – you don’t obey just because it makes your home life smoother. Don’t obey just to avoid punishment. Don’t listen to your parents just because it makes them happy. Obey your parents because it’s righteous. Col.3 says Children obey your parents for this pleases the Lord.  First and foremost, obeying your parents should be a religious experience.   It has more to do with your closeness and intimacy with God than anything else. The idea that we could bring pleasure to God is one of the most amazing concepts the human brain is capable of contemplating.  Now, if Paul, writing under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, says it’s right, then it’s right. But Paul really wants to drive this point home, and so he quotes one of the 10 Commandments. So children you are to obey, and your motive should be to please God. Now let’s take a look at what obeying really means. There are two parts to it: Listening and honoring.

The Two Parts of Obedience:  
listening & honoring
Listening
The term translated “obey” literally means “to listen.”  God is not just telling you to do what your mom and dad say – it’s saying listen to them. That doesn’t just mean hearing the sounds coming out of their mouths – it means giving credence (importance) to what they say– taking what they say and giving it weight and validity in your thinking. It means to take what they say seriously. The older you get, the harder that is. When you are real little, you assume your parents know everything and aren’t wrong about anything. By the time you’re 16, you realize there are some things your parents don’t have a clue about.  In fact there are some things even they would admit you know more about than they do. It’s at that stage of life when this command begins to become difficult.  When you are in your early or mid teens, you know so much more than you knew just two years ago, that it seems to you like you are practically at the adult level of knowledge. So when you give your reasoning why you should be allowed to stay out later or wear some clothes they don’t like, etc., and your parents aren’t convinced, it seems like your parents are being irrational. When Scripture tells you to listen to your parents, that involves trusting what they say to be valid.  It means saying to yourself, “Even though it doesn’t seem like mom’s reasoning is sound - I’m going to assume she has some knowledge or some perspective that I don’t have, and there may be more to this than meets my 14 year old eye.”That is faith, and it’s very difficult for an adolescent to do, but it’s exactly what Scripture calls for. 
 
Pr.1:8  Listen, my son, to your father's instruction
Pr 23:22 Listen to your father, who gave you life
 
Listen to them, and trust what they say. Don’t just listen to your parents when you agree with what they are saying.  We wouldn’t need a command in the Bible for that – everyone does that.  The point is to listen to them when you don’t agree. Now, if your parents tell you to do something sinful, obviously you can’t do that.  And if your parents are beating you – leaving marks, or injuring you.  You need to come tell me. But if you just disagree with them, you must listen and obey. 
            During the time you are under your parents’ roof, you should not only follow their rules, but actually look to them for guidance, and pay careful attention to what they say. When you are young, and your parents tell you you’re not mature enough to do something or to make a certain decision, that’s not an insult.  Listen to them, and give them more credit than you are naturally inclined to. If you are 16, and your mom says you don’t have the maturity of an 18 year old, that’s not bad. God didn’t intend for 16 year olds to be like 18 year olds. If you are 12, and your parents don’t treat you like a 14-year-old, that’s not an insult. In fact, that puts you in good company.  You are just like Jesus.  
Jesus Grew through Obedience
People often wonder, “What was Jesus doing from age 12 until He was an adult?   How did He spend His teen years and His 20s? The answer is He spent that time growing in 4 areas in which He was lacking.  Even though He was God in human flesh, during His teen years He was immature in 4 areas and needed to mature in those 4 areas. Luke 2:52 describes what Jesus’ life was like from age 12 to adulthood:  
 
Lk.2:52  Jesus grew in wisdom and stature, and in favor with God and men. 
 
At age 12 Jesus was different than any other 12-year-old in that He had no sin.  But He was like every other 12-year-old in that He was lacking mentally, physically, spiritually and socially. That’s pretty obvious with real little kids. Very young children don’t have wisdom – they can’t make good life decisions.  Leave them to themselves and they will eat nothing but candy & ice cream. Toddlers do not naturally know how to get along with other kids – they have to be taught that. They have no ability to function in society – they need years of training and learning. But very often when someone reaches adolescence, he assumes those things are no longer true of him.  Once you hit your teens, you start feeling like an adult. But Lk.2:52 is talking about Jesus from age 12 on.  So it’s not talking about His early childhood, but His teen years. During His teen years Jesus lacked wisdom. He didn’t know how to make good decisions in life.  He didn’t have enough knowledge or life experience to successfully navigate through life without guidance from His parents. Left to His own, He would have tended to make foolish decisions.  I’m sure He was much wiser than the average 12-year-old, but still He needed to grow in that area.“But wasn’t He in the Temple teaching the Scribes at age 12?”  No. He was in the Temple asking the Scribes questions. 
 
Lk 2:46,47 they found him in the temple courts, sitting among the teachers, listening to them and asking them questions. 
 
He was also giving some answers as well.   
 
47 Everyone who heard him was amazed at his understanding and his answers. 
 
So for a 12-year-old he was advanced to the point that people were amazed at his understanding, but still He needed to grow. And if that was true of the Lord Jesus Christ, it’s true of you. The thing about wisdom is, when you don’t have it, you don’t know you don’t have it. In fact, the less wisdom you have, the more you think you have. You don’t find out that you didn’t have it until later on when you get it and you look back with embarrassment on the way you were as a teenager. Listen to your parents and learn wisdom from them.
            Secondly, Jesus lacked stature.  He wasn’t tall enough or strong enough, and He needed to grow physically.  Third, it says He grew in favor with God.  Amazingly, even though He was completely sinless, He still had to grow and learn and make progress spiritually.  And fourth, He grew in favor with men.  He had to learn social graces. During His teen years Jesus needed to learn how to get along with people. He needed to learn from His parents how people react to various things, and what offends people or annoys people, and how other people interpret things. He needed to learn how to put people at ease, how to comfort them, how to motivate them, and how to communicate with them and understand them. He was like any other teenage kid – He needed to learn how to smile and how to be confident when He talked to an adult. He had to learn not to mumble, and to look people in the eye. I can see why Luke put this last, because it seems to be the last area in which we mature. Very often someone will reach his full height physically and so he assumes he is mature, but he lacks understanding regarding all that is involved in the subtleties of social interaction. When you’re a kid, you have pressure from your friends to be cool, and you learn to protect yourself from ever being embarrassed.  But when you become an adult you have to learn how to not worry about protecting yourself so much, and to be confident, and warm toward people. It takes years of maturing to unlearn being cool, and to relearn how to be warm and non-threatening and inviting to people. Children need guidance in this area – especially teenage children.  
            And you really need help when it comes to romantic relationships and dating. Anyone who falls in love tends to make foolish decisions (there is an entire book of the Bible designed to warn us against that - SoS). That’s true of everyone, but especially young people. No matter how smart you are - it doesn’t matter. When a person falls in love, his brain turns to mush. Just watch someone who falls in love and you’ll see. Even the most intelligent people, when they fall in love, make the dumbest decisions.  It is extremely foolish to ignore your parents’ guidance when you start dating – extremely foolish.  And not just foolish, but sinful.  Remember, listening to your parents is not just following rules, but listening to them and heeding their counsel.
            So when you are growing to maturity, just like Jesus, you need to progress in those 4 areas, and the way to do it is the same way Jesus did it. You often hear about Lk.2:52, where Jesus grew in wisdom, stature and favor with God and men. We hear about v.52 all the time.  What we don’t hear very often is v.51. The verse right before the verse about Jesus growing in those 4 areas says this:
 
Luke 2:51 Then he went down to Nazareth with [Mary & Joseph] and was obedient to them.
 
Jesus obeyed His parents, and the result of that was He grew in those 4 areas. Like Jesus, all young people need to grow in those areas, and like Jesus, you need to do it by listening to your parents. And not just listening, but also honoring.
Honoring
Commandment #5: "Honor your father and mother" This goes beyond just obeying or even listening. God calls us to honor our parents. There are a couple applications of that. Primarily it has to do with respect. It means to highly value someone and to look up to him. It is your duty before God to honor & respect your parents.  It doesn’t matter if they deserve it or not.  The truth is, they don’t.  They are sinful, created beings with limited knowledge and limited power who make mistakes. You don’t respect them because they deserve it.  You respect them because that pleases God, and He does deserve it. Your duty goes way beyond just doing what they say. Think about this, kids: Is it possible to disobey your parents even when you do what they tell you to do? Yes, if you do it with a disrespectful attitude. If your mom tells you to do something you don’t want to do, and you say, “Aw maaaan!” and go stomping off and do it, that may be obedience on the outside, but it’s still disrespect on the inside. When your mom or dad tell you something you should immediately say, “Yes Ma’am!” or “Yes Sir!”  (Of course then you have the added chore of having to try to revive them because they have passed out).
            Those of you still living with your parents, the next time you really, really want something – before you even bother asking your parents, get it settled in your own mind how important that thing is. Is it more important or less important than pleasing God?  Is it more or less important than honoring your parents? Make sure the answer to those questions is firmly in your mind before you even ask.  Because if pleasing God is more important than getting what you’re asking for, than honoring your parents is more important than getting what you’re asking for. So you go to you parents thinking, “I really want this, but honoring them is more important to me than getting what I want.   If they say no, I will listen to them. Plan that out ahead of time so if they say no, you will already have a pre-planned godly response (like “yes sir” or “yes ma’am”).  Even if you have a question about what they are telling you – like “Why?” or “Why not?” First you say, “Yes ma’am” and then you ask your question.
            So you honor them in your heart through respect. And then you also honor them in your actions by doing things that show them to be worthy of respect and high regard. Anytime you do something that causes people to think well of your parents, you have honored them.Anytime you cause someone to look down on your parents, you dishonor them. When you are with your friends and you find yourself talking about your parents, be very careful about what comes out of your mouth. Do not dishonor your parents. You shouldn’t dishonor anyone, but especially not your parents. And this applies whether you are 6 or 66. The command to obey applies, as I said before, mainly to children who are still being raised. When you get married you leave your parents and are joined to your spouse, and so their authority over you isn’t the same after that. However Jesus made it clear that the command to honor our parents applies to adults just as much as children. When you are a child you honor your parents mostly by obeying them. When you are older you honor them through many, many different ways. You honor them with your attitudes, your speech, your actions – even your money. The word “honor” can refer to giving money.And that’s how Jesus uses it in Mt.15. 
 
Read Matt 15:3-9
 
If your elderly parents are in need and you do not help them financially, you are not honoring them, which means you are not honoring God. I should probably note here that it is not right for parents to use this command to manipulate their children to get them to do what they want. Sometimes parents think “Honor your father and mother” means “Do whatever your parents want” or “Don’t ever make your parents sad.” That is not what it means. Some parents will try to run the lives of their grown children – get them to move somewhere or marry a certain person or not marry a certain person. And they make their children think that if they don’t do everything the parents want, that is a violation of the 5th commandment. The 5th commandment was not intended to enable parents to manipulate their children. The purpose of the 5th commandment is to cause children to respect their parents. And sometimes, as an adult, you need to respectfully decline something your parents want. Respect doesn’t mean sacrificing your family to do everything your parents want. But it does mean holding your parents in high regard in your own heart – so high that other people hold them in higher regard when hear you talk about them.
 
The Reward for Obedience: It will go will with you
So Paul quotes Dt.5:16, and then he adds a most interesting motivation:
 
-which is the first commandment with a promise 3 "that it may go well with you” 
 
Everyone wants his life to go well.  People go to college, because they think it will help make their lives go well. People try to earn money so their lives will go well. People pursue all kinds of relationships in an effort to make their lives go well. God says if you want your life to go well, honor your mom & dad. And specifically He talks about long life.
The blessing – long life
and that you may enjoy long life on the earth."   
 
If you are obedient and respectful to your parents, your life will tend to go better and you will most likely live longer. As a young child, listening to your parents can protect your from physical injury caused by high places or sharp objects or fast-moving cars or hot stoves. As you get a little older, listening to them can save you from bad friendships, which very often result in a very difficult and often shortened life. You look at people whose lives have ended in disaster, and so often it can be traced back to some bad friendships – friendships they never would have gotten mixed up in if they had listened to their parents. The same can be said about a lot of train-wreck marriages. So being obedient will give you a much smoother, much better, and longer life.
 
Heaven
But beyond that, if you obey your parents in the Lord (out of obedience to the Lord). If you obey your parents because you love the Lord, the result of that will be the ultimate Promised Land – the glories of heaven. In the OT the promise referred literally to living a long, healthy life in the Promised Land. Now we understand that the Promised Land was a picture or illustration of heaven. And so when we read that OT saints were promised blessing in the Promised Land if they were responsive to God’s covenant. The application for us is that we too will be blessed with salvation if we are responsive to God’s covenant. That’s not to say you earn the right to go to heaven by obeying your parents. There is not thing anyone could ever do to earn the right to go to heaven. The only way anyone ever goes to heaven is through faith alone. But true faith in Christ will be expressed by an attitude of submission to Him. And submitting to Him means submitting to and honoring those authorities He has placed over you. And so when you obey your parents out of genuine love for Christ, you give evidence that you are on the path to eternal joy in heaven. And one other thing we can add.

 
Enjoyment of Blessings
If the Promised Land was God’s place of reward and blessing. And He promised a long life in that land for obedient children. The point is that the obedient child will have a great ability to enjoy the blessings of salvation. Most of the blessings of salvation we have to wait unto heaven to enjoy. But there are many of them we enjoy in this life. And we enjoy them to varying degrees. Some Christians enjoy freedom in Christ a great deal. Others hardly at all. All Christians have it, but some enjoy it a lot while others hardly even know what it is. Some Christians enjoy forgiveness of sins so much they can hardly contain themselves. Others barely notice it. They rarely even think about it, and when they do think about it, it has almost no effect on them. Some Christians enjoy fellowship with the Lord so much their lives are full of unassailable joy. Others only have the most vague sense of fellowship with Christ. Some Christians open up the pages of their Bible each day and very often they literally feel a rush of excitement and anticipation and joy that they are about to read wonderful things. Other Christians only experience that maybe only once a month or once a year or maybe never. Some Christians’ lives are full and rich and powerful because their spiritual gifts have been fanned into a massive flame. They know their calling and they can see the almighty, supernatural power of God flowing through their lives in their spiritual gifts. Other Christians don’t even know what their gift is. Or they know it, but it seems almost pointless or they sense very little power in their lives. Some Christians enjoy fellowship with the Body of Christ so much they feel like they have to pinch themselves to see if it’s for real. They feel so loved and so cared for, they can hardly believe it. Other Christians don’t even like fellowship, and they hardly feel any connection with the Body at all. All those things are examples of the benefits of salvation. And what this verse is saying is if you obey and honor your mom and dad, you will be in the first group of each one of those examples. For ancient Israel it meant living a long time and prospering in the Promised Land. The equivalent of that for us now is to really prosper in the aspects of salvation that are available now. So if you honor your parents, you will be one of the ones who really enjoys 
·         freedom in Christ
·         forgiveness
·         closeness and intimacy and fellowship with the Lord
·         encouragement from the Scriptures
·         spiritual power and fruitful ministry
·         warm fellowship with the Body of Christ…
- and that list goes on as long as the New Testament. 
            If you are obedient to you parents, you will have great capacity to enjoy all the benefits of salvation in this life, and eternal life in heaven.“Why? How do those things go together?  How does obeying my parents make me understand the Bible more or enjoy fellowship at church more?” The answer is simple. But it only works if you obey your parents in the Lord. When you obey your parents in the Lord (that is, you obey them not to avoid punishment or to make your home life smooth, but you obey them because you want to honor the Lord Jesus Christ). When you do that, God responds by blessing your life. And the main way God blesses a person’s life is by giving him the ability to enjoy the wonderful things God offers. You see, whether or not you enjoy something is not up to you.  You can’t make yourself enjoy something. You can do things that usually bring enjoyment, but it’s up to God whether they actually bring enjoyment or not. You take your favorite activity in the world – the funnest thing you can think of. If God decided not to grant enjoyment with that thing, you could do it all day long and no matter how hard you tried it would never bring any enjoyment. According to Ecclesiastes 6:2, sometimes God gives a man wealth, possessions and honor, so that he lacks nothing his heart desires, but God does not enable him to enjoy them
 
On the other hand, when God blesses a person’s life, God not only gives that person wonderful things, but He gives him the ability to enjoy those things.
 
Eccl 5:19-20 Moreover, when God gives any man wealth and possessions, and enables him to enjoy them, to accept his lot and be happy in his work — this is a gift of God. 20 He seldom reflects on the days of his life, because God keeps him occupied with gladness of heart. 
 
Parents, do you want a great life for your child? Do you want your kids to really do well? Parents will break their back to get their kid in every kind of lessons and sports and will help them with school work so they get good grades. And they’ll go into debt to put them through college. All so they will have a good life. But none of those things are anywhere near as important as the blessing of God on their lives. If you really love your kids, and you really want them to have a good life. Teach them through discipline, through instruction and most importantly by example what it means to honor authority out of reverence for Christ. Because when we honor our authorities with that motive, we receive His blessing. And His blessing comes in the form of a great ability to enjoy the wonderful gifts of God in the Gospel.
 
BENEDICTION:  Jude 24-25  To him who is able to keep you from falling and to present you before his glorious presence without fault and with great joy- 25 to the only God our Savior be glory, majesty, power and authority, through Jesus Christ our Lord, before all ages, now and forevermore! Amen.
 
Review Questions:
1. What is the significance of the fact children are addressed directly?
It shows Scripture’s high view of children and their capacity for spirituality.
2. What is the significance of the phrase in the Lord?
The promise is valid only if children obey their parents out of a commitment to obeying Christ.
3.What are the present day applications of the promise of long life in the land?
A long, blessed life; blessings in heaven, and a great capacity to enjoy the present benefits of salvation.

[1] The command to wives is in the middle voice – “submit yourselves” which highlights the voluntary nature of the submission. It’s not optional for wives, but it is voluntary. Husbands are not to discipline their wives for disobedience. 
[2] Before the 5th commandment God had given general promises that had to do with reward that comes if you keep all God’s commands. But this is the first time there is a specific reward attached to a specific command.
[3] This is something that always sets the ethics of Christianity apart from the ethics of the world. Scripture does not call us to behave in a certain way simply in the name of ethics. It’s always driven by theology. Ethics is the highest standard the world acknowledges. They say you should do right things simply because they are ethical. But Scripture shows us that the only thing that makes something ethical or unethical is its relationship to God’s character.