Father's Day

Father's Day was yesterday and it was a great day to celebrate the gifts of all the men in our lives. For my part, I preached on the passage from Ephesians 6:1-4.  This passage has Paul telling the reader about the relationship between father's and children.  Each party in the relationship is respect the other.  Yet, I want to focus on the instruction to the children.

Paul recalls the instructions of the Old Testament Ten Commandments to the people of Israel.  These are the initial instructions given to the people as they leave slavery in Egypt.  The first few are instructions about obeying God and keeping focus on God alone.  The sixth commandment is the first of all the commandments to hold a promise.  Now this seems strange to me as the first five are a focus on God and keeping the worship of God alone central.  So, why would the respect of our parents hold a promise to keep the land being offered by God?

To answer this, we need to look at ancient training and teaching.  IN the time of the Ten Commandments, there was no public education.  The only thing children learned was from their parents.  The parents passed on all the information of work and keeping a house.  If your father was a farmer, most boys would become a farmer.  All the women learned from their mothers how to care for children and take care of a house.  The children had to learn from the parents for a continued fruitful life.

The parents were not just in charge of the economic training, parents were also the primary educators of the faith.  IF the laws given by God through Moses were going to be passed down through each generation, the parents were going o have to teach the children all the instructions.  The faith of the people is dependent of the training of the parents.  I believe now we see why the only commandment to offer a promise is the obey your parents.

But I do not think this the only reason for the commandment.  Paul points that fathers are not to exasperate their children.  This is an instruction for the fact that we all need someone to rain us in the faith.  If we want to keep the faith of Christ moving into the next generations, the men of faith must pass on the faith and the practices to the next generation.  We are called to raise all in the faith no matter who a persons parents are in reality.