1. Please pray with me. May the words of my mouth and the meditation of our hearts be pleasing in Your sight, O Lord, our Rock, and our Redeemer. Amen. The message from God’s Word today comes from Luke 2:41-52 and is entitled, “The 4th Commandment,” dear brothers and sisters in Christ.
2. Seriously? The boy Jesus actually does what? It’s unheard of! The text says: “He went down with them [Joseph and Mary] and came to Nazareth and was submissive to them” (v 51, emphasis added). 12 year-old children don’t do that! Do you know any? Obedience is a fighting word for kids. After all, children complain about “parental privilege” in which dads and moms control lives and hinder children from reaching their potential. That’s just spin for this: “Parents don’t let us do whatever we kids want, and we kids aren’t going to take it anymore!” Lawyers are at beck and call to help kids take their parents to court and sue.
3. Obedience to parental authority is unheard of with most kids, let alone tweeners. When parents exercise everyday, parental authority and expect simple obedience to a simple request such as “make your bed,” “clean your room,” or “take out the trash,” eyes roll back, fingers are poked in the ears, a condescending tone of voice leaks out, lots of back talk erupt with a little kicking, some screaming, a tantrum or two, the slamming of a few doors, and maybe a fist put through the wall. The cherry on top is the earsplitting words “I hate you!”
4. But with Jesus—12-year-old Jesus—none of that! He does the exact opposite. He willingly obeys his parental units—Mary, his mother, and Joseph, his guardian. He keeps the Fourth Commandment. Not because he has to but because he wants to.
5. Speaking of the Fourth Commandment, you remember how it goes, don’t you? Sure you do. “Honor your father and your mother.” Bingo! You are to honor Dad and Mom. Honor. Honor your parental units? Yes! Absolutely! Honor. That’s a big word. It’s as if God is at work through father and mother. News flash! He is! Parents are God’s representatives in the family. Dad and Mom are God’s masks behind which God hiddenly yet really does his miraculous life-giving and life-sustaining work for your sake. Dad and Mom are God’s hands and mouth in the home for you. God is at work in your little world through them—for you.
6. Tell me. How did God create you? Did he snap his fingers and say abracadabra and poof you appeared? No. God created you through the physical, real-life bodies of your parents. It’s absolutely true. This is how God rolls, He makes creatures through his creatures. He sustains your life through the sweat, hard work, and sleep-deprived bodies of your parents. So, God gives the commandment: “Honor your father and your mother.” This means that you are to fear and love God so that you do not anger or despise your parents or other authorities like your teachers, coaches, principal, pastor, or police, but honor them, serve and obey them, love and cherish them. Whether you like it or not, God gives you parents and other authorities in your life. Regardless of how you feel about it, God established parenting as one of the two most important relationships there are in life and on this earth. You are given to honor the office of parenthood regardless of who’s in it. That’s another faithful biblical, Lutheran teaching. It’s this: God first makes the office, then puts people in it and gives it the highest place in life. God peoples it! He fills the office of parent with your very specific and unique father and mother!
7. But, here’s the catch-22. The first thing that kids begin to notice is that parents are bizarre, odd, or peculiar. They always act a little creepy. “Strange” is a better way to describe your parental units, right? Sure. After all, Dad and Mom aren’t like everyone else you meet in the world. Dad and Mom always seem to embarrass you! You go out to eat or you go to the mall and you really don’t want to be seen with them. You don’t want to listen to them, love them, or obey them, let alone honor them in their office of parent. So, you need to repent! Seriously, you do!
8. You also need to learn to forgive your parents. News flash! Your parents aren’t perfect people! They’re sinners just like you. Dad and Mom blow it all the time in their vocation of parenthood in every stage of life. Lots of times parents aren’t the people they’re supposed to be according to God’s will. It’s called sin. No-brainer, right? You bet!
9. Parents, if you haven’t noticed this by now, I’ll let you in on a little secret. Your kids have what I call parental sin detectors. Your kids can sniff out a big parental sin, and it isn’t your eccentricities or idiosyncrasies. Your kids zero in like lasers on your parental hypocrisy. They notice that what you say as a parent isn’t what you do as a parent! “Do as I say, not as I do” is a disastrous way to parent. And your kids can see this as plain as day. Then they begin to resent you, lose respect for you, and . . . dishonor you as you violate your office of parent.
10. In the rough and tumble of everyday life in the family, tempers flare. Nasty words are exchanged. Hands become fists. If looks could kill. . . . There’s a ton of hurt. A few sins that a parent commits against you can be quite gruesome or monstrous and in the world’s eyes quite unforgiveable. Forgiving parents for their sin(s) against you isn’t easy. In fact, it’s probably the hardest thing in the world for a sinned-against child to do, especially when you’re older.
So, every day you are to battle against your sinful natures, the world, and the devil that always want to drive wedges between children and parents. To ruin and destroy the family. To allow sin to fester, boil, and remain forever unforgiven.
11. Who’s the odd man, or, dare I say, “boy,” out in all of this unforgiveness? Jesus! That’s who! So, it’s time to use Jesus—twelve-year-old, obedient Jesus and thirty-three-year-old Good Friday Jesus—properly. The exact way that he wants you to have good and beneficial use of him. Use him as the Savior that he is. As your Savior, he purposely kept the Fourth Commandment and all the commandments perfectly in your place. What you ought to do but couldn’t, he did! Flawlessly. Totally righteous he is! But not for himself. His obedience is for you! It counts as yours before God! Philippians 2:8-11 says it best, “8And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. 9Therefore God has highly exalted him and bestowed on him the name that is above every name, 10so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, 11and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.”
12. And more! Hanging on the cross, Jesus allows the Law to accuse and attack him with all its might because he willingly bears all your sin in his body. He takes your bad. All of it. Therefore, the Law’s indictments, blame, charges against you have been exhausted on Jesus. Including God’s wrath. Jesus experienced that, too, on the cross for you. What all this means very simply is that you are forgiven! Completely. With Jesus’ divine, Good Friday–earned forgiveness. Absolved for all the bad you’ve given to your parents and other authorities. Pardoned for all the bad your parents and other authorities have done to you. He would do that? For you? Absolutely. Let me tell you again. Emphatically. In the stead and by the command of Jesus, I forgive you all your sin in the name of the Father and of the + Son and of the Holy Spirit.
13. Now what? Well, as Jesus has forgiven you, so now he generously uses you to forgive one another just as freely. Or as some might say—just as “recklessly.” Putting Jesus to good use in your life and other lives as well. Using his divine blood to cover and cleanse your sin as well as the sin that’s committed against you. Children forgiving parents. Parents forgiving children. As Jesus Has Forgiven You, He Now Uses You to Honor Your Parents and Other Authorities.
14. Fearing and loving God so that you do not anger or despise your parents or other authorities but honor them, serve and obey them, love and cherish them. That’s what you want to do, don’t you? Of course you do. That’s the Lord’s good use for you. Happy doing just that, and God bless you in it! In the name of Jesus. Amen. Now the peace of God that passes all understanding, guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus, until life everlasting. Amen.
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