Quick Note – Leviticus 10:3 – Respect to Whom It Is Due

Leviticus 10:3 – “Then Moses said to Aaron, ‘This is what the Lord has said: “Among those who are near me I will be sanctified, and before all the people I will be glorified.”’”

One of the most difficult things about teaching a youth/college group when you aren’t above your thirties is that you often start treating your students like your friends.  You grow so close to them that the teacher-student, mentor-mentee relationship is blurred to the point of being lost in the background.  Without constant attentiveness in how close you allow your relationships to be with them, you will likely lose their respect and be seen as a peer instead of as a role model.  The “cool” uncles and aunts can certainly relate to this problem, because although they are looked on with admiration from their nieces and nephews, they occasionally lose their respect as an elder.  The problem is finding the balance of being close and friendly and relatable without losing the respect needed to discipline and teach.  I have had difficulty finding that balance with the older college kids that I teach, because I tend to overshare what is going on in my life.  Because of that, I am almost certain that they only see me as a friend rather than a teacher.  Do I like being their friend?  Of course!  But would I also like to be treated with respect as a teacher and authority figure?  Yes.  Instead, because we are so close, they joke around with me and occasionally poke fun, and honestly, I don’t think they respect me very much.

The funny thing is that as a disciple of Jesus Christ, I treat God the same way the college kids I teach treat me.  Because I know that Jesus Christ died on the cross for me and saved me by His grace, because I know that He loves me and forgives me when I falter, because I know that He is my Friend, I treat Him with less respect than He deserves.  More often than not, I abuse the grace He has given me, because I know that He will forgive and will never forsake me as His child.  But our God is a holy God.  He is the Lord of lords, the King of kings, the Master and Creator of the universe; He deserves our respect and honor and praise.  He should not just be treated as some buddy from the bar.

In our verse for today, we hear the Lord tell Moses and Aaron, “Among those who are near me I will be sanctified, and before all the people I will be glorified.”  In order to understand the point that God was getting at we need to understand the context in which He said it.  The previous two verses describe how Aaron’s sons Nadab and Abihu offered incense up to the Lord that was not according to His commands.  Instead of offering up incense according to His law, they went ahead and offered their own concoction, and for doing so, they were struck dead.  In saying these words in vs. 3, He was letting His people know that if they were going to serve Him, they would have to do it with respect and honor, not according to their own rules and ideas.  If you are going to draw near to God, you need to sanctify Him.  Sanctify means to set apart as holy.  God, of course, is already holy, and you don’t do anything to make Him that; but what this verse is saying is that you will set Him apart and revere Him as holy.  You will not treat Him as some ordinary guy off the street.  You will not treat Him just as a teacher.  You will not treat Him just as you would the President of the United States or the Secretary General of the United Nations.  Rather, you will treat Him as He deserves – as the God and Lord of your life.  We need to treat God with the respect He deserves.  Yes, we can come to Him as a child to his father.  And yes, we can come to Him as our best Friend.  But even in doing so, we need to come to Him as Master and Lord.  As you draw closer to God, do not let your relationship with Him get looser, but instead, learn to honor Him more, love Him more, and thank Him more as you realize that only by His grace can you come into His presence.

Quick Note – Proverbs 19:26 – Honor Your Parents

Proverbs 19:26 – “He who does violence to his father and chases away his mother is a son who brings shame and reproach.”

Ephesians 6:1 states, “Children, obey your parents in the LORD:  for this is right”; I must admit that sometimes it is quite hard to follow this command.  A lot of people like to think that this verse is directed only towards younger children, for it is one of the most common children’s Sunday school lessons, but that would be wrong.  To say that the verse is restricted to a certain age group like younger children and teenagers would be ludicrous, for the verse speaks to everyone, because we are all children of a set of parents.  We must all obey and honor our parents no matter how old we get.  And it’s true that a lot of us tend to think that as we grow older and more mature, we learn to respect them more, but that is not always the case.  Sometimes, if we are not careful, we can actually become even more disrespectful because we may think that we now “know more.”  Whether we are old or young, we must be careful to obey and honor our parents.

Our passage today is found in the book of Proverbs.  It is just one of the hundreds of wise and pithy statements that Solomon, the wisest man to have ever lived, left for posterity.  Although a lot of the Proverbs in this chapter focused on the poor, idleness, and temper-control, it was this specific verse that hit home with me today.  The reason for that is because I actually did not show the proper respect to my mom today when she shared some advice with me.  Instead of calmly listening, weighing the information, and taking it to heart, I lashed back in a way that showed dishonor to my mother.  It is just like the verse says, I “chased” away my mother.  Now, of course, I didn’t actually chase my mother away from my life in my words or actions, but the way I acted was certainly a step in that direction.  It was after I had done that that I realized how foolish I had been.  Fortunately, my mom is a fairly quick forgiver and forgave me after I apologized.

Although my short story ends with a happy ending, a lot of people today do not have good relationships with one of their parents, because they refuse to give them the proper respect and honor.  It may not even be an issue of a specific event but a general disrespectful attitude.  As Christians, God expects us to love and honor our parents, no matter how trying it may be.  They could be always giving you a hard time, but you must still respect them.  They could be elderly and need more of your time and help, but you must still respect them.  They may be controlling and difficult, but you must still respect them.  They could be unsaved, but you must still respect them.  The fifth commandment of the Ten given to Moses was “Honor your father and mother.”  We must make sure that we set an example for the world of what it means to respect one’s parents.  We must love and take care of them.  We must listen and obey them in the LORD (as long as it is not going against God’s Word).  We must honor them.  By honoring them, we honor God through obedience as well.