I just want to remind every individual about God’s first commandment with a promise.
(Eph. 6:1-3, New Revised Standard Version)
“’Honor your father and mother’ – this is the first commandment with a promise:
‘so that it may be well with you and you may live long on earth’.”
“There is no place like home.” This saying reminds us of sanctity and essential role of the home to world to an individual person. True indeed, no place in the world could ever give the sense of identity, security, belongingness, and love and care better than one’s own home.
In this measureable significance of the home for the well-being of an individual lies the primordial role of parents. As progenitors of the family, parents are morally responsible to provide and sustain the physiological, physical, and emotional needs, among others, of every member, particularly of the children, should they wish to build their home on a foundation of mutual love, concern, and happiness.
But what if the parents fall short of what is expected of them? As a troubled youth laments, “My parents have been very strict and tough on me. I think they are blooming unfair. They impose several restrictions, when they themselves do not abide by the rules they are supposed to follow. They do not love me anymore”.
We as children, however, should not harbor ill feelings against our parents. It must be understood that parents are not without shortcomings. They, too, are human beings limited by their weaknesses and imperfections. They have their own hang ups, misconceptions, tenderness, joys, sorrows and tears. They may not be so demonstrative of their affection or they may tend to be very strict but they still remain to be parents.
Honoring the parents through respect and obedience and reciprocating their sacrifices would certainly earn us God’s blessings because through these God pleases very much Even in this life, God assure obedient and dutiful children of a long, blissful existence.
Honoring the parents through obedience and care may take various forms, but it takes its sublime expression when it is done at the twilight years of the parents when the air of authority commanded by their physical strength and presence seems to diminish with old age. At this period when the feeling of insecurity and the specter of death slowly creep in, a dutiful son or daughter who has reverent fear of the Lord understands that this is the best time to show his or her parents love, the best opportunity to demonstrate concern for their well-being, and the best time to express wholehearted gratitude. Without gainful employments and now becoming more vulnerable to disease or health problems, parents in their old age depend largely on their children for their physiological as well as physical and emotional needs such as food, shelter, clothing and their need for affection.
Children or grandchildren should take the responsibility of looking after their parents when they grow old, especially at a time when they most need it. Through a protective circle of loving and responsible children, elderly parents can experience the real joy in the final days of their lives.
Although not all of us are fortunate to have been born to responsible and demonstratively loving parents and to have gone to school for education and enjoy the pleasures of youth no matter how we see it, the mere fact that we have been able to survive through their guidance speaks of the driving force behind our parents’ efforts in raising us. That force is their love for their children, be it felt or acted out consciously. No amount of money can pay for their sacrifices and toils of our parents.
God’s eyes are set against anyone who maligns his or her parents. Certainly, no one who mistreats his or her parents by the way of neglect, verbal abuse, and worse, by doing violence against them will be able to put his or her relationship right and live peacefully with God. Hurting one’s parents physical y or emotionally strikes the highest form of ingratitude and dishonor against both God and the parents. It inevitably incurs the ire and curse of God.
Love your parents dearly and look after them in their old age regardless of how they might have treated us in the past. When we establish families and beget children of our own, the kindness that we have shown our parents shall go after us in return.
We are lucky enough our parents are still there. Not all people were given a chance to grow old with their parents. Spend more time with them while there’s still chance. Now is the right time for us to pay all their sacrifices. A simple word thank you and I love with a hug is not enough to express our gratitude to them, but those words will surely make their heart so happy and proud.
Thanks for dropping by.
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