Honoring Your Father and Mother - 23
The house we were born to and the church we grew up in
So, if we are to show perpetual respect for our father’s (and/or parents’) household, our grandparents and other familial (ethnic) relationships, then we should apply this same respect for our church’ fathers and church’ relationships.
Though, of course, these church relations do not all share our ethnic heritage. In other words, it is not only you, your children, grandpa and grandma and cousins filling the church pews.1 The universal Church is made up of many nations. And even the local church will contain a mixture of the races.2
When I arrived at Alto CRC, I found myself in a heavy Dutch community. My role as a pastor/elder was to officiate in a heavy Dutch church. The Christian Reformed Church has long been Dutch in the extreme majority. This is something for which, I think, the denomination often unnecessarily, self-flagellates.3
In any case, I came into the church and community as a Swedish-Norwegian. No one asked what I was. As far as I know, no one cared. Since I’ve been there, another of our teaching elders came in who is German. While our third elder is Dutch.
I’ve been in Alto for 22 years now. Then the congregation was all Dutch - except for me and mine. Since then, God has melted in some Germans, Polish, English, and various strains of who knows what. Nobody asks. There was also a family with Italian ancestry for a time. They left. Figures!4
That aside, the point is that honoring your father and mother in your family tree goes hand-in-hand with honoring the people and heritage of your church family. And the church family is not determined by race. The church family denies no ethnic lineage but appreciates every one of them.
What is of vital importance to the church family is love for God and love for His people. Furthermore, those holding office in the church should be honored by its members, as if they were fathers given responsibility for the church.5
The New Testament makes clear the importance of honor: The Apostle Peter writes, “5Likewise, you who are younger, be subject to the elders. Clothe yourselves, all of you, with humility toward one another, for “God opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble.” 6Humble yourselves, therefore, under the mighty hand of God so that at the proper time he may exalt you, 7casting all your anxieties on him, because he cares for you.”6
Just as it would be inappropriate to refuse honor to your mother or father,7 or government officials,8 so it is wrong to dishonor the church elders. They care for your soul and you should not stubbornly ignore them, but invite them to shepherd you.
This is the recommendation of Hebrews 13:17: “Obey your leaders and submit to them, for they are keeping watch over your souls, as those who will have to give an account. Let them do this with joy and not with groaning, for that would be of no advantage to you.”
There is nothing wrong with your heritage having a strong representation in the local church. There is something very good about it, as long as God’s Word is the highest measure and favoritism does not creep in. A healthy church will not become blinded by whether you are Dutch or Chinese or Mexican, but it will see clearly according to the teaching of God’s Word and the work of His Holy Spirit.
I use the term race as it was historically used, not as the differences due to skin color, but as a synonym for ethnicity. After all, we all descend from Noah and Adam.
I tend not to care what a person’s heritage is. What I mean is, it doesn’t make a difference to me. I appreciate the ethnic lines of demarcation that God established, but truth is truth and it gets applied equally to all. A person’s character is what matters. If, in the past, the Dutch had mistreated other races (ethnicities) that entered into the church doors or into the community, then surely they should change that. They should lovingly respect and receive people. I just haven’t seen or experienced mistreatment by the Dutch people I have come to know and love.
Just kidding.
Matthew 23:8-12 talks about calling no man “father” or “teacher” for we have one Father, God in heaven and the one Christ, Jesus who is our teacher. Jesus point was that we should not exalt men, nor should men want to be exalted. This was a problem in the first century. The Jews thought too highly of the rabbis, the scribes and the Pharisees. And they, in return, loved it. The bottom line is not that the titles are forbidden, (for then we should not call our biological fathers, “father”) but that improper esteem must never be given to any. Jesus ends the portion with, “The greatest among you shall be your servant. Whoever exalts himself will be humbled, and whoever humbles himself will be exalted.” That is the goal.
1 Peter 5:5-7
Exodus 20:12, aka the fifth commandment, “Honor your father and your mother, that your days may be long in the land that the LORD your God is giving you.”
Romans 13:7 “Pay to all what is owed to them: taxes to whom taxes are owed, revenue to whom revenue is owed, respect to whom respect is owed, honor to whom honor is owed.