Exodus 20:12: “Honor your father and your mother, that your days may be long in the land that the LORD your God is giving you. (ESV)
The fifth commandment is the only one accompanied by a promise. At least, the apostle Paul interprets it that way in Ephesians six. While there is a promise embedded in this command, it is not a simple promise such as the kind God sometimes gives. The promise is dependent upon obedience to the command, and therefore is contingent.
The implication is rather dark. If you do not honor your father and mother, your days will be short in the land. But the emphasis is on the positive side. God tells them to honor their father and mother so that their days may be long in the land he is giving them. The motivation has a negative side, but the emphasis is on the positive. The people are supposed to be motivated by the positive idea of many years of life in their new land.
The Fifth Commandment Then
What does it mean to honor your father and mother? The term for "honor" will be familiar to some. It is a term generally used to describe heaviness or weightiness. But the idea of heaviness is leveraged to speak of what is glorious or honorable.
This idea of weightiness is fairly easy for us to understand. We describe people as carrying a lot of weight, and we are not referring to their waistline but the sense of importance and influence they have. The idea of honoring is opposite the ideas of contempt, disdain, and treating as of little importance.
We understand, then, what it means for parents to be honored. It means that they should be respected, considered important. Their words should have a heavy influence and their desires should be given strong consideration. It really is a fascinating thing that Yahweh would himself treat this issue as so important that he would include it in the Ten Commandments!
Why is this so important, and how do we do it today? The main clue to its importance is found in the motivation to obey the commandment. If the people as a whole obey the commandment, they will have long days in the land. This is to say that the people's longevity in the promised land hinges on how they treat their parents.
Why would this be the case? If we consider what happens when children do not honor their parents, it is easier to see the utility of this commandment.
If we picture the people of Israel as they come out of Egypt and head toward the Promised Land, we can imagine the numerous children they brought out with them. It was the parents who killed the Passover lamb and smeared the blood on the doorway. It was the parents who followed the instructions to save their firstborn. It was the parents who gathered their families together and organized to follow Moses out. And it was the parents who kept families together as they made the trek to Mount Sinai. In short, parents were responsible for leading their families to trust and obey Yahweh.
If we consider the above, what would happen if children dishonored their parents, treating them with contempt and living against the way in which their parents pointed them?
If mothers and fathers are given little weight and shown little honor, then their instruction and admonition will also be given little weight and shown little honor. And if the parents' instruction and admonition is to fear Yahweh, to remember his redemption, and to keep his commandments, then this will also be given little weight and shown little honor. And if the children do not fear Yahweh, remember his redemption, and keep his commandments, then Yahweh will add to them the curses that are included in the Law. Just consider what happens in Exodus 32-34 with the debacle of the golden calf. We can also read the list of covenant blessings and curses in Leviticus 26 and Deuteronomy 28. The blessings for keeping the covenant are wonderful, and the consequences for breaking the covenant are increasingly awful.
In short, one main reason the fifth commandment is accompanied by such a promise is because the people's perseverance in keeping the covenant depends on one generation's faithfulness continuing to the next generation. This is surely why such a repeated emphasis is made in Deuteronomy while Moses is at the end of his life.
The Fifth Commandment Today
What about for us today? It is common wisdom to hear that the church is only one generation away from losing the gospel. When we read of Paul commanding children to obey their parents (Ephesians 6:1), it is not just so that the parents might have an easier and more convenient time in the home. Paul adds the descriptor "in the Lord," and it must be for a reason. Just like there were specific benefits tied to honoring parents in the old covenant, so there are specific benefits for honoring parents today. In the old covenant, the benefit of honoring parents was that life would be long. In the new covenant, the benefit is tied to their obedience “in the Lord.” In short, Paul exhorts the Ephesians’ children to listen to and obey their parents so that through imitating their parent's faith, they might come to enjoy the same benefits in Christ as their parents.
Of course, in thinking about this commandment and its relation to us today, there is the glaring fact that not all parents are seeking to raise their children in such a way as to encourage and lead them to live for God through Christ. Even the initial generation who received this commandment did not do that. The entire generation ended up dying in the wilderness. The parents did not obey Yahweh, and so the children had to wait until their parents died before they could enter the Promised Land.
Paul's modifying phrase, "in the Lord", is surely important here. There is a sense in which children's honoring of their parents is calculated to happen a certain way. It is not a generic honor, but an honor that is in the Lord. Whatever Paul means exactly, the way that children should obey their parents should have something to do with the Lord and not just be an abstract sort of obedience for obedience's sake.
As we consider the command for today, we can of course consider how we are raising our children. Am I raising them to love and follow the Lord? Am I setting them on a path which will lead them to flourishing in Christ as a repentant sinner if they follow it?
But children can also consider their parents. Am I obeying my father and mother in the Lord? Am I considering how to honor them and learn from them so that my life might be all the happier and God glorified in me? There are other combinations we could consider, such as those without children, children with ungodly parents, children with no parents, children with adoptive parents, children with one parent, and more.
Perhaps for all of us, the point is this: the next generation needs to carry on the wisdom, knowledge, and godliness of the current generation. It does not make sense as a generation to believe that your generation will thrive and flourish if you despise the former generation. And that is especially true with regard to generations within the church.
Perhaps we all need a dose of humility from this passage. Our parents weren't perfect, and neither will we be. But we can all seek to model to the next generation a humility about ourselves that can serve as an example to them for years to come.