Meeting guide · command 47

Honor Your Parents

Honor father and mother rather than using religious explanations to avoid real responsibility toward them.

Read

Read the complete passage aloud.

Primary passage

Matthew 15:4

4 For God commanded, ‘Honor your father and your mother,’ and, ‘He who speaks evil of father or mother, let him be put to death.’

World English Bible

Jesus confronts a tradition that allowed people to dedicate resources religiously while withholding support their parents needed.

Discuss

Listen carefully to what Jesus says.

  1. What does Jesus command?
  2. What does this passage reveal about Him?
  3. Where do we resist this command?
  4. What is difficult or unclear?
  5. What does honor require, and what does it not require, in healthy, strained, or unsafe family relationships?

Practice

Choose one specific act of obedience.

Take one appropriate act of honor through gratitude, contact, practical care, or provision; use wise boundaries where a relationship is harmful or unsafe.

Return

Come back and discuss what happened.

What act of honor did you take, and what wisdom or boundary was needed?

Close together

Pray. Then prepare to teach.

Pray

Father, teach us faithful honor. Give us gratitude, courage, practical love, and wisdom for necessary boundaries.

Teach

Keep honor connected to concrete responsibility while distinguishing it from enabling abuse, denying truth, or surrendering adult boundaries.