I was ‘that kid’ in school.  The one who never missed a day of school.  Who studied more, not less, than required.  Who worried about a maximum page count, never the minimum.   I loved short answer and hated multiple choice.  I assumed ‘softball’ multiple choice questions were all nefarious tricks.  So, I added asterisks and sidebars – just to clarify.  I truly loved to read and study.  As a side gig, my father sold World Book encyclopedias.  I read them habitually and thoroughly.  Academics were my interest, my passion.  And so ‘Honor’s Day’ at school was for me like a sporting event.

Our school ‘Honor’s Day’ recognized virtually everything.   Perfect attendance, number of consecutive days a whole class participated in the lunch program, and academic achievement.  I loved the certificates, pins, and medals – not out of hubris, but because I delighted in the pomp and circumstance.  It was a time to recognize things that matter, things that were of value to me.  Not what the rest of culture valued, honored, and idolized the rest of the year.   Of course, I am still a little salty about being blackballed for the ‘safety patrol’ but I am working through it.

Showing honor is important.  But honoring goes further than certificates, pins, and medals.  Much deeper than what may be observed.  In fact, honor by way of eye-service is not real honor at all.  Rather honor recognizes the weightiness of someone’s place in our lives and values their impact.   We live in a world of participation trophies and egalitarian values. Distinctions in value, authority, gifts, and graces are vilified, not honored.  But this aberrant view is just an outgrowth of our totally depraved self-centeredness.  We are skilled at virtue signaling to serve our interests, but not honoring what is worthy of honor.  

We think of honor as a currency in a closed economy.  As though any honor given diminishes honor we may receive.  But the duty to be honorable and to honor others is built into the fabric of our being and encoded into God’s moral law.   It is not a closed system but a reflection of God’s holy character and thus limitless.   Honoring others is fundamental to what it means to be truly human.  And so, we come to the Fifth of the Ten Commandments.

“Honor your father and your mother, that your days may be long in the land that the Lord your God is giving you.”

Exodus 20:12

Anyone who was raised in a family knows that even on the surface, this command is daunting.   Even if our parents are praiseworthy, they are sinners and so are we.   We can think of a thousand reasons to deny them honor, obedience, care, and duty.   Yet the command remains as a bulwark against sinful hearts that hate any authority but our own.  

While the command speaks of both father and mother, its implications go much further.   The Bible declares that the family is the genesis of every sphere of authority on earth including the state and the church.   While it holds no implicit primacy, it does inform us about the nature of those other sovereign spheres, their boundaries, and their duties.

Consequently, the Westminster Larger Catechism asks and answers this question of scope regarding the Fifth Commandment.

WLC 124. Who are meant by father and mother in the fifth commandment? By father and mother, in the fifth commandment, are meant, not only natural parents, but all superiors in age and gifts; and especially such as, by God’s ordinance, are over us in place of authority, whether in family, church, or commonwealth.

Westminster Larger Catechism, Question 124

The Catechism then proceeds to a remarkable exposition of all the relational duties of those who are both equal and unequal in regard to authority, age, and gifts.   While our modern sensibilities are offended by the language of ‘superiors and inferiors,’ this is merely the language of Providence.   A recognition that while all men possess equal dignity, our age, gifts, and authority have not made us equals in many respects.

The Fifth Commandment calls us to show honor, not perfunctory obedience or mere ‘meeting expectations,’ but honor.   What does this mean?  How do we show it?  Who deserves it?   How far does it go?   What difference does it make?   These are all questions we routinely ask but which the Fifth Commandment addresses.  

Join us as we examine Exodus 20:12 and consider what it means to ‘Honor your father and your mother.’  We meet on the square in Pottsville, right next to historic Potts’ Inn at 10:30 am for worship.  Get directions here or contact us for more info.  Or join us on Facebook Live @PottsvilleARP or YouTube. 

The Lord’s Day is a Feast Day, never a Fast Day!  That has always been Christendom’s creed.  Even when long, protracted penitential fasts were the fashion of Medieval Christianity, the Lord’s Day was always excluded from the fast.  The Lord’s Day is to be a day of celebration, joy, and fellowship.  It is not the day for downcast faces or despair.   Any solemnity that marks the Lord’s Day is due to sheer awe for the graciousness of a Holy God of whom “mercy is His proper work.”   Any sorrow sown by conviction of sin is wiped away for the forgiveness and cleansing which are ours in Christ.  The Lord’s Day is a Feast Day, never a Fast Day! 

Our forefathers were apt to call the Lord’s Day, “the Market Day of the Soul.”  It was not a day for buying and selling the commodities of temporal life, but a day to traffic in the commerce of higher things, better things – eternal things.   While our lives today blur the distinctions between the Lord’s Day and every other day, we are most blessed and at rest when we “remember the Lord’s Day and set it apart.” 

The Lord’s Day is not like every other day.  Quite the contrary it is unlike any other day.  When the Lord was creating the world, He rested from His work, not just on the first day after he finished, but He finished by creating the seventh day – actively making it and setting it aside to celebrate, rejoice, and fellowship with His creation.

Thus, the heavens and the earth were finished, and all the host of them. And on the seventh day God finished his work that he had done, and he rested on the seventh day from all his work that he had done. So, God blessed the seventh day and made it holy, because on it God rested from all his work that he had done in creation.

Genesis 2:1-2

Is the Lord’s Day a feast day for you?  Is it the Market Day of your Soul?  Is it unlike any other day?  Or has it become like any and every other day?  Is it distinguished by the pursuit and enjoyment of the things that really matter, that last forever?  Or only the pursuit of more of what will fade away? 

Undoubtably, for most of us, the week is the unit of time that most defines our lives, yet it is the only unit of time not defined by some celestial or environmental cycle.  It has no exemplar in nature.  It is simply given to us by God and delineated for us by the Lord’s Day.   Whether you observe it or not, your life revolves around the Lord’s Day.  

Growing up, Sundays were always unique.  The usual biscuits that adorned every breakfast at our house, were replaced with blueberry muffins.   Lunch was a grand affair, usually grilled steaks, baked potato and salad – a meal we never ate except at lunch on Sundays.   My father always included me in his duties at the church.  Some weeks we drove a church van into downtown Atlanta to pick up a spunky group of elderly ladies who lived at a distance from our church.  Other weeks, I would carry the Sunday School boxes to each classroom before anyone else arrived.  My service made me feel important and useful.  

After lunch, was “rest time.”  We could play quietly at home, but it was not a time for the usual kinds of play with friends and neighbors.  And then in the evening we would return to church for choir, and Royal Ambassadors (a Christian boys club), and worship.   It was a full day, different from every other day.  Full of feasting, fellowship and rest – all centered around worshipping and celebrating who we were in Christ.

When Christians lose delight in enjoying the “thousand sacred sweets” of the Lord’s Day, then life begins to lose its savor in every other area as well.  Just as the Lord’s Table defines how we live at every other table in our lives, the Lord’s Day defines how we will live every other day. 

The Lord’s Day with its corporate worship, fellowship, feasting, resting and serving is the heartbeat of the Christian life.  It is one of two “positive commands in the Ten Commandments.” It comes with great promise.  Jesus reminds us that “man was not made for the Sabbath, but the Sabbath for man.”  The Lord’s Day is a Feast Day and never a Fast Day.  It is the Market Day of the Soul.

Today the Fourth Commandment is viewed by many as repressive and strict.  A tedious day when our fun is forbidden.  A day for stiff collars and uncomfortable seats.  But what if we saw it for what it is. As the first positive command in the moral law. And as a gift of rest, made for man by the Lord God who desires to rest with his people. 

Do you love the Lord’s Day?  Is it a Market Day for your Soul?  Is it a day for feasting?   Join us as we examine Exodus 20:8-11 and consider the Lord’s Day – a day like no other.  We meet on the square in Pottsville, right next to historic Potts’ Inn at 10:30 am for worship.  Get directions here or contact us for more info.  Or join us on Facebook Live @PottsvilleARP or YouTube.