Plain Sermons by Contributors to, Tracts for the Times Deuteronomy 5:16 Honor your father and your mother, as the LORD your God has commanded you; that your days may be prolonged… I. The keeping of this commandment PRODUCES A CERTAIN TEMPER OF MIND WHICH WE CALL MEEKNESS. So far as anything like peace can be obtained in this world it can only be obtained by obedience to God; and this cannot be shown but by obedience to those whom He has set over us. II. The temper of obedience being therefore the very foundation of all true piety, GOD HAS SO APPOINTED IT THAT MEN SHOULD BE ALL THEIR LIVES IN CONDITIONS OF LIFE TO EXERCISE AND PRACTISE THIS HABIT OF MIND, first of all as children under parents, then as servants under masters, as subjects under kings, as all under spiritual pastors, and spiritual pastors under their superiors. III. IT IS IN THIS TEMPER OF MEEKNESS, ABOVE ALL, THAT CHRIST HAS SET HIMSELF BEFORE US AS OUR PATTERN. Christ was willingly subject to a poor carpenter in an obscure village, so much so as even to have worked with him at his trade. He, alone without sin, was subject to sinful parents. IV. THE MORE DIFFICULT IT IS FOR CHILDREN TO PAY THIS HONOUR AND OBEDIENCE TO PARENTS WHO MAY BE UNWORTHY, THE MORE SURE THEY MAY BE THAT IT IS THE NARROW WAY TO LIFE AND THE STRAIT AND DIFFICULT GATE BY WHICH THEY MUST ENTER. True love will cover and turn away its eyes from sins and infirmities. For this reason there is a blessing unto this day on the children of Shem and Japheth, and a curse on the descendants of Ham. (Plain Sermons by Contributors to "Tracts for the Times. ") Parallel Verses KJV: Honour thy father and thy mother, as the LORD thy God hath commanded thee; that thy days may be prolonged, and that it may go well with thee, in the land which the LORD thy God giveth thee. |
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