What Makes Honor Hard
Written by Jarred Rushing
(5 minutes)
"Honor your father and your mother, that your days may be prolonged in the land which Yahweh your God gives you." Exodus 20:12
I have to start by honoring Abba and what He is doing in our Kingdom family at The Wilderness Place. The last two gatherings we have had at Linger House on Tuesday nights have been amazing. We are beginning to catch a glimpse of what Yahweh is building at 208 Pass Road in Gulfport, Mississippi, and it so good.
Pastor Tim shared a word with the family last night that I feel is important for us to pull into our walk with Abba today. It is keeping with the conversation on honor and it can almost be seen as the first step towards honor.
We learned yesterday that honor is easy. It's easy to grasp. It's easy to see the principle of honor at work in our lives. From gardening to marriages, to our relationship with Abba, the principle of honor is in play. It's the undercurrent that is moving and directing all of the relational waters in our life. And if we're honest with ourselves, deep down, we know it's extremely easy to honor what we have fallen in love with. Need an example? Okay. Did you have to go out and buy a book on honor when you fell in love with your spouse? Or when you had your first child? (Or seventh child, for some of us.) I didn't think so. Honor flowed naturally, because you were passionate and falling deeply in love with someone. Honor comes easy to lovers.
The thing that makes honor hard is familiarity. This is why we have an easier time honoring people we don't know above those that we're most familiar with. Honoring a total stranger at the gas station becomes easier than honoring your husband or your wife in your own home. One of the side effects of intimacy, getting close to someone, is that you come to know everything about that person. The good, the bad, and the ugly. Their strengths and their weaknesses. This is where honor begins to be tested. And this is where familiarity has the potential to stir up dishonor in our hearts.
Last night, Pastor Tim shared this revelation about honor - we will never honor what we are ungrateful for. We will never be able to honor appropriately that which we are not incredibly thankful for. Gratitude goes before honor.
Bill Johnson, the Senior Leader of Bethel Church in Redding, California, says this when he talks about honor: "A culture of honor is celebrating who a person is, without stumbling over who they're not."
I need you to go back and read that quote again, really slow.
This is where the rubber meets the road.
Are we able to honor the people and the places that Abba has planted in our lives even though they have areas of perceived failure and lack? Areas of weakness? Areas of immaturity, needing growth?
You see, honor isn't about finding the perfect person who is deserving of praise. Honor is about choosing to focus on the greatness of God in every person. Yahweh would never tell us to honor our fathers and mothers if He thought that they had to be the perfect parents in order for us to do so. No, Abba is saying, "Can you celebrate and be thankful for who they are, instead of stumbling over who they're not?"
Honor doesn't deny problems or issues, it just doesn't allow them to dictate the level of love that gets poured out on a person.
Above all, constantly echo God's intense love for one another, for love will be a canopy over a multitude of sins. 1 Peter 4:8
Abba is asking us to do the same thing He has chosen to do in His heart when He relates to us. I am extremely grateful that Abba celebrates who I am, instead of stumbling over who I'm not.
Honor is all about what we will choose to focus on. We will become more familiar with what makes a person common, or will we stay most fascinated with what makes a person incredible. One path leads to ungratefulness, followed by dishonor. The other leads to overwhelming gratitude which overflows into honor.
Will we continue to eat from the Tree of Life - the "I Am" Tree? Or will we stumble over the supposed "lack" in our own lives and the lives of others and eat from the "I-Am-Not Tree?"
As we take the walk with Abba today, let's ask Him to show us the greatness in every person in our lives, the greatness in everything He's intentionally planted in our lives, and the greatness He's placed in us. And let the overflow of gratitude splash all over anyone who gets close to us!
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Worship: "Million Little Miracles" by Elevation Worship & Maverick City feat. Joe L. Barnes
Honor: Give Online to The Wilderness Place
Share With Us: We would love to hear how you're encountering Abba in your daily walks. Don't hesitate to share what you're hearing, seeing, or sensing in His presence. Email us here!
