How Do I Honor My Father and Mother When They’ve Hurt Me?

The Bible tells us to honor our father and mother, but how can I do this when my parents have been the source of so much pain in my life? That's just one of the questions we'll be answering on today's edition of CORE Christianity. Hi, this is Bill Meyer, along with Pastor Adriel Sanchez, and this is the radio program where we answer your questions about the Bible and the Christian life every day. You can call us right now with your question at 833-THE-CORE.

Our phone lines will be open for you for the next 25 minutes or so, 833-843-2673. You can also post your question on our Facebook, Instagram, or Twitter accounts, and you can email us with your question at questionsatcorechristianity.com. First up today, let's go to Crystal in Beggs, Oklahoma. Crystal, welcome to the program. Hi Pastor Adriel, how are you?

I'm doing well. So I received, oh good, so I received a, I basically received a letter in the mail with a prayer cloth, and this particular ministry quoted Psalm 130, but basically asked for a donation of $130, and this is not the only time that I've seen this. I've seen this on TV, and also there's another place that says that if you go to their holy land they have sand, and if you go and touch the sand that you will get direct healing. So I was just wondering, what did you, how do you perceive this?

Yeah Crystal, thanks for that question. I hope that you did not send them $130 for a blessing because I perceive this as just an absolute, I mean this is a way in which quote-unquote ministries take advantage of people, promising them things that really they should never be promising them because they're not God, they don't control the Lord, and it, I mean frankly it really is just an abuse, an abuse of God's Word. I just opened up to Psalm 130 right now. This is what Psalm 130 says, out of the depths I cry to you O Lord, O Lord hear my voice, let your ears be attentive to the voice of my pleas for mercy, if you O Lord should mark iniquities O Lord who could stand, but with you there is forgiveness that you may be feared. I wait for the Lord, my soul waits, and in His Word I hope, my soul waits for the Lord more than watchman, for the morning more than watchman, for the morning O Israel, hope in the Lord for with the Lord there is steadfast love, and with Him is plentiful redemption, and He will redeem Israel from all His iniquities. Really the hope even of Psalm 130 is the forgiveness of sins, and the fact that God is a God who is forgiving so that He might be feared.

We fear the Lord because we know that there's forgiveness with Him, and we want that forgiveness, we long for that forgiveness, Crystal. These kinds of ministries, frankly I'll say it, they don't fear the Lord. They take God's Word, and they twist it, and they use the Word of God in order to take advantage of other people, and so I think that we really shouldn't get involved with these kinds of things. No pastor or ministry leader can say, God is going to heal you if you just do this, because they don't know the mind of God.

Now we can pray for healing, we can ask the Lord to heal us. James chapter 5 talks about if you have a sickness or some need for healing to go to the elders of the church and have the elders to pray with you to pray for healing, and I think that's totally legitimate, but no one can say, yes, for sure God is going to heal you, and if He doesn't, it's because you don't have enough faith or because you didn't give enough, that kind of a thing, and so I'm really concerned about these ministries that you see on television and in other places. I'll tell you, years and years ago I remember calling into one of these ministries, and I knew at this time that they were already kind of out there, but I called them because I wanted to see, if I asked them what's the gospel, what will they tell me, and I got on the phone with someone, and of course they were just looking for your money, for a donation, and I asked the question, what is the gospel, what do I need to do to be saved, and the person on the other line said, I'm sorry, I don't know how to refer you with that question. I just thought, man, this is such a joke, and sadly that's what you see in a lot of these ministries, and so it sounds to me, Crystal, like you're discerning, and like you know that already, and I encourage people not to get involved with these things, so thank you for your question, and may the Lord bless you.

Thanks so much, Crystal, for your call. I didn't know about the sand from the Holy Land, Adriel, you got a lot of sand there in San Diego if you want to, you know, scoopity that up. I mean, that's the thing, they're basically selling dirt, that's what they do, and they say that if you just get a hold of this, it'll bless you, and it's absolutely crazy, and so nope, I mean, who knows where that sand comes from?

We do have nice sand though in San Diego, Bill. This is Core Christianity with Pastor Adriel Sanchez. Let's go to Benjamin from El Paso, Texas. Benjamin, what's your question for Pastor Adriel? Hello, Pastor Adriel, good afternoon.

Hey Benjamin, good to hear from you. What's your question, brother? So recently I saw a quote by one of currently my favorite theologians and pastors, Charles Spurgeon, he said, visit many good books but live in the Bible, and as a young Christian man, I'm barely getting my feet wet in some of these books, but I don't want to get into debt acquiring a library for myself. What books or authors would you recommend a young Christian man like myself acquire? All right, man, so it sounds like you're already reading some Charles Spurgeon. I remember years ago as a newer believer, I read a book by him that really was impactful for me.

It was called All of Grace. That's a book you might want to get your hands on. Other books, you know, we oftentimes recommend core Christianity on this broadcast, excellent book, written by my friend Dr. Michael Horton, Core Christianity, Finding Yourself in God's Story, but this is really going to ground you, Benjamin, in the core Christian doctrines that we think every believer ought to know. The sad reality is so many Christians don't understand the basics of good theology anymore. We're not being taught this, and so we really need to dig into the scriptures. I love that, make your home in the Bible, but also getting good books, good resources that are going to help you go deeper. So core Christianity is another one. In terms of apologetics and worldview, a book that we oftentimes recommend on this broadcast is called The Story of Reality by Greg Kochel.

That's a really wonderful resource. I mean, it's accessible, it's easy to understand, it's the kind of book actually that you could read and even give to a non-believing friend afterwards to expose them to why, you know, we think Christianity is true, good, true, and beautiful, why you should believe it. And I would say, you know, C.S. Lewis, pick up C.S. Lewis as well, Mere Christianity. Some of those books that Lewis wrote, those classic Christian books, I think digging into the classics of the Christian faith is really important. I remember when I was in college I took a Christian classics course and I read St. Augustine's Confessions. It's his sort of autobiography, how Jesus brought him to the faith and everything that was entailed in that. That's a really wonderful book, and so there's a handful right there for you, Benjamin.

I would say, you know, take up and read and be encouraged, and may the Lord continue to bless you as you study the word. Hey, Benjamin, we'd like to send you a copy of Core Christianity, so hang on the line. We'll get your address and send that off to you, okay? Okay, all right. All right. All right, thank you. You bet.

Have a great day. This is Core Christianity with Pastor Adriel Sanchez. We would love to hear from you if you have a question about the Bible or the Christian life. Here's the number. It's 833-THE-CORE.

That's 1-833-843-2673. Let's go to Judy from Sioux City, Iowa. Judy, what's your question for Pastor Adriel? Yes, this is... Hello? Hello, Judy. How are you doing today?

Good, good. I've been reading Leviticus, and it talks about the year of restoration, excuse me, the seventh year, and so you're not going to plant any of your grain and you're not going to prune your grapes and things like that, but it does say that you cannot, you can't even, you cannot even take what grows up by itself without being planted or without being pruned and yet at the same time it says everything that the land produces may be eaten. So I'm thinking, what land?

What else is there? Yeah, so are you, are you thinking of a specific verse here, Judy? Well, let's see, Leviticus 25, basically one through seven. Okay, so right here we're talking about the Sabbath year, and then he's going to go on, Moses is going to go on to talk about the year of Jubilee, and one thing, well first let me just say, I think it's awesome that you're reading through the book of Leviticus. A lot of people skip over Leviticus.

I am one of the few pastors who preached through Leviticus. I am daring in that way, and I think it was an edifying time for our people, but it really is such a wonderful book because the book of Leviticus is all about how to dwell in God's presence. It's God calling his people into his presence after they had turned away from him and had all these these challenges, his difficulties, sins. It's God making a way for his people to go to his house, the tabernacle. So a wonderful book, and then you get to some of these later chapters, and it really is what if it looked like for the people of God to live in the land, to have longevity there in obedience to God's law, and what you had with the Sabbath year and then also the year of Jubilee was this this period of restoration, of letting essentially the land rest. Even the land was to rest in the same way that the Israelites were to rest on the the seventh day, on the Sabbath day. There was a rest for the land, and this was a part of how God's people were obedient to God's law at that time in history. These laws primarily pertain to Israel as this political body, and so it's not something that we do per se as believers under the new covenant today, but it was really a way for the people of God to trust the Lord. What I love is a little bit later in chapter 25 in verse 20, you know this is what we read, and if you say what shall we eat in the seventh year if we may not sow or gather in our crop, I will command my blessing on you in the sixth year so that it will produce a crop sufficient for three years. In other words, God was saying, look be obedient to my law and I'm going to provide for you. You can trust in me.

You can follow me. You don't have to doubt that I am going to care for you because I am going to provide for you, and that's one of the things that we're seeing here in Leviticus with these commandments and certainly that we see throughout the history of God's people is God's provision for them when they were obedient to his word, and so that's I think the best way to to look at this, and I appreciate that question. I want to encourage you to keep reading the book of Leviticus and digging into what the scriptures say there, so thank you for your question. I love the fact that you have preached through that book, Adriel. That's a challenging one for all believers, isn't it?

Yes, it is, and you know it's funny, Bill. It's one of the books. I've preached through many books of the Bible now, and I would say Leviticus is the one that I personally as a pastor, as I was studying for that sermon series, I took the most out of that. I mean it just really is so wonderful when you dig into the scriptures.

Often those books that we sort of set aside that we don't want to read because we feel like, oh, there's nothing there for me. No, there is so much there for us, especially when you think about the reality of sin and the way in which God puts sin away so that we might dwell in his presence, and so really wonderful to see other believers digging into this book as well. You're listening to Core Christianity with Pastor Adriel Sanchez. Easter coming up this weekend, and we have a special Eastern devotional that we want to send you that will really help you get into the Easter spirit this week. That's right, and we're really encouraging you to get a hold of this today because it really is a week-long devotional, and so you know starting today, if you go through it each day, it'll lead you right up to Easter, and it's just an encouragement. It's called Sang's from the Cross, where we take different sayings from our Lord Jesus and unpack them, digging into the scriptures in a way that will build you up in your faith, and so get a hold of this free Easter devotional today. All you have to do is go to corechristianity.com forward slash Easter. That's corechristianity.com forward slash Easter, and as Adriel said, get that today so you can start going through that each day this week leading up to Easter. You can also call us for that resource at 833-843-2673. That's 833, the core. Well, let's go to a voicemail we received yesterday.

This is from one of our international listeners, and one of the ways you can actually leave a voicemail is go to our website, click on the little microphone icon, and record your message there, and that's what this gentleman did. Hi, so there are many struggles I have with Christianity. It's not so much with the belief side in it, because I believe in God, I feel him. It's more to do with the values, and one of those values is honor your mother and your father, and it's difficult for me to do that because me and my mom, we've had turmoil for a long time, going back to when I was like a kid. You know, we've been estranged now for well over four years, and I've tried building those bridges, but my question is, when is it okay for me to not feel bad about that anymore, just to move on with my life? Now I have a wife, and we've got a baby, and as much as they fill my heart, there's still this section of my heart that doesn't feel good about the way things turned out there. It doesn't feel peaceful. It doesn't feel like God's at peace with it. I just, I don't know what to do about that situation.

Thanks. Yeah, I really appreciate this question, and it's one that moves my heart, one that I've personally wrestled through. I don't have the the greatest relationship with my dad, and I've talked about that before, and it's one of the struggles that you can have in a situation like this, is closing your heart to a parent that you don't feel like you have a very strong relationship with, and just saying, you know what, I'm just gonna brush this aside. And so as a Christian, for me, really wrestling through what does it look like for me, as someone who embraces the teachings of Jesus, to obey God's word, and in particular, you mentioned the fifth commandment, to honor our father and our mother. And if what honor means there is, well, do we just pretend like, you know, they were the greatest parent in the world, and we put them on a pedestal and sort of brush everything under the rug, that kind of a thing, live in this sort of lie, that's not what we're called to do there. It's not saying be dishonest about the reality. I think it is a call for all of us to love our parents, to cherish them, to honor them, and to be respectful, but it doesn't mean pretending.

And I think a lot of people wrestle with that. And so I think the way in which we honor our parents is by loving them, is by forgiving, realizing, look, no one is perfect, we all fail, we all sin. And one of the values, I mean, you're talking about the values of the Christian faith, brother, one of the core values of the Christian faith is forgiveness. I love the way the Apostle Paul put it in Ephesians 4, verse 31, listen to this, he says, let all bitterness and wrath and anger and clamor and slander be put away from you along with all malice.

Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, as God in Christ forgave you. And so forgiveness is so key for Christians, because we have been forgiven so much by God through Jesus his Son, and we take that forgiveness that we've received, the mercy that God has given to us, and we extend that to others, even those who have let us down, even those who really should not have let us down, but they still did, we can forgive them. We can forgive them. Let me just say too, you're a father now, I've been a father for about 10 years, and you quickly realize that this parenting thing isn't very easy, that we all make mistakes, that we as parents also need forgiveness, the forgiveness of our own children. And so I think we forgive, we pursue, we continue to love, we don't allow our hearts to grow hard and cold towards those who have hurt us, including our parents, and that does not mean that we just sort of endure abuse, right?

I know that there are situations where there is abuse, even in the family relationship, and I would say that that's separate from what I'm talking about. I'm talking about, you know, when our parents let us down and there's conflict in the home and difficulty, well, we pursue forgiveness. And again, we do that while also being honest. You can have honest conversations with your mother and say, look, here's where I've been hurt, I want to be forgiving, and I want to forgive you because God has been so merciful to me. And you can forgive regardless of what your mother or your father do, whether they say, oh, I agree with you, or I disagree with you. We're called to forgive as Christians, and there's freedom there. Now, if they recognize, like, yeah, I really dropped the ball here, then there can also be reconciliation, right? A sense of, they're also saying, man, I failed, I'm sorry, and there's healing there, and that's a wonderful thing, that's a beautiful thing, but we don't always experience that. And so I would encourage you to forgive, to love your mother still, not to allow your heart to grow cold and hard toward her, but to keep the door open, not to burn the bridge, but to be open and to be honest.

Honoring your parents doesn't mean pretending like they were the greatest parents in the world when they weren't. It means loving them, even though they weren't forgiving where they failed, extending mercy, because we need mercy too, and Jesus gives it to us, and pursuing healing in that way. And so, brother, thank you for your question, and I pray that the Lord blesses you and your family. You're listening to CORE Christianity with Pastor Adriel Sanchez. Our phone number, if you have a question for Pastor Adriel, is 833-843-2673.

That's 833-THE-CORE. Let's go to Mari in Wichita, Kansas. Mari, what's your question for Pastor Adriel? First Corinthians 13, verses 8, 9, and 10. 11 never fails, but whether they be false prophecies, they shall fail, whether they be tunnels, they shall cease, and whether it be knowledge, you shall vanish away. For we know in part and we prophesy in part, that when that which is perfect has come, and that which is impartial shall be done away. Can you explain 9 and 10?

Or 8, 9, and 10 to me, so I have a better understanding of it? Yeah, Mari, thank you so much for that question, brother. So this is coming in the context of Paul essentially rebuking the Corinthian church, and he does this throughout this letter. And part of the problem at Corinth was they were really passionate about miraculous spiritual gifts, you know, and the issue was, while they were diving in the water, they were and the issue was, while they were diving headfirst into, you know, the gift of tongues and some of these other things, they really weren't loving each other. And so Paul is helping them to see, look, your guys' priorities are misplaced over there in Corinth. You're talking about tongues and prophecy, but the reality is you're really not caring for one another like you should.

And he actually highlighted this back in chapter 11 when he talked about how they were gathering together when they were taking the Lord's Supper. And so what Paul is trying to do here in 1 Corinthians 13 in particular is he's painting this picture of what love is, calling the Corinthians to that love because they're really falling short of it. And he's helping them to see that really this love is the ultimate sign of being filled with the Spirit. You can have all these other things, but what you really need, Corinthians, and frankly, what we need today, brother, is love and the fruit of the Spirit that the apostle Paul described in 1 Corinthians chapter 5. A person can, excuse me, in Galatians chapter 5, a person can talk all day long about how gifted they are and so on and so forth, but if you don't have the fruit of the Spirit, you're missing the ultimate sign of the presence of the Spirit in an individual's life.

You see, and Paul wants them to know the importance of love. These other gifts, Paul says, they're going to be done away with. We're not going to need those gifts in the new creation.

When we're in the presence of the Lord, when we see him face to face, when the perfect comes, and I think the perfect there is a reference to ultimately to Christ and being in the presence of Christ. Yeah, like these gifts, they're not going to be around. We're not going to need those gifts that God gave to his church.

Why? Because we're going to be in the presence of the Lord. There's going to be perfect love. Love is going to endure, and that's what he goes on to say in verse 13. So now faith, hope, and love abide, these three, but the greatest of these is love. And so there's this call for all of us to prioritize love. And the perfect picture of love that we have in the scriptures is Jesus himself.

I love this. When you read 1 Corinthians 13, Paul's description of love, think about Christ and how he lived and what he did. And every single thing that Paul mentions, he's painting a perfect picture for us of Jesus and of his love for us.

And so we can rest in that as well, brother. Thank you for your question, and keep digging into the scriptures. Thanks, Mari. This is Core Christianity with Pastor Adriel Sanchez.

Let's go to Jonathan from Terre Haute, Indiana. Jonathan, what's your question for Pastor Adriel? A lot of stuff has happened in my life, and I've kind of always believed in Jesus. I grew up in a Christian family, but I feel like I've used my prayer just for when I needed something. And then here recently, some stuff happened in my life that I just gave everything to him.

Everything's changed. I don't really judge nobody. I've forgiven everybody. And it's just every day I wake up, or when I go to bed, I'm being taunted by past sins, and I don't know what's going on. And I know that Jesus is with me because I pray to him, and I know that stuff could be so much worse, and I've got to be thankful the way it is now. But I just keep being taunted by past sins, and I know he's forgiven me because God's a merciful God, but what could it be?

Yeah. Well, look, first let me just say praise the Lord for how he's worked in your life, Jonathan. And for how he's brought you to this place where you feel like you can say, you know, I've given it all to him. But even with that, we can still be reminded of things that we've done in the past. And frankly, even as Christians, Jonathan, we still fail. We still sin.

We still fall short. And the devil can use that. The accuser can use that.

He can remind us of it. And there's a lot of guilt that can be had, a lot of shame. But here's what you need to know. You have an advocate in heaven, Jesus Christ the righteous. And we're told that when we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us and cleanse us of all unrighteousness.

So here's what you need to know, Jonathan. Regardless of how you feel, God's word says when you confess your sins to Christ, believing in him, you are forgiven. Take that, brother, and rest in it. Thanks for listening to CORE Christianity. To request your copy of today's special offer, visit us at corechristianity.com and click on offers in the menu bar or call us at 1-833-843-2673. That's 833, the CORE. When you contact us, please let us know how you've been encouraged by this program and be sure to join us next time as we explore the truth of God's word together.