A Call To Honor: Honoring Authority

Sharing good news of great joy to all people,

Elation Church. This is week number four in our

series we've entitled, A Call to Honor. A Call

to Honor. Every believer is called to honor.

Every Christian is called to be a people of honor,

characterized by... honor. When people think

of Christians and those who go to church, it

shouldn't be those that are hypocritical. It

should be people of love and it should be people

of honor. It's different, right? Our society

is full of dishonor. So full of dishonor. We

don't honor, you know, you just see it everywhere

all the time. We are called to be different.

We're supposed to be in the world, but not of

the world. And we're called to honor. Honor is

mentioned over 300 times in the Bible. As we've

seen, we're going to recap a little bit. It's

mentioned over 300 times in the Bible. That means

it's important. And from now on, I hope through

this series that when you're reading your Bible,

when you see that word honor, a flag kind of

goes up and you start paying attention to it.

Like, what am I supposed to do with this information?

Because a lot of times when we see the word honor,

it's actually calling for a response. It's not

just intellectual knowledge when we read the

Bible. Often when we see things, they're commands

for us as Christians to take a hold of and to

respond to. To not just be hearers of the word,

but to be doers of the word. Amen? In honor,

we look at several different words. that the

Bible uses when we read our English word honor.

The Bible in Greek uses several different words.

One of those is kavod, meaning to be heavy. The

word honor means to be heavy or to make weighty.

Honor, it means glorify. Sometimes the same word

kavod is translated glorify in your Bible. talking

about the weight of glory of something, of God,

of his manifested presence. And it's talking

about value. Value kind of needs to be our mindset

shift. When we hear the word honor and when we

read it in our Bible, we really need to change

the way we think about it. It's not just, you

know, this vague sort of thing. It's actually

talking about value and how we value someone

or something. The verb that is used means to

prize or to revere, temeo. Teme is the noun.

It means a value, valuable, esteem of the highest

degree. The adjective temeos meaning valuable,

costly, honor, esteemed, beloved, precious. Kind

of goes against our normal understanding of honor.

It kind of opens it up a little bit. And as we've

seen, honor includes the ideas of worth, esteem,

dignity, and price, whether used of God or of

Christ or of people or of material goods. And

as we've seen in this study through the past

three weeks, you know, honor always measures

value. It always measures the value of something,

and it calls for a response. And our honor, our

response should be proportionate and is proportionate

to our perceived value of it, right? Perceived

value, meaning the worth or weight or honor we

willingly assign to something. So as we've learned

in week one, we're called to honor the things

that God honors, what God honors. And we talked

about honoring the word of God. How many of you

know we should honor the Word of God? Amen? We've

talked about that a little bit. We should honor

His Word, the written Word and the spoken Word

of God through the Holy Spirit. We should honor

it. We should honor the church. We should honor

the church. See, a lot of people get confused

when you say things like this because it's like,

what do you mean by church? The church, the called

out ones. Not the building. Not the elation.

But look to the person on your left. Look to

the person on your right. The church. We are

the church. Amen? And we're supposed to honor

one another. And we are called to honor the kingdom.

His rule, his eternal, God's eternal rule and

reign over everything. We're called to honor

it. We're called to value it. Too many times,

we want to honor ourselves, right? Too many times,

the king, right? We view ourselves as the king

of our own kingdom. We view ourselves as the

king and the queen sitting on the throne of our

heart. And all of our value is just, you know,

it's just about me. It's not the way it should

be for a Christian. We're called to honor the

kingdom, his kingdom, his rule and his reign.

Because as we've learned, if you don't honor

God's word, If you don't honor God's bride, the

family of faith, if you don't honor God's kingdom,

you won't receive any value from it. People all

the time say, well, you know, I just don't understand.

Why do I go to church, right? Why do I need to

go to church? I can be in my deer stand or I

can be in my car and experience the presence

of God. While that may be true, there is value

in community. We are not meant, we were not created

to do life alone. We need each other. And we

need, listen, we need to follow God. And we need

what God says, because look, God can speak through

someone else too. We are called to honor God,

as we learned in week two. We honor God with

how? Our praise and our worship, of course. We

learned we honor God with our lives, our whole

bodies, our breath, the spirit we talked about,

pneuma. We honor God with our service, the things

that we do, our time, our talent, and our resources.

And we honor God with our wealth, the first fruits.

We give a portion of that back to him. Amen.

We honor God with that increase. We give it back

to him. So, and then we've seen that the lack

of honor. will hinder the work of God in our

lives. Because honor puts us in a position to

receive everything that God has for us. And honor

is always recognized and rewarded. Amen? Our

main text is in 1 Samuel 2 .30. And it says this,

God says to Eli, after his sons, we'll talk about

this a little more later, after his sons were

dishonoring the money of the temple, they were

dishonoring it, they were dishonoring the women

who were coming through, they were taking advantage

of women. And God specifically told Eli to remove,

you know, you got to remove them, you got to

get rid, you know, take them out. But he wouldn't

do it. And God tells Eli, Here in 1 Samuel 2

through 30 says, I will honor those who honor

me, and I will despise those who think lightly

of me. And as we've seen, your value of God is

proportionate to his presence, to his work, to

his power, to his influence in your life. It's

proportionate. And your honor of him, your value

of him, is proportionate to your usefulness to

him in the kingdom. If we don't honor him, we

are of no value. We carry no weight in the kingdom

of God. Now, a lot of people, when I say that,

you might think, well, that kind of seems unfair,

because God loves everyone. And yes, he does

love everyone. He does love you unconditionally.

But your honor, listen, this verse, I want you

to see the concept of reaping and sowing. You

reap what you sow. I will honor those who honor

me. If we value God, listen, you will receive

from him. In the same way we talked about the

Bible, right? If I honor it, if I value what

it has to say, if I genuinely believe it, When

I read it, it's more than just a book. All of

a sudden, it carries weight in my life. It changes

the way I operate day to day. It changes the

way I treat the people around me. It's no longer

just words on a page if I value it. It's a good

example of what we're talking about here. I will

honor those who honor me, and I will despise

those who think lightly of me. So honor is not

love. But honor is a demonstration of love. It's

a demonstration of love. When we're showing love

to God, we will honor him, right? When we're

showing love to other people, we honor them,

right? And despise here is not hate. Often we

look at that, we think of the word despise, we

just immediately like, we see God, he's like,

oh, he despises those? That seems a little harsh.

But despise is just the opposite of honor. So

to despise means to look down on, to ignore.

Our regard is worthless. Be casual about it.

It's not to even, it's not to even like think

about it. It's just to be casual about it. It's

this whatever mentality, right? How many of you

have been there? You just like, you get tired

about something and you're just like, whatever.

Don't even care. Couldn't care any less. And

often we treat God like that sometimes. We're

like, we get sort of lazy. We get like, I don't,

you know, just whatever. Whatever. The time with

the family, whatever. My time in scripture, whatever.

It'll be there when I get to it. It's kind of

the last thing of the day. We put everything

off and then if I have enough time, I'll read

my Bible or I'll pray. I'll spend time with God.

You know, often that's the low thing, the last

thing that we do, right? We put it off because

our time is more important. You know, we got

things. We got more important things. Don't frown

at me when I'm just talking. We're just having

a conversation. It's okay. Often that's the least

thing, but we need to value it. We need to esteem

it. I will honor those who honor me. I will despise

those who think lightly of me. In week three,

we talked about how we are called to honor other

people, called to other people in our demonstrations

of honor. We went through this like four or five

times last week. But how we demonstrate honor,

huh? We're doing it again. It's going to come

up a few more times until we get it. Amen? To

demonstrate honor, we have to speak highly of

other people. Let that sink in. Yeah. We kept

saying that last week, and all throughout the

week, I was just like, oh, man, messed up again.

Speak highly of it. You know, it's so hard to

do, but you get in like a habit, almost like

an addiction of speaking bad about the people

around you. Right? Start speaking bad. You know,

it's just little phrases that we don't even really

process, but we get into a habit of just being

like, oh, well, that just, you know. Right? We

do it. It's important that we demonstrate honor

to other people, and we do that by speaking highly.

of everyone, not just the people that we like.

Show generosity towards. Show generosity towards

is a demonstration of honoring the people around

us. We should be a people who are generous, characterized

by our generosity towards those around us and

who are in our circle. Amen. High respect of.

We should be respectful of everyone. Amen? And

we demonstrate honor by submitting ourselves

to authority. We're going to talk a little bit

more about what that means today. The word submit

don't always carry the greatest happy warm fuzzies.

But it means to place yourself under. A lot of

times we want to be above everyone else, right?

And often we just want to be above God. We act

like our minds and our will and our... We always

put those things way above what God says in His

Word. We're supposed to submit to His authority,

to His way, to His will, to His kingdom. Submit

ourselves. We're not supposed to be the highest

person in our world. The world does not revolve

around you in case you didn't know. Just wanted

to remind you today that the world does not revolve

around you. Your life is much more important

than you realize and much more valuable to the

kingdom of God than you're operating in today.

I want to kind of move now into where we're going

today. I know that was a long recap, but it kind

of gets us ready and prepares us to what we're

about to talk about. So Romans 13, 7 says this,

give to everyone, meaning be generous towards,

give to everyone what you owe them. What is owed

to them? Give to just those that you like. Give

to those that you think are worthy of it. No,

it's what is owed to them. I want you to see

that. Give to everyone what you owe them. If

you owe taxes, pay taxes. I don't want anybody

at a lay church not to pay your taxes. Don't

do that. It's not okay. It's not cool. If you

owe taxes, pay taxes. If revenue, then revenue.

If respect, then respect. If honor, then honor.

It's very straightforward, very simple. Give

to everyone what you owe them. If you owe them

honor, we should honor them. Simple enough, right?

So who do we owe respect and honor to? That's

our question. Who do we owe respect and honor

to? Well, of course, we owe honor to God. We

owe it to him. It is what is due unto him. We

owe honor to God. And we owe honor. to all God

-given authority. We owe honor to all God -given

authority. Some of these verses, so we owe, get

this, we owe double honor. It's an interesting

concept. We owe double honor to elders that teach

the word. 1 Timothy 5, 17. It says this, let

the elders who, listen, rule well be counted

worthy of double honor, especially those who

labor in the word and doctrine. Double honor

is owed if you can have honor and then you have

special honor. You have... extra honor so that

tells us here that there's an honor that is owed

to everyone but then to some there is extra honor

owed okay to the elders that teach the word who

it's conditional here who rule well who rule

well so double honor is to elders who rule well

who are worthy of it, okay? Husbands owe honor

to their wives. They owe honor to their wives,

to value them, to esteem them, to set them up

on a pedestal, right? Everybody say, amen, oh

me, oh my, something, come on. Come on. Wives

owe honor to their husbands. Oh, honor to their

husbands. And how do we demonstrate that honor?

Right? We speak highly of. Be careful what you

say about your significant other. You're going

to. You're going to be really upset at me later

today. You're just going to be like, oh man,

I said that again. I shouldn't have said that.

Supposed to honor those, speak highly of, show

generosity towards, respect towards, value. We

should esteem, right? Wives honor their husbands.

Husbands honor their wives in 1 Peter 3, 1 through

7. I encourage all husbands and wives to read

this today. And then, Get this, in Hebrews 13,

4, it says that we, meaning the believers, we

owe honor to marriage. We owe honor to the sanctity

of marriage. I just want to let that sink in.

If you want to read it, go ahead. Open up your

Bibles, turn there. Read it. We owe honor to

marriage. Our society does not honor marriage.

And most people in the church do not honor marriage.

What does it mean to owe honor to marriage? We

should value marriage. Should esteem it. I'm

going to move on. Children owe honor to their

parents. Amen. Say it again for the people in

the back. Children owe honor to their parents.

Deuteronomy 5 .16. It's given in the Ten Commandments,

and it's the only commandment with promise, with

a promise connected to it. Specifically, it says

that children who honor their parents, what,

they will live a long, and satisfying life. Ain't

that a promise? Honor your parents. You'll live

a long and satisfying life. And as we learned,

honor should be modeled in the home. Meaning

that it should be genuinely displayed by the

husbands and wives towards one another. And it

is called, listen, this is how honor is supposed

to be. It's supposed to be caught by the children

from the honor displayed in the home between

the husband and the wife. But the problem is

our society has, you know, the home is so broken.

Many people grow up and they, you know, they

never know their real parents or they never,

you know, it's like their father left when they

were real little, something like that. It's like...

But it should be genuinely displayed in the home,

and that's why we need to, as the church, as

the family, is the ideal family of faith. What

you're missing at home, you should be getting

here in this community. And so that's why we're

in this study, a call to honor, because so many

people want to force honor, but that's not the

way it works. That's manipulation. No one can

force you to honor them. That's fear. It's not

how the people of God should operate. You don't

force people to honor. You don't, well, I'm your

elder. You need to honor me extra. Come on. I

had a guy one time. I was... I was praying. We

were doing like a middle school camp, and I think

it was North Carolina or something like that.

It doesn't matter. And we were in a circle praying.

These three kids had just gotten saved, and we

were praying. He asked me to pray for them. And

I had a hat on because we were doing children's

ministry, and I wore like a dog costume. I wore

a dog costume. I would do anything. Right. We

just did anything that we could to tell people

about Jesus. no matter if it was the most ridiculous,

absurd thing, like put on a dog costume, and

we'd just tell people about Jesus, traveled the

country for many years. And I remember I was

wearing a hat because I was just sweaty. I looked

like a wet rat, you know? You know when you look

like a wet rat? It's just nasty, and I'm sweaty.

I've just been going all day. We've been jumping

around being crazy. And I remember this guy specifically,

we're praying now. He's the one who asked me

to pray, and he reached over and grabbed, I was

wearing a hat, he reached over, during the middle

of my prayer, reaches over and grabs the hat

off my head and throws it into the woods. And

he's the one who said, I wasn't honoring God.

I got a lecture at the end of it saying, I wasn't

honoring God by wearing a hat. Well, I was praying

to God. What were you doing? You were upset about

my hat and the way I looked and all these things.

God didn't care. He heard me. He heard my prayer.

But somebody was not honoring God, were they?

Moving on. We owe honor. Listen, the Bible tells

us that we owe honor to true widows of the church.

1 Timothy 5 lays out the rules and regulations

for this. It's an interesting concept that we

owe honor to true widows, and it specifically

talks about what classifies a genuine true widow.

Did you know that the people of God are not called

to honor, to give of their generosity and time

to just every widow in the whole world? Go read

it. True widows of the church, of the family

of faith. We're not called to just supply the

whole world with our generous giving. It's okay

if you do that. That's great. If God leads you

to do something like that, that's great. But

a lot of people get this wrong. The church is

supposed to honor the true widows, those who

do not have family. to take care of them, those

who have been abandoned in our community, in

our local community. We are called to give to

them, generously support them when they have

no family, when they have no kids, to take care

of them. Those are all conditions laid out in

1 Timothy 5, but I thought it was interesting

to include as people with God -given authority

that we are called to honor. And it specifically

says that true widows of the church who are worthy

of respect, who are diligently seeking God, who

are valuable members of the community of faith.

We owe honor, listen, to all governing authorities.

And this includes spiritual authority and also

human authority. Let's look at it. Romans 13

.1 says this, everyone must submit to governing

authorities. A word submit, again, I'm not going

to pronounce it in Greek, but it says to subject,

to subordinate, to submit, to be in under and

obedience. What does governing authorities mean?

That word here is to surpass. to excel, to be

superior, to be above or beyond. And then get

this, the word here is exousia, meaning delegated

authority, power, right, jurisdiction, and it

refers to the authority God gives to his saints.

How many of you have heard this so differently,

and when you've read this, you've thought of

it a lot differently? But as I studied, and you

look at these words, It's specifically referring

to the authority God gives to his saints, authorizing

them to act to the extent they are guided by

faith, his revealed word. So we're supposed to

submit ourselves, again, we're supposed to submit

ourselves to governing authorities. Forget this,

and this makes more sense in context, talking

about spiritual authorities with what comes next

in the verse. For all authority comes from God.

God has placed members in the body of Christ

as authority figures, right? Prophets, pastors,

evangelists, teachers, all these things, apostles.

He's given these things. For all authority, these

places come from God. And those impositions of

authority have been placed there by God. Placed

there by God. It's not talking about, you know,

the president of the United States is placed

there by God. No. It's not true. It's not placed

there for God for, well, I know. I'm going to

move on. This is talking about spiritual authority.

But we're not off the hook. 1 Peter 2, 13 through

14 says, for the Lord's sake, submit, get this,

to all human authority. Different word, different

Greek word here, to all human authority, whether

the king is head of state or the officials he

has appointed. We are to submit to all human

authority. This word means creation, creature,

institution, man -made institutions on the earth.

We're supposed to... Live in under them, not,

you know. When a police officer pulls you over

this afternoon. No, I'm just kidding. You need

to honor them. If you want to receive a less

sentence. Real talk. If you want to receive a

less sentence, you need to honor them. You need

to say, yes, sir. Yes, ma 'am. You need to speak

plainly and don't make any sudden movements.

Somebody laugh, smile or something. Come on.

We need to submit to the authority of this place,

the human authority that's in the world. We need

to submit to them and honor them in that regard

because they have authority. If you want to receive

a less sentence, like I said, you better honor

them in that way. Dishonor. Why? We're not talking

about dishonor, but... You know, dishonor. If

you dishonor your boss at work this week, you'll

be fired. What a novel concept. If you dishonor

your boss too much, you will be fired. If you

dishonor what? Come on. If you dishonor, I don't

know, the person at the grocery store, instead

of giving you the discount, they're going to

charge you double for the same, you know, for

the same apple that you could have bought down

the street at Aldi for less money. We're supposed

to submit ourselves to all human authority, whether

the king is head of state or the officials he

has appointed. Titus 3 .1 continues, remind the

believers, everybody say, I'm a believer, remind

the believers to submit to the government and

its officers. They should be obedient, always

ready to do what is good. They must not slander

anyone. Must not slander anyone in a position

of authority in government. Come on. Just open

up your Facebook right now. I'll tell you five

minutes there'll be someone slandering someone

in authority. Come on. We're not supposed to

be like that, church. We're called to be different.

We're called to speak highly of. This is tough,

but it's true. This is the word. Don't just hear

it. We need to do it. Come on. Should be obedient,

always ready to do what is good. They must not

slander anyone and must avoid quarreling. Let's

don't fight about it. I'm just pausing here because

the word is just sinking in. Let it sink. Bless

you. Gesundheit. No slander. No quarreling. Look

to your neighbor and say, stop it. Say, stop

it. Don't do it. Instead, they should be gentle.

Should be gentle. Gentleness is not weakness.

Having self -control is not weakness. Not talking

about dancing on eggshells around everyone and

everything, but you can be gentle. Do you think

God, do you think Jesus was gentle in the earth

when he talked to people? We can be that too.

Our words should not be offensive. to our culture.

Our culture should be attracted by it. Something

different. Something not like everything else

the world is offering, right? Gentle. And show

true humility. Humility. Submission, right? We're

humbling ourselves and under in a position, right?

To everyone. That means I don't think, more highly

of myself than I do the people around me. It's

the key to true gentleness and key to receiving

everything that God has for you in the kingdom

of God is humility. I urge you, first of all,

to pray for people, for all people. Ask God to

help them. When's the last time that you prayed

for someone other than yourself and your needs,

your situation? This is intercessory prayer at

work, and it's meaning that you're praying for

the people around you because the people around

you are above you. They matter more. Right? Ask

God to help them. Intercede on their behalf and

give thanks for them. It says all people. It's

not just the people that we like. Pray this way

for kings and for all who are in authority. Maybe

instead of quarreling and complaining and fighting,

maybe we should start praying. Praying for those

in authority over us. Instead of talking about

the corruption and everything that's wrong, being

every single word, every other word out of our

mouth is like, it's wrong, it's bad, it's not.

Yep. Newsflash, yep. Maybe we should pray. Because

if we valued the word, If we value what it's

saying, we would pray. Some of us, we just need

to act like the word of God is true and we need

to start doing it. Because we're not honoring

it. There's so many Bible, you know, there's

so many Christians, people who believe in God,

who are not honoring God. You can believe in

God and not honor him. We need to honor those

in positions over us with how? With our words,

our prayer. It's what is owed to them. It's what

we're called to do. What you owe them, listen,

none of these things, look, what you owe them

is not based on their actions. But what God's

word said is owed by his children, by his followers,

by the family of faith. That is what we owe to

authority. In none of these instances does the

instruction to give honor have anything to do

with whether or not the person deserves it. God

did not put a condition on it. His word just

says for you and I to do it. A great example

of this, I can't get too lengthy here, but a

great example of this is the, I like to call

it the saga of David and Saul. I mean, it's just

a lot when you start reading through Samuel and

you start reading their interactions back and

forth. But in case you're not aware, Saul was

the king of Israel. The people had appointed

him, and God anointed him to do great and powerful

things for God's people. So he went, he was obeying

God, he was serving God, and he was walking accordingly,

doing the things that God had asked him to do,

until one day, he was like, you know, I'm the

king. You know, I know God told me to do this

specific thing, but... You know, I'll do it,

but I'll do it my way. Right? Because all of

a sudden, when you start becoming the king of

your own, you know, your own king, your own master

and your own boss, right? Things start going

downhill. Saul began to look at himself in a

high regard and said, you know, I know better.

this doesn't make sense to me, so I'm going to

do, you know, I do what God said, but I'm just

going to do it my own way. Little thing. But

because of that, God tells Saul he's going to

remove his anointing from him in his favor. And

it's all going to be removed. I will honor those

who honor me. The anointing was on his life as

long as he honored God with his actions, with

his words. There was something special. Every

battle that Saul went to fight, he won until

he did not honor. If you're losing battles, check

your honor. When the anointing was removed from

Saul, God anointed David, little boy David. And

remember, he fights Goliath. All of a sudden,

he starts winning every time he stands up, because

while he was honoring God when no one was looking,

he had a heart after God's own heart. And Saul...

It's interesting that it never really says that

Saul... Saul was never told that David was going

to be the next king, but we see throughout that

all of a sudden that kept coming up. He kept

getting jealous of David, because after David

killed Goliath, he was working for him, serving

him. And all of a sudden he's getting very jealous

of David. The people are starting to, you know,

praise David for... you know, all his mighty

things, because the hand of God was on his life,

the hand of blessing and favor. And long story

short, Saul attempts to kill David several times.

David has to leave. He gets kicked out from where

he was, and he all of a sudden becomes a wanderer,

hiding from the king Saul, who was trying to

kill him. And David couldn't figure out why in

the world, why in the world is Saul trying to

attack me? I've only been good, I've only honored.

You know, he's only done good things towards

him, only spoke highly of him. And after many

years, a lot of times, you know, people of God

don't want to face any trial or tribulation.

God promises to see you through. God promises

for you to overcome. But there's tribulation.

It says this, 1 Samuel 24. David's men, he had

garnered men and like a small army, even though

he had been... you know, cast out of the palace.

More and more people were kind of being drawn

to David. And his men, they were again trying

to hide from King Saul. And then his men come

to him and he's like, now's your opportunity.

Because Saul had went to use the bathroom. He

had went into a cave. He was kind of hidden.

He was vulnerable. And his men told him here

in verse 4, it says, now's your opportunity.

David's men whispered to him, today the Lord

is telling you, I will certainly put your enemy

into your power to do with as you wish. So David

crept forward, cut off a piece of him of Saul's

robe. Seems so insignificant, right? He cuts

off this piece of Saul's robe, but then David's

conscience began bothering him because he had

cut Saul's robe. It bothered him what he did.

He said to his men, David said to his men, the

Lord forbid that I should do this to my Lord,

the King. His words are showing that he had submitted

himself under someone who was trying to kill

him. He says, David says, I shouldn't attack

the Lord's anointed one. Now we know from the

story that God's anointing had left Saul and

been placed on David. But David is not aware

of this at this moment. And so he's still going

to honor Saul in this way, for the Lord himself

has chosen him. So David restrained his men and

did not let them kill Saul. After Saul had left

the cave and gone his way, David came out and

shouted after him, My Lord the King. And when

Saul looked around, David did what? He bowed

low before him. Bowed low before him. 1 Peter

2 .17 tells us to respect everyone and love the

family of believers. Fear God and respect the

king. Can't you see that David did this, right?

It was who he was. It's how he honored the position

that he would once take. If David didn't honor

Saul, what would have happened? Probably the

same thing that happened to Saul when he didn't

honor God. This word respect here is to mayo.

It means to honor, to value, to revere, and to

respect. So we're supposed to respect everyone.

So is everyone to be honored? Everybody say yes.

Hope we've established that by now. Is everyone

supposed to be honored? To the same degree. Are

there different levels of honor? We saw that

from the double honor portion. That's a very

clear example of that. But then all these God

-given authorities of the home, of wives, you

know, those are special honor things, right?

It's not just he's telling us this because it's

a special honor due or owed to them, to these

things, right? So it's not to the same degree.

So we need to be... mindful of our honor and

who we honor and how we honor. Our honor of God

should far outweigh our honor of any other person,

thing or ourselves. Right? Because if we show

more honor to any one or thing above God, we're

guilty of idolatry. Because we're placing something

of this world above his word. What about those

in positions of authority that openly do things

that do not honor God? Sin, moral failures, neglect,

abuse, church. Does not justify hate. Does not

justify bitterness. Does not justify harsh words

towards. Lack of basic honor that is owed to

everyone. A lot of times though, especially in

our culture today, we see someone in a... position

or whatever, they fail, something happens, like

we immediately just cut them off. We're just

like, oh, we slander them. We get all upset and

bothered and just, you know, throw them away.

Electrocute, you know, throw them in the trash.

They're completely worthless to us, right? And

it can erase everything that they've ever done.

Now, We'll talk about this in a little more detail,

but listen, for the people of God, no matter

what someone does, they deserve your honor. And

if you don't think so, if you genuinely think

that someone... in your life does not deserve

the basic honor that is due to them. Listen,

you're putting your imagination and your thoughts

above God's word. You're not challenging me.

I don't care. This is what the word of God says

for us to do as believers. We're supposed to

honor everyone. Speak highly of the people around

us. not just to a select few. Show generosity

towards everyone. Does not justify hate bitterness.

These failures though, listen, these failures

though do disqualify those in positions of authority

to receive the special honor that is owed by

their position. Okay? Does not, no one can force

you to honor them in some special way. Like that's,

we've already talked about that a little bit.

When we think of Eli and his sons, right? God

removes his honor from them because they, why?

Why was his honor removed? We've talked about

this the past three weeks. Those who honor me,

I will honor. You reap what you sow. God sees

their dishonor towards him, and they were in

a position of honor of the tribe of Levi to carry

out the stuff in the temple, right? But God is

like, you're not going to honor me, so I'm not

going to honor you. And what happened? They get

removed from their position and a lot of other

bad things. Listen, these failures disqualified

those in position. They should not be honored

as this, you know, just because they hold some

kind of position. They should not be honored

in that regard. But everyone deserves honor.

So honor is to always be given to everyone, but

the level of honor to be given should be, listen,

proportionate to God's honor of them and to their

honor of God. This is how we know what honor

is due above the basic. My wife, many of you

know, or many of you probably don't know, her

story, and her story is one that she should tell.

It's her testimony, right? But there's, you know,

growing up, she grew up in a very poor home.

Her mother abused her to the age of like five.

Her grandparents took custody of her. They were

able to get custody of her, remove her of that

situation, and then her mother just walked out,

said, I don't want anything to do with her, you

know. That's her story to tell another day. But

I want you to see, like Kayla and I, we were

talking about this, and there's an honor that

we're supposed to give to everyone. And you know

what? Kayla and I, we've been married now for

eight years, and she's never once spoken unkindly

of her mother. It's just who she is. She's never

spoken down about her mother or her situation.

And to me, that just blows my mind. And I'm not

doing this to just like, you know, ooh, she's

some, you know. No, when I met her, she wasn't

a Christian. You know, she's never once spoken

negatively of her mother to me or spoken down

because she realized that there was an honor

due owed to her. And she said, you know, she's

my mother whether she left me or not. So I'm

not going to speak unkindly towards her. I'm

not going to harbor unfeelings to her, right?

Because that's what God wants from me. But that

does not mean that if her mother all of a sudden

wanted some kind of, you know, in her life that

she has to honor her in that way, you know, as

her mother or give her some sort of special honor

that is because, not because Caitlin's the way

she feels about it, right? Not because of, you

know. All the things that would want to come

up and all the responses that could be given.

It would be because her mother disqualified and

lost that opportunity. Because she did not honor

God and did not honor her position. So her position

was removed. But her position in the kingdom

of God. is still love, is still honorable. The

honor you give, listen, the honor you give is

a direct reflection of your honor of God. That's

what it all boils down to. Why do you give honor?

Because God does. And I want to be like him.

You want to be like him. You want to honor him.

And you want to honor what he honors. And if

he honors someone, I need to honor them. We are

called to honor God. We are called to honor what

he honors. We are called to honor who he honors.

And we are called to honor how he honors. To

the same degree that he honors. This online worship

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