Honor Your Mother/Hate Your Mother?

[Enoch111]

I know they GO together but I can’t PUT them together.

The resolution is very simple. Honor your father and mother at all times. However, when it comes to deciding between your loyalty to Christ and your loyalty to your family, it is a no-brainer.

 

[stunnedbygrace]

The resolution is very simple. Honor your father and mother at all times. However, when it comes to deciding between your loyalty to Christ and your loyalty to your family, it is a no-brainer.

What is the correct way to honor your father and mother when they want to see you destroyed? What if your abuse by their hands stretches into your adulthood and then they try to also destroy their grandchildren? I understand forgiveness and wishing them no ill, despite what they did or do. I don’t understand a definition of how to go about honoring them though.

 

[Nancy]

What is the correct way to honor your father and mother when they want to see you destroyed? What if your abuse by their hands stretches into your adulthood and then they try to also destroy their grandchildren? I understand forgiveness and wishing them no ill, despite what they did or do. I don’t understand a definition of how to go about honoring them though.

Sorry for the copy/paste, but I could never put better. I came across this on Got Questions while looking into how to honor an abusive parent/parents. Your situation stems from childhood on, you WERE a victim and are still in adulthood. It also made me really wonder how in the world we could honor an abusive parent. Wow Jen, you have come a long way.

"One thing forgiveness and honor are not, though, is a permanent submission to parental authority. The Bible commands honor but not remaining a prisoner in a dysfunctional family. Families with a destructive cycle of sin are dangerous, and children who break free need to find safety in the family of God—which is every Christian’s true family (Matthew 10:35–38). Dysfunctional families are fraught with codependence, addiction, violence, and an absence of safe boundaries. These traits will be like a millstone around the neck, dragging the child toward the same sinful patterns. Removing oneself from an abusive situation is much like overcoming addiction; when a person desires sobriety, he cannot associate with people who abuse drugs (Proverbs 13:20).

Also, in cases in which the grandchildren are exposed to the threat of physical harm or sexual assault, it becomes the adult child’s responsibility to protect their own children. There is no guilt in keeping one’s distance from abusive parents, as long as the separation is not motivated by vengeance. You can honor your parents from afar. Sadly, some parents do not value their children enough to maintain a relationship. The void left by a broken relationship should be filled by Christ rather than pining for a parental relationship that will never be."

 

[Enoch111]

What is the correct way to honor your father and mother when they want to see you destroyed? What if your abuse by their hands stretches into your adulthood and then they try to also destroy their grandchildren? I understand forgiveness and wishing them no ill, despite what they did or do. I don’t understand a definition of how to go about honoring them though.

This is definitely not within the norm of parental behavior. Even evil parents desire what is good for their children, and Christ already taught this. So how would you honor destructive parents?

1. Commit them to the Lord, so that they might be converted and saved.

2. Send them the Scriptures which require that all sinners repent and be converted. The Word of God is the Sword of the Spirit. And the Gospel is the power of God unto salvation.

3. Move away to a different and distant location so that they do not have access to the grandchildren. Also refrain from communications with them (which are of no benefit to anyone).

4. Let the grandchildren know that the best way to honor their grandparents is to pray for their conversion but to not harbor any evil thoughts against them.

 

[stunnedbygrace]

I don’t have children by the way. It was an example. I was, however, mentally and emotionally abused and raised by a covert narc parent and groomed to be the “scapegoat”. I do NOT feel sorry for myself. I actually am thankful I wasn’t the “golden child.” There are differing opinions on which assigned role is worse but I think I got the better end of the sordid deal even though it’s taken my entire lifetime to understand what happened and why and to break free of the…programming and despair. They say the golden child often never escapes and heals. Of course, many scapegoated children are lost to drugs and suicide but…I still think I got the better end of the generational curse deal.
And thanks, Nancy and Enoch.

 

[quietthinker]

I know these verses go together.

Honor your mother.
Hate your mother. (And even your own life).
Who is my mother and brother?
Let the dead bury their own dead.

I know they GO together but I can’t PUT them together. They aren’t IN me in an integrated understanding. As my friend would say, I’m a half baked cake in this matter, a cake not turned yet. I don’t have the balance.

Any help?

These texts sbg are about prioritising relationship....and each text a context.
Taking Jewish idiom and translation into account will also shed light on the word translated as 'hate'

 

[stunnedbygrace]

This is definitely not within the norm of parental behavior.

Ah…I’m not so sure. Narcissism is…a scale we ALL fall on somewhere. It’s the useless way of life we were all taught. We are all capable of gaslighting and sneaky passive aggression and selfish emotional manipulation of others. If it were so unnormal and rare, I would not see it everywhere I look. Rules for others but not for you - I see this so often in politicians. And it’s a persistent trait of narcissists. I can’t imagine their own children weren’t subjected to a boatload of it.
I think a lot about how I see it’s extreme and toxic form so often outside of my family and I wonder if it’s always been so prevalent but I didn’t notice or understand it, or…if it’s growing. It would make sense that it’s growing(the love of many growing cold.)

 

[BeyondET]

What is the correct way to honor your father and mother when they want to see you destroyed? What if your abuse by their hands stretches into your adulthood and then they try to also destroy their grandchildren? I understand forgiveness and wishing them no ill, despite what they did or do. I don’t understand a definition of how to go about honoring them though.

Those are difficult times but it's the reason of you being in this time.

 

[stunnedbygrace]

These texts sbg are about prioritising relationship....and each text a context.
Taking Jewish idiom and translation into account will also shed light on the word translated as 'hate'

I don’t know…I don’t think that’s all it is. A man wanted to follow Jesus but wanted to go bury his own father first. Jesus told him to let others bury him. This is more than your explanation covers.

 

[quietthinker]

I don’t know…I don’t think that’s all it is. A man wanted to follow Jesus but wanted to go bury his own father first. Jesus told him to let others bury him. This is more than your explanation covers.

It is as you say 'more than my explanation covers'
I might add, due to the knowledge that a persons attention span is relatively short, my explanations imply more than is stated by the actual words posted. Subsequently my usually short offerings which some consider cryptic. I do it in the hope that the batten is grabbed and run with, so to speak.

This is my understanding of 'let the dead bury the dead'
Jesus wanted this man to prioritise his call. Luke 9:57-62 There were no doubt sufficient relatives or others to look after putting a deceased body into the ground, to put it bluntly.
The man made the offer to follow Jesus. Jesus checks his priority while using it as a spiritual lesson. 'Dead' in the sense Jesus is using it could mean....and I think it does, those who have not had their heart's touched to want to make a commitment.

 

[stunnedbygrace]

It is as you say 'more than my explanation covers'
I might add, due to the knowledge that a persons attention span is relatively short, my explanations imply more than is stated by the actual words posted. Subsequently my usually short offerings which some consider cryptic. I do it in the hope that the batten is grabbed and run with, so to speak.

This is my understanding of 'let the dead bury the dead'
Jesus wanted this man to prioritise his call. Luke 9:57-62 There were no doubt sufficient relatives or others to look after putting a deceased body into the ground, to put it bluntly.
The man made the offer to follow Jesus. Jesus checks his priority while using it as a spiritual lesson. 'Dead' in the sense Jesus is using it could mean....and I think it does, those who have not had their heart's touched to want to make a commitment.

Which ties into, who are my mother and my brother?
But anyone who doesn’t attend a parents funeral will be thought badly of by men and will be said not to have shown any respect or honor to their parent.
I didn’t go to my own fathers funeral. I could not bring myself to sit there and deal with his second wife and her ugliness. I knew I would just become a…pawn for her histrionic displays and hatred and pretensions. He married a second narcissist but she was not as sly as the first one.
So…it also ties into counting the cost, I think. Not many will think well of you if you leave your own family behind because they are not really your family any more.
It’s a lot of struggling to understand for me. But, my life is much better now that I no longer hate people.

 

[quietthinker]

Which ties into, who are my mother and my brother?
But anyone who doesn’t attend a parents funeral will be thought badly of by men and will be said not to have shown any respect or honor to their parent.

yeahhhh, I can run with that.

 

[Reggie Belafonte]

What is the correct way to honor your father and mother when they want to see you destroyed? What if your abuse by their hands stretches into your adulthood and then they try to also destroy their grandchildren? I understand forgiveness and wishing them no ill, despite what they did or do. I don’t understand a definition of how to go about honoring them though.

Your moral obligations towards them regardless, because you know better even if they don't ?
My Dad and Mum have did the wrong thing by me plenty of times but that did not change my love for them, I did let them do such without firing up against them, because I loved them.

Looking back nowadays I should of fired up at such abuse. if I were to have them days back I like to think I would of or should of fired up ? not that it would do me any good at all. I have learnt lessons. we were to be seen and not heard back in them days. so they did not care less what you said or thought at all. Gangs could work to bash me up and dad and mum thought nothing of it, such was just normal !

My mum about 2010 seen some TV news of brats that was a non issue and mum made a big issue out of that cat fight rubbish ! and the same with another TV news of a fat kid who was being abused by a pipsqueak and fatty struck back, so TV was all for fatty, but fact is fatty went to far with pipsqueak ! fatty did not have due diligence in fact = no Grace ! such is a Zoo.

So is that like they say "The new normal" ? Culture now can change like as a trend. Communist Russia one year, Mad Max and then Queer the next such BS spastic world.

My mums dad destroyed her and my dad business wise, he had set my dad up to go too Jail ! but my dads brothers gave money to save him from Jail.

So how does one see such in regards to Honour ? well yes you can still Honour such a one for or from a position but also their can be other positions to see such from ? but as long as your position is true and you take note in virtue and Grace regarding Christ Jesus you are free to make the call, because you still love such an idiot ? so it does not change the facts of reality.

My mum is way out of line with my sister for years and I do not respect that line of abuse at all played on my sister, not to mention to old to deal with such abuse from my mum who's gives her a real hard time. when my sister has dealt with cancer and then got T boned crashed and hurt badly, then crushed a vertebra in her back then dealt with getting myocarditis, then Covid.

 

[Lambano]

I never did feel inclined to tell you what I thought it meant since you never asked but I do feel inclined suddenly.
Here’s what I think it means:
Never answer a fool using the foolish way he chooses to converse. Don’t enter into his useless tactics and foolish or arrogant manner or you will be as foolish as he is. Always answer him though, to try to help him to see how foolish he is being because if you were to fail to answer his foolish manner, he would think himself so wise and his foolish tactics so good that no one one could answer with true wisdom.
In other words, always answer a man being foolish but don’t do so in the same foolish way as he chooses to act.

Okay. I think it means, "Know when to answer a fool - and when it's best to remain silent." That takes discernment. (How you answer him when you do is an implementation detail.) Me, I usually remain silent when I should speak up, and speak up when I should hold my peace. So who's the greater fool?

 

[Lambano]

Is flesh and blood my enemy that I should hate a flesh and blood person? I can hate what they do but I no longer have hate for them. I just don’t. Maybe you don’t either, since you put quote marks around the word “hate.” I have to guess because you made statements but didn’t explain them.

Just want to wrap this up, because it looks like you've figured it out by now, but the context of Jesus's reply (a man who asks to defer the call to follow Jesus in order to fulfill his God-ordained obligations to his parents) tells me that "hate" is a rhetorical exaggeration used to make a point. (Would the master of parables use hyperbole? Nah!) That point being that anything that comes before following Christ including God-ordained commandments (a point that would later affect Paul's ministry to the Gentiles) has to be set aside. And it's not always easy or obvious.

Whether and how that applies to your own situation with your mother, I have no idea.

 

[Lambano]

What is the correct way to honor your father and mother when they want to see you destroyed? What if your abuse by their hands stretches into your adulthood and then they try to also destroy their grandchildren? I understand forgiveness and wishing them no ill, despite what they did or do. I don’t understand a definition of how to go about honoring them though.

That's horrible. That falls in Jesus's "Love your enemies" category.

Or Paul's "Bless those who persecute you" category. Which is more than not cursing them. How do you be a blessing? I'm not even gong to try to advise you how in this situation.

 

[Lambano]

It’s rattling around and almost coming into focus.
If someone were to say, your mother is outside asking for you and I said, who is my mother? Would others not see that as not honoring her?

Object lesson. Jesus' response was, those who do what God wants are His mothers and brothers and sisters, which is why we refer to each other as brothers and sisters "in Christ".

I was not able to care for my own mother during the last years of her life owing to the 1500 mile distance between us; that task fell to my sister who lived close by. However, I picked up a "mother in Christ", a dear lady from my church whose daughter has her own health issues and was overwhelmed by the demands of caring for an elderly mother.

She's gone now, but the point being that you have other mothers and fathers out there whom you can honor as a daughter.

 

[VictoryinJesus]

I know these verses go together.

Honor your mother.
Hate your mother. (And even your own life).
Who is my mother and brother?
Let the dead bury their own dead.

I know they GO together but I can’t PUT them together. They aren’t IN me in an integrated understanding. As my friend would say, I’m a half baked cake in this matter, a cake not turned yet. I don’t have the balance.

Any help?

I can relate to one of your post later about parents. My mother lied to me about who my father was until I found out in my forties that the father I was told was my father, was not my father. she had an affair and I was the child of that affair. My sister is the one who told me finally when I was in my fourties because the doctors were searching family members to see if what I had was hereditary. My mother didn’t want me to know who my father was nor that I had a younger sister, three brothers: two twins. My mother still growls that my oldest sister had no right telling me and it was a secret she meant to take to the grave. Her reasoning is that she was trying to spare me the embarrassment; I get it was her she wanted to spare. But my mom is 91 now and unable to bear our trying to fix it through talking to her. I get my mother carried this secret for decades, telling her I'm ok and I’m glad I was told. I ask her is it not better that she doesn’t have to bury it any longer? How she is free from a lie. That same sister who told me the truth, she is 68 years old…she called the other day crying. We all take turns tending to mom everyday because she forgets her medicine and even to eat. My sister called sobbing saying “she is so hateful”. My mother had said something so cruel, so cutting deep old wounds of rejection. But at the same time my mothers only focus when I go sit with her is something her father said to her as a young child that was so cruel, so cutting deep old wounds of rejection. Which even though at 91 and most memories are hard to find, my mom still voices how hateful her father was. Then she does the same (unknowingly) to my sister.

I’m not really sure the answer to your question. For me it has something to do with the fear of God is the beginning of departing from evil.

John 12:25-27 He that loves his life shall lose it; and he that hates his life in this world shall keep it unto life eternal.
^consider the above with Paul who said he lost all things, what all he counted as dung…the titles, the prestigious…that he might win Christ. Consider if any man build flesh upon that foundation which is Christ; what is burned.

 

[VictoryinJesus]

I can relate to one of your post later about parents. My mother lied to me about who my father was until I found out in my forties that the father I was told was my father, was not my father. she had an affair and I was the child of that affair. My sister is the one who told me finally when I was in my fourties because the doctors were searching family members to see if what I had was hereditary. My mother didn’t want me to know who my father was nor that I had a younger sister, three brothers: two twins. My mother still growls that my oldest sister had no right telling me and it was a secret she meant to take to the grave. Her reasoning is that she was trying to spare me the embarrassment; I get it was her she wanted to spare. But my mom is 91 now and unable to bear our trying to fix it through talking to her. I get my mother carried this secret for decades, telling her I'm ok and I’m glad I was told. I ask her is it not better that she doesn’t have to bury it any longer? How she is free from a lie. That same sister who told me the truth, she is 68 years old…she called the other day crying. We all take turns tending to mom everyday because she forgets her medicine and even to eat. My sister called sobbing saying “she is so hateful”. My mother had said something so cruel, so cutting deep old wounds of rejection. But at the same time my mothers only focus when I go sit with her is something her father said to her as a young child that was so cruel, so cutting deep old wounds of rejection. Which even though at 91 and most memories are hard to find, my mom still voices how hateful her father was. Then she does the same (unknowingly) to my sister.

I’m not really sure the answer to your question. For me it has something to do with the fear of God is the beginning of departing from evil.

John 12:25-27 He that loves his life shall lose it; and he that hates his life in this world shall keep it unto life eternal.
^consider the above with Paul who said he lost all things, what all he counted as dung…the titles, the prestigious…that he might win Christ. Consider if any man build flesh upon that foundation which is Christ; what is burned.

Personally I do think Christ Jesus Honored Mary by Honoring God and the mother of us all New Jerusalem. So I don’t see it as a rejection of Mary or his brothers when Christ said see these …whoever does the Will of My Father; is my brother, is my mother …even though it was said to Mary that a sword would enter her heart also that many hearts would be revealed …
(which of course is just opinion)
But to me…going to tend to my mother is not because of her but what I feel God wants me to do …because He tends and cares for me even though I’ve been blind and done hideous things in ignorance.

 

[marks]

Gotta say that is the best answer to those verses I have ever heard. Never could grasp it so I've left it alone all these years, not sure your view is correct or not, but it explains it better than any I've heard to date.

From my study, I think this is correct. Don't leave them unanswered, but don't do what they do.

Maybe that should be posted at the head of every thread!

Much love!