When Jesus saw His mother, and the disciple whom He loved standing near, He said to His mother, “Dear woman, here is your son,” and to the disciple, “Here is your mother!” John 19:26-27
Jesus not only died on the cross for our sins, He also exhibited the kind of life God wants us to live. There is no better demonstration of the meaning of the Fourth Commandment than the touching example of Jesus’ love and respect for His mother just moments before His death. Seeing her there before Him He commended her into the care and keeping of His beloved friend and disciple, John, who cared for her from then on.
All of us have parents. There comes a time, to be sure, when “a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife” (Genesis 2:24). But we don’t stop being our parents’ children when we grow up and leave home. Nor does God’s command that we honor our parents have any time limit on it.
Today God blesses us by letting us have our parents with us longer and longer. May the example of Jesus’ concern for His mother, even while dying for us, motivate us not to forget but to honor our parents and elders in their declining years with our love and respect. God has added a special promise to those keeping this commandment.
PRAYER: Lord Jesus, forgive me for not being sensitive to the needs of my parents. Help me to follow Your example. Amen.
(Devotions from “The Abundant Life” copyright 1998, CPH. All Rights Reserved. No part of this publication may be printed, reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without prior written permission of Concordia Publishing House. Permission is granted for one-time e-mailing of this link to a friend. For information on other devotional material, please contact CPH at 800-325-3040 or visit CPH at www.cph.org.)
Today's Bible Readings: 2 Samuel 13-14 John 4:1-26
To Download Devotion MP3 to your computer, right click here and select "Save Link As" or "Save Target As" or "Download Linked File As"