Sermon 

Genesis 6:9-10
This is the account of Noah and his family. Noah was a righteous man, the only blameless person living on earth at the time, and he walked in close fellowship with God. ^₁₀ Noah was the father of three sons: Shem, Ham, and Japheth.

1. What does the Bible say about this topic?

• In the first family I assume that there was an amount of this from Cain, Able and finally Seth toward their parents.
• I took some verses 

In favor of the parents:

Matt 15:3-7
³ Jesus replied, "And why do you, by your traditions, violate the direct commandments of God? ⁴ For instance, God says, 'Honor your father and mother,' and 'Anyone who speaks disrespectfully of father or mother must be put to death.' ⁵ But you say it is all right for people to say to their parents, 'Sorry, I can't help you, for I have vowed to give to God what I would have given to you.' ⁶ In this way, you say they don't need to honor their parents. And so you cancel the word of God for the sake of your own tradition.

Eph 6:1-3
Children, obey your parents because you belong to the Lord, for this is the right thing to do. ² "Honor your father and mother." This is the first commandment with a promise: ³ If you honor your father and mother, "things will go well for you, and you will have a long life on the earth."

1 Tim 5:3-4
³ Take care of any widow who has no one else to care for her. ⁴ But if she has children or grandchildren, their first responsibility is to show godliness at home and repay their parents by taking care of them. This is something that pleases God.

2 Timothy 3:1
You should know this, Timothy, that in the last days there will be very difficult times. ² For people will love only themselves and their money. They will be boastful and proud, scoffing at God, disobedient to their parents , and ungrateful. They will consider nothing sacred. ³ They will be unloving and unforgiving; they will slander others and have no self-control. They will be cruel and hate what is good. ⁴ They will betray their friends, be reckless, be puffed up with pride, and love pleasure rather than God. ⁵ They will act religious, but they will reject the power that could make them godly. Stay away from people like that!

Prov 19:26
²⁶ Children who mistreat their father or chase away their mother are an embarrassment and a public disgrace.

Luke 18:28-30 In favor of the kids
²⁸ Peter said, "We've left our homes to follow you."
²⁹ "Yes," Jesus replied, "and I assure you that everyone who has given up house or wife or brothers or parents or children, for the sake of the Kingdom of God, ³⁰ will be repaid many times over in this life, and will have eternal life in the world to come."

Ps. 127:3, Prov. 29:17
Ps 127:3
Children are a gift from the Lord; they are a reward from him.
Prov 29:17
¹⁷ Discipline your children , and they will give you peace of mind and will make your heart glad.

2. What should the attitude of the parent be?

• Let your kids make as many adult decisions as you can allow.
• Spend time with them! 

1. If you send them away to school or where ever don’t be surprised when they come back if they have lost some of your values.
2. If you don’t spend time with them they won’t spend time with you later.   

• Don’t expect too much of your children:  Expectation is the source of disappointment. 

1. In Education
2. In Career
3. In Time
4. In Spouse
5. In Communication

3. What should the attitude of the child / family member be?

• Entertain every reasonable request of your parents and family.
• Making your parents pleased and helping your family is a biblical thing. 
• Think about your future.  Things will go well for you. 
• If something is not right the younger should go to the older.  This isn’t an eternal precedent.

4. How do we draw the line in our relationship with our heavenly father and our earthly parents?

• Ultimately our father is in heaven. 
• We have a heavenly father who doesn’t expect us to balas budi.
• The Father in Heaven is more concerned about who we become than what we do for him. 
• With that, what kind of a family member are you?

5. There is security in perfect love.

• For that reason they could be naked
• This was the first thing they noticed after eating of the fruit was that they were now naked.
• They had a level of Security between the two of them.

6. Sin causes people to fall out of love.

• When you are first in pursuit everything is perfect. 
• When we have sinned against each other love begins to disappear
• Imagine how much they lost.
• Being a Christian and rediscovering God’s love for us helps us to know and attain perfect love.

GO Question

Matthew 15:3-7; Ephesians 6:1-3
 
On Sunday, Pastor Jeff told his experience with his neighbor about unending “balas budi” when he first tried to be a good neighbour by giving the neighbor’s son free English lesson, but the parents gave pastor Jeff things to repay him. This has been a part of tradition that Indonesian people express gratitude, by “balas budi.”
 

1. Do you think it’s necessary to do such thing, repaying what people have done/given to us with something?
2. The principle of “balas budi” has rooted down in Asian culture; and Asian parents would teach this to their children. But, as I observe in my own big family, the parents prefer to live their own life, they don’t want to burden their children. This is one of the reason, they work hard to save money for retirement in a hope they would be able to live independently in the future.
• Children, do you think it’s still necessary for you to support your parents financially as a symbol of repaying their sacrifice, though you know, they actually don’t need financial support? 
• Parents, do you expect your children to repay what you’ve done for them? in what way do you expect your children to “balas budi”?
3. There are some people would send their parents to “panti jompo” because they don’t have time to take care of their parents. Do you think it’s appropriate in? Explain your opinion.
4. There are some area that Pastor Jeff mentioned in his sermon that parents should not expect their children in Education, career, time, spouse, communication. So what should the attitude of the child who has parents with one of these expectations set in him/her? (see 1 Timothy 5:8). And parents, Do you agree with this statement? how would you deal with this statement, since many parents would expect their children to do something?
5. If we have to “balas budi” to our earthly parents, do you think we have to do the same thing to our heavenly father? How would you do that? Do you think our Heavenly father expect us to “balas budi”? (Mark 12:30)

Have a good discussion :)
    
Santi Novia (GO Uni)