Fourth, Fifth, and Sixth Commandments of God
Did God tell us to obey and respect our parents in everything they tell us? This is lesson 19, The Fourth, Fifth, and Sixth Commandments of God. Welcome back to another lesson of All About My Catholic Faith. Today, I want to continue to talk about the Ten Commandments. This lesson will be on the Fourth, Fifth, and Sixth Commandments. Fair warning that during this episode I’ll be talking about some sexual and life topics that may not be appropriate for younger ears. So, with that being said, I’d like to give you a few questions to think about during this lesson. From whom does all Earthly power come? Did Jesus obey his parents? How did Jesus obey his Heavenly Father? Did Jesus obey Pontius Pilate? How can we imitate Jesus? Let's get going into this lesson with a quick reading or two from the Holy Bible. These readings are from St Luke's Gospel chapter 2: verse 51, and from Philippians chapter 2: verse 8. He went down with them and came to Nazareth, and was obedient to them; and his mother kept all these things in her heart. he humbled himself, becoming obedient to death, even death on a cross. Let's dive in to find out what these readings are all about. First of all, we need to realize that God controls all power on Earth and in Heaven. He may grant people here on Earth a share of his power. Your parents have authority and power over you the same as my parents have power and authority over me even though I'm an older adult. God also gives rulers of the world, in countries and cities, the power to make decisions and rules for the people of their areas. We need to give obedience to those people who are in power and authority because their power comes from God. Here's an example when Jesus obeyed his Heavenly Father. In Saint John's Gospel chapter 6 verse 38 Jesus said; "I have come down from Heaven not to do my own will but the will of him who sent me." Of course, he was talking about his Father, God the Father. Jesus also said in John's Gospel chapter 14 verse 31. "I love the Father and I do as the Father has commanded me." Also in this reading, we see that Jesus not only obeyed his Heavenly Father he also obeyed his earthly parents, Mary and Joseph. Jesus obeyed his parents in anything they taught him and guided him in, Jesus did this because he knew that his Heavenly Father gave his earthly parents their authority. This is the same as when God gives your parents and my parents the authority over us. Jesus also obeyed the rulers of the country and the areas where he was. Jesus knew that their power came from God just like the power his parents were given. An example of this is when Pontius Pilate asked Jesus this question. "Do you not know that I have the power to release you." Jesus gave a great response because he knew that Pontius Pilate had power but only because God gave him the power. Jesus said, "You would have no power at all over me if it were not given to you from above." We know that Jesus obeyed those in power even though it cost him to be put to death on the cross on Good Friday. Jesus showed us the way of love and obedience. We must follow him and we must obey the Ten Commandments just like Jesus did. We must also follow his example of love and show Jesus just how much we love him by going to Mass every week, reading the Bible and praying every day, and also by loving and having obedience to our parents, teachers, and anyone who God has given power to. In this lesson, we're going to talk about the Fourth, Fifth, and Sixth Commandments of God, so let's get going into the Fourth Commandment. What is the Fourth Commandment of God? “Honor thy father and thy mother.” We must obey our parents in everything that is not sinful. When we obey our parents in this way we are also obeying God. Our parents are here to help us grow and to help us to know everything that is good and also to keep us away from things that are bad. Part of the Fourth Commandment means that we should be helping our parents in every way that we can by doing our chores, cleaning our room, making our lunch, doing our laundry, and listening and being a good member of the family. The Fourth Commandment also tells us that we shouldn’t be disrespectful, unkind, or disobedient to our parents and those who are in lawful authority. Let's move on now to the Fifth Commandment. The Fifth Commandment says "Thou shalt not kill." This sounds pretty straightforward. I think we all know that we shouldn’t kill anyone or anything for an unjust reason. This also means that we need to take care of our body and our spirituality by being and staying healthy and keeping our prayer life healthy. We are not to murder or commit suicide or fight or to have hatred or anger toward another person. We also shouldn’t be seeking revenge against another person. It’s not good to get drunk or take drugs or do anything that harms our body. We should also not be setting bad examples for others. Everyone in this world should be able to live without someone killing them, from the time they are first conceived in their mother's womb until the time they die of natural causes. You probably heard of a great event that happened last Friday in Washington DC. It was the annual Walk for Life. The Walk For Life is an event where thousands and thousands of people gather together in Washington DC to stand up for the rights for children to be born. You may or may not know, that right now in our country, the United States, it's legal to kill a little baby who's in his mother's womb. This, of course, goes directly against the Fifth Commandment, "Thou shalt not kill." The baby in the mother's womb has never done anything wrong and deserves the right to be born just as you and I were born no matter how they were conceived. Sadly and tragically, just this past week, the State of New York, a law was passed that allows many terrible things to happen to little babies. It is now legal to kill babies through abortion all the up to the time he or she is born, If the abortion fails to kill the baby, it’s now the law that the baby can’t receive medical attention to help them. Weirdly, New York law doesn’t recognize a human baby as actually a human until after he or she is born. It’s also now against the law for any other laws to be on the books that support the right to a baby to be born. Did you hear me? How can this possibly have happened? What a most horrific and hateful attitude and now law. Please pray for the governor who signed this law and for all the people, especially little babies. If your listening to this podcast on the day it came out, tomorrow is Saturday, January 26th, There is another big walk for life Saturday in San Francisco and it's the West Coast Walk For Life. You can stand up for the Fifth Commandment and for all of those babies who deserve the right to be born by praying and attending one of these wonderful events that are helping to promote the right to a child to be born. Since the right to kill a baby in their mother’s womb was made law back in January of 1973, there have been about 60 million babies killed before they had a chance to live and make a difference in the world. That is very tragic. If there would have been 60 million more people on Earth, you never know, one of them could have been that person who invented the cure for cancer or to figure out how we can live on this Earth completely without destroying the natural resources. Besides that, of course, every person deserves the right to live from the time they were conceived in their mother's room until the time they die of natural causes. As I said, the West Coast Walk for Life is Saturday, January 26th and I hope I will see you there. What's really amazing about The Walk For Life in Washington DC and the West Coast Walk For Life in San Francisco is that there are so many families and so many young people there. We really need the young people to lead this country back to being great again, and to be holy again, and back to a point to where we really truly respect everyone, most especially the young children in their mother's womb. I really hope that I will live to see the day when the law that allows children to be killed in their mother's womb, will be changed. Furthermore, and most especially, I hope that I will see the day where everyone in this country will realize how important life is and that we'll start respecting everyone's life, those here on Earth already and those who have been conceived in their mother's womb and are about to be born. This is what the Fifth Commandment is all about. If you are a young person, please make sure you stand up for all the babies to be born. Never be afraid to do this or to show your Catholic Christian faith to everyone around you. You are the key to our future. If you are a parent of a young person please, please, we must take care to protect, support, and lead our young men and women to the truth that Jesus taught us. The Sixth Commandment says, "Thou shalt not commit adultery." Remember from earlier lessons that the Holy Spirit lives in you. The Holy Spirit moved into your soul when you were baptized. This is when you became a childof God. I don't know about you, but since God in the form of the Holy Spirit is living in my soul, I want to do my very best to keep my body and my thoughts pure and clean for him. This means that we should have perfect respect for our body and for the bodies of other people. This commandment also means that when we get married we should only be with and have true love with that person who we are married to. Marriage is a Holy Sacrament. Marriage should never be broken up by any man or woman. The Sixth Commandment also tells us not to commit acts of impurity or immodesty in the way we speak, the way we look, the way we dress, and how we act. This pertains to when we are alone by ourselves or when we are around other people. Do you have any questions for me now? Student: Is it really important that we need to be thinking of our health? Yes, we must always be thinking about our health. We must always keep our body and our soul healthy. We were made in the image and likeness of God. God wants you back one day to join him in Heaven, so it is your responsibility to keep your body and our soul in good shape. Remember, your body is the Temple of the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit is living in your soul so do whatever you can to respect your body and your soul and not do any damage to yourself in any way. Student: Is God really displeased when we try to get even with other people even though it may make us feel better? He does want me to be happy, right? Yes, God does want you to be happy, but he would be very unhappy, and very displeased if you try to get even with others by taking revenge. Revenge is when you try to get back at someone because perhaps they said something bad to you or did something against you. Jesus teaches us not to seek revenge. In the Bible, it actually says to turn the other cheek which means that if someone hurts you, don't go back and try to hurt them. Student: What does the Fourth Commandment say? The Fourth Commandment says, "honor thy father and thy mother." Both your father and mother are very special and need to be honored and obeyed. Student: Should we obey and follow our parents even when they teach us something sinful or bad? No, not actually. We must obey our parents. This is part of the commandment to honor thy father and thy mother. Remember though, this is only when your parents are doing things that are not sinful. If your mother and father are doing something or teaching you something that is sinful you should not follow their example. Your parents should not be doing things sinful or leading you into sin. If I knew my parents are teaching my something sinful I would respectfully not follow them. I would even ask them why they’re doing that and why they’re leading me down the wrong path. I want to go to heaven and I want my parents to go to heaven so I would try to get them back on the right path by not doing sinful things and helping them not to have me do sinful things. Student: Did Jesus always obey his parents? Jesus always did obey his parents in everything. His parents were very special, they were holy. Jesus's parents Mary and Joseph never did try to lead him into doing sinful things. Jesus's parents are saints because they were such holy people. Student: What does the Fifth Commandment say? The Fifth Commandment says, "Thou shalt not kill." We talked a lot about the Fifth Commandment in our lesson. I hope that you’ll have courage to always stand up for the week and the innocent, especially the unborn and the elderly. Student: What does the Sixth Commandment say? The Sixth Commandment says, "Thou shalt not commit adultery." This means to keep our body and our spirit pure and clean. Student: Is it a sin if I have impure thoughts? Part of being human is that we often think impure thoughts. It is not a sin when you have impure thoughts about others. What’s important, is how you react to those thoughts. If you see a beautiful woman and a handsome man together on a beach and you look at them in awe and thank God for the gift of beauty he has bestowed on them you are certainly not committing a sin. If you, however, see those same two people and start thinking of sexual thoughts about them, you then have have crossed that line and are committing a sin. If you actually act on these lustful fantasies by watching porn or masturbating, you are deeply harming your soul and may be committing a mortal sin. If you or someone you love experiences problems with porn, I want to recommend going to CovenantEyes.com. This is a program that will help you to break away from this terrible thing. Viewing porn images or movies and mastubating are not good for your soul and by doing these things you are training yourself to treat others as simple objects for your pleasure, instead of them as being persons made in the image and likeness of God. I am not sponsored at all by them, but I know it’s the best software program out there to help. Remember that God made each of us as either a male or a female. You can tell, even before a baby is born, if the baby is male or female. That’s not something that’s dependent on how a person thinks or feels, or what a person likes to do, it’s how we were made. God also gave us the gift of being attracted to those of the opposite sex. This, of course, is a very good thing. When a man and a woman are joined together in the Sacrament of Marriage, it’s a beautiful thing for them to love each other in very intimate ways. God told Adam and Eve, and all of his children, to be fruitful and multiply. As long as we do this in a loving marital relationship and without treating each other as an object simply for our pleasure, God will most definitely be happy with us. There are people who have a disordered attraction toward someone of the same sex. That alone is not a sin, but remember it’s how we react, that actually determines whether we fall into sin. We’re all called to be chaste in our life. Chastity is living out our sexual life according to our state of our life. Regardless if a someone is attracted to a person of the opposite sex or to someone of the same sex, we should never be taking part in a sexual or romantic relationship with anyone until we are married. And remember, marriage was set up by God and made into a Sacramento by Jesus to be only between one man and one woman. Student: Does everyone's power come from God? Yes, anyone who has power over someone else gets that power from God. If God did not give someone the power they would not have it. Student: Who should we use as our model for obedience? Well, of course, Jesus Christ Our Lord and Our Savior is the best and truest model for us to follow in everything. Those were some great questions. I’m sure they helped many other people. Let's have another reading from the Bible. The first part will tell us about obedience. This is from Ephesians chapter 6: verses 1 through 3 and then from First Peter Chapter 2: verses 13 through 25. Children, obey your parents [in the Lord], for this is right. “Honor your father and mother.” This is the first commandment with a promise, “that it may go well with you and that you may have a long life on earth.” Be subject to every human institution for the Lord’s sake, whether it be to the king as supreme or to governors as sent by him for the punishment of evildoers and the approval of those who do good. For it is the will of God that by doing good you may silence the ignorance of foolish people. Be free, yet without using freedom as a pretext for evil, but as slaves of God. Give honor to all, love the community, fear God, honor the king. Slaves, be subject to your masters with all reverence, not only to those who are good and equitable but also to those who are perverse. For whenever anyone bears the pain of unjust suffering because of consciousness of God, that is a grace. But what credit is there if you are patient when beaten for doing wrong? But if you are patient when you suffer for doing what is good, this is a grace before God. For to this you have been called, because Christ also suffered for you, leaving you an example that you should follow in his footsteps. “He committed no sin, and no deceit was found in his mouth.” When he was insulted, he returned no insult; when he suffered, he did not threaten; instead, he handed himself over to the one who judges justly. He himself bore our sins in his body upon the cross, so that, free from sin, we might live for righteousness. By his wounds you have been healed. For you had gone astray like sheep, but you have now returned to the shepherd and guardian of your souls. Now let's have a reading from First Corinthians chapter 6: verses 19 and 20. This reading is about respect for the body. Do you not know that your body is a temple of the holy Spirit within you, whom you have from God, and that you are not your own? For you have been purchased at a price. Therefore, glorify God in your body. I hope you learned a little bit more about the Fourth, Fifth, and Sixth Commandments. Remember the Fourth Commandment is "Honor your father and your mother." The Fifth commandment is, "Thou shalt not kill." The sixth Commandment is, "Thou shalt not commit adultery." Next week we will continue to learn more about the Commandments of God. Remember Sunday is coming up so please make sure that you go to Mass this week and every week. Do your best to do something special this week to honor God and to honor your parents. In this way, you will be truly living out the Fourth Commandment. If you're not Catholic you can still always come to church with us to see how we love and worship Jesus. You don’t need to be invited or anything. Just find where your local Catholic Church is and go to Mass. I hope you'll keep listening to these lessons to learn why we love Jesus and his Church. If you know someone who wants to learn more about the Catholic Church please tell them about this podcast series.
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