The younger girl spoke vehemently, and I watched the older lady wilt.
I watched her wilt because she knew what I saw—that tones of such a nature are rarely becoming when directed toward a person three times your senior.
It was awkward. But more than that, sad. How honor loses it’s seat in our society baffles me. And as she spoke, I knew there was truth her mother needed to hear, but was unable to hear because it was spoken with such heat and disrespect.
Years of the same old had brought the ugly side forth. Like a dam waiting to burst, the girl’s heart had finally had enough, and she was letting her mother know. But in letting her mother know, there was an even more vital thing she didn’t know.
When we speak the ugly reality, we must speak it in an honorable manner.
There is little left in our culture to properly define and exemplify true honor. In other cultures, we read of children standing when a parent enters the room; here, parents are sassed about and disrespected while kids slouch in front of the TV, remote in hand, guiding their way through another movie which most likely feeds even more disrespect.
When our girls grew older, they began loving high school romance movies. Their father and I put a stop to them because these shows fostered selfish, vain, immature attitudes, rich-kid lifestyles, and pre-mature making out. Many of the main characters showed anything but honor to those around them.
It wasn’t easy to say no to the girls. We wanted them to have fun. But rather than spending hours in front of the TV watching shows that lead them away from God more than toward Him, we tried to foster hard work, intense play and recreation, and more reading rather than more of those shows.
Fill your child’s life with the good and they will have little time for the bad.
What are we feeding our kids? And why?
It’s not uncommon to walk into a home and have a child ignore your presence completely because his eyes are glued to his video game. If you say hello, you get a quick, reluctant response as if you’re not worth the time and effort to greet.
In our culture it is not unusual to see men wilt while wives emasculate them and strip them of their dignity—in public, at that. We forget that to a man, honor speaks love—just as to a woman, time, tenderness, and affection speaks love.
We attribute a man’s need for honor to an egotistic desire for recognition and status, while forgetting that they were created a certain way for a reason—and it’s not sexist to affirm that need and put forth effort to meet it.
In many other cultures, the elderly are cared for, respected, and seated at the table with their families; in our culture, they are often passed over, neglected as grown kids run their own families, and despised as “old fashioned” when they try to speak wisdom into a younger generation.
When a president in the most powerful country of the world is elected, people drive cars with demeaning bumper stickers and run protests until people get hurt. This happens regardless of which party is elected—because people have forgotten that in the same breath as we’re asked to honor God, we are asked to “honor all men, and to “honor the king”. [1 Peter 2:17]
In our culture, we’ve forgotten the dignity of honoring a person for his office or calling more than for his perfection. We’ve lost our fear of God, and of those whom He’s placed in powerful positions. We forget that despite our greatest efforts, God still has the final say of who enters the oval office in the White House.
When David was on the run, trying to escape a wicked king who was hunting him down out of sheer jealousy, he had opportunity to kill the king himself. Rather, he cut a corner off Saul’s robe as he slept—and later berated himself for doing so. He warned his men severely not to kill God’s anointed.
His honor moved Saul to repentance, and he returned from his jealousy driven man-hunt in shame. [1 Samuel 24]
David was able to show honor because he first possessed it. Only when honor is known vertically [with God] can we show it horizontally [to others].
The young girl in the first paragraph was obviously frustrated with her relationship with her mother. I spoke with her, for the trial had lasted for many years.
“You must continue to be honest with your mother, but you must change your tone. There’s a way to own your feelings in an honorable manner.”
Ladies, we can twist our faces into an angry knot—or we can express our feelings in a loving manner.
We can speak vehemently and forcefully to the aged—or we can allow powerful truth spoken in love to work its own force.
We can shake our head in disgust at our men—or we can get into their heads and learn more about them, including how they are hard wired to need honor because that’s what God created them to need.
When we speak to our men, we need to treat them with the same courtesy we treat our girlfriends. Every relationship only lasts with certain dynamics in place, including your marriage. Never expect your man to put up with tones and attitudes you wouldn’t expect your friend to put up with.
If a friendship cannot thrive with certain things, neither can your marriage. Accept that fact, and cease to blame your man for being so sexist.
We can ignore the aging parents, or we can sit them at our dinner table and glean from their years of experience before walking the same journey. We can absorb the fact that we wouldn’t even exist had they not given their own time and energy for our well-being and care.
“Your mother needs to hear the truth,” I urged the young lady. “But she will hear the hard things spoken in a soft way much better than she will wade through a rebellious attitude. Allow raw truth spoken in love to work its own power.”
We mistake pretense for honor, but nothing could be further from the truth. When we learn to speak honorably, we have an open door to speak even more clearly. Honor never implies shutting down or putting up with wrong or hurtful things.
Being an honorable person simply means that you show respect as you disagree with another. Others will listen more carefully to you—not less—when you begin to know and possess your own honor.
Honoring others is not only for their benefit, but also for yours. When you see the value God places on you, you will be loathe to represent yourself in a manner others find distasteful and even disgusting. No one, not even your girlfriends, appreciate seeing a woman put down or dishonor her man, her friends, or her kids.
Own your worth and dignity by speaking honestly, but honorably!
Women of Purpose 