The fifth commandment states, "Honour thy father and thy mother: that thy days may be long upon the land which the Lord thy God giveth thee" (Ex. 20:12). Honoring one's human parents is childhood's first step in preparing to honor God. In the Bible, loyalty and obedience toward one's parents are strongly enjoined. Doubtless it was early realized that the virtues of respect, honor, obedience, and teachableness in children were prerequisite for family harmony.
When children respect and honor their fathers and mothers, parents who are sincere students of Christian Science can impart to them the gentle precepts and strengthening influence of wholesome religious teaching which will enrich their lives with a demonstrable spiritual understanding of God. If the work is well done, it will promote the control of selfishness. It will instill in the child's consciousness his first sense of law and discipline. It will awaken a deep appreciation of the parental wisdom and devotion that nurtured childhood's formative years. It will move the heart of youth to be mindful of one's human parents and will call forth acts of loving-kindness to reciprocate for a father's protecting care and a mother's tender love. Moreover, it should eventually lead to that higher expression of honor which rises on wings of faith and understanding to reverence God, the divine Father-Mother of the universe.
There is implied in the commandment the condition that fathers and mothers be worthy of honor. Generally, their years of patient labor, sacrifice, and affection rightly merit childhood's gratitude. Impelled by wisdom, parental influence may refine and elevate youthful character by fostering the love of right and truth. The parental example of right conduct at all times, based upon an understanding of God's laws, wins the respect of youth.
St. Paul refers to the fifth commandment in his letter to the Ephesians (6:2) as "the first commandment with promise." The promise of length of days upon the land given by Deity should be fulfilled in the experience of those who obey the commandment, yet it is evident that this promise cannot be realized solely by honoring one's human parents. The one hope of attaining the promised reward rests on the basic requirement of understanding that God is the Parent of all, thereby honoring Him and reaching the true sense of man's origin.
Mary Baker Eddy, speaking of the creation of man, makes this plain in "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures," where she writes (p. 529), "Another change will come as to the nature and origin of man, and this revelation will destroy the dream of existence, reinstate reality, usher in Science and the glorious fact of creation, that both man and woman proceed from God and are His eternal children, belonging to no lesser parent." And Christ Jesus taught (Matt. 23:9), "Call no man your father upon the earth: for one is your Father, which is in heaven." He understood God to be man's origin, the eternal source of his continuity and being. From this Scriptural and scientific basis of the fatherhood and motherhood of God the spiritual meaning of the fifth commandment will begin to appear to Christian Science Sunday School pupils. As their thought of parentage rises to acknowledge God to be the divine, loving Shepherd of all, they will learn not only to love and honor their human parents, including them in the universal family of God's ideas, but also to perceive their true selfhood as sons and daughters of the Most High. Thus they will find the heritage of health, joy, hope, and peace provided by our heavenly Parent for those that seek Him.
To honor God it is necessary that His name and nature be understood, and that they be loved without reservation. The study and practice of Christian Science makes this possible, because this Science gives glory to God, revealing Him as the One altogether lovable. It shows God to be divine Principle, the only cause and creator; omnipresent Spirit, Soul, the sum total of whose goodness is ever at hand to bless. He is self-existent, eternal Life, tender, inexhaustible Love, omnipotent Truth, and omniscient Mind, infinite and perfect, manifested through spiritual man and the universe. How naturally and unreservedly we may love and honor such a Supreme Being and universal Father-Mother, in whom "we live, and move, and have our being," as the Apostle Paul declared (Acts 17:28).
The curriculum of a Christian Scientist at college included a course in philosophy. At the conclusion of the course many of the students, who were of various religious backgrounds, confessed that the different doctrines they had studied had proved very challenging and unsettling to their religious beliefs. The Christian Scientist, whose better understanding of God was impervious to the apparently plausible philosophical reasonings, finished the course with his spiritual understanding of God and man, gained in the Christian Science Sunday School, unshaken. He had already proved that God was the source of his intelligence and strength. Convinced that only on the imperishable basis of perfect God and perfect man could he honor his Father-Mother God, the student concluded that the course was an intellectual effort to account for human nature and conduct. He knew that these are to be overcome, not dwelt upon, if we would make the higher demonstration of man's spiritual identity. He kept constantly in thought man's unassailable relation to his heavenly Parent, and this honoring of God lifted him above the challenge of human belief.
Mrs. Eddy states the transcendent importance of honoring God in these words in "The First Church of Christ, Scientist, and Miscellany" (p. 225): "The coming of Christ's kingdom on earth begins in the minds of men by honoring God and sacredly holding His name apart from the names of that which He creates." Thus our Leader wisely indicates that mankind must reverently acknowledge the supremacy of God, or divine Mind, which includes all that is real and eternal. She also calls for an understanding of the greatness and glory of the parent Mind by pointing out that it is not to be found in its creations.
Because of her deep desire to know and honor God there was born in the pure thought of Mrs. Eddy a spiritual understanding of His allness. Equipped with this understanding, she accomplished healing works through the divine name and power, thus honoring God as prophets, disciples, and apostles honored Him. Through her demonstration and revelation of the rules of Christian Science it is now possible for all mankind to prove that God is indeed both Father and Mother, who meets all needs impartially with compassion and efficacious love.
Science shows that we honor God by spiritual attainments, by the exercise of faith and patience, by growth in humility, by sincere gratitude, and by the desire for spiritual understanding. Christ Jesus taught (John 4:23), "The hour cometh, and now is, when the true worshippers shall worship the Father in spirit and in truth: for the Father seeketh such to worship him." Christian Science inevitably lifts our worship of God to higher levels, lengthening and brightening our earthly days as more of the divine nature appears in our lives.
We honor God by courageously rejecting error as unreal. Glorifying God by understanding that He does not know matter and evil, empowers us to overcome pride, fear, resentment, jealousy, selfishness, sickness, and death. Such iniquitous contradictions of Truth have no foundation in divine Principle. The sole course, in loyalty to our only Parent, is to refuse to accept them. The success of our prayerful realization of error's nothingness in Science must rest upon the degree of honor accorded to our Father-Mother God as the author of eternal good alone.
We honor God when we think and act in harmony with the beatific attributes of His character. The consistent expression of kindness and love, of honesty and purity, constitutes a sincere tribute of honor to Him. Willingness to turn to God in time of need and confidence in the tender care of the Father-Mother Love honor Him by their silent recognition of the underlying restorative power of this Love.
God is honored as the great Physician whenever healing and regeneration are attained through prayer in Science. Victories thus won are always permanent, for they are achieved by divine power, which cannot be reversed.
The steps that honor our Father-Mother God are not material, but spiritual. They appear in unfolding order to every student who enters the land of Christian Science, which God has given. Maintained upon this land by the ever-present Christ, Truth, students in every stage of progress gain increasing light and understanding that promote health and longevity. Eventually thought soars above even the improved belief of human longevity to behold man's immortal status as the eternal child of God, understood here and now. Such revelations and proofs in Science bring present fulfillment of the promises of the fifth commandment, in keeping with its higher meaning, expressed on page 509 of Science and Health in these inspired words: "The periods of spiritual ascension are the days and seasons of Mind's creation, in which beauty, sublimity, purity, and holiness—yea, the divine nature—appear in man and the universe never to disappear."
