Jesus Shouldn't Have to Foot the Bill

We used to live in that crap.

I have seen friends die early. I have seen others become atheists or get divorced and change who they are. This kind of Christianity is so freaking bad. And it’s wrong.

When people are taught that keeping a family happy means keeping God happy, they can spend years trying to obey people who won’t let the Bible correct them. Then when they finally question the people, everything they’ve been told about Christ comes into question too.

A reel about honoring parents brought this up. A girl helping to pitch her mom’s book describes respecting your parents through your teens, young adulthood, and later life. Honoring your parents throughout life is biblical. The clip doesn’t tell us what happens inside the home or what the rest of the book teaches.

The mentality I’m talking about takes that command and makes parental control permanent. A grown son or daughter is expected to keep submitting as though marriage changes nothing. Saying no to the parent becomes saying no to God. The family gets to demand obedience while keeping its own demands beyond correction.

Wednesday night, my pastor was in Matthew 5, teaching on divorce. He brought it back to the way a person can use Scripture to excuse what he already wants to do. You can know enough Bible to defend yourself without letting it tell you that you’re wrong.

That’s the principle I’m applying here. If a parent wants to keep control, the command to honor parents can be used to resist what God said about marriage.

Ephesians 5:31:

For this cause shall a man leave his father and mother, and shall be joined unto his wife, and they two shall be one flesh.

A man has to leave. His parents remain his parents, and he still owes them honor. God has given him duties toward his wife. Those duties don’t wait for his mother to approve or his father to agree.

A daughter has those family loyalties to settle when she marries too. Her parents don’t own the household she and her husband establish. They can offer advice. The couple can listen and still decide differently. That disagreement doesn’t automatically become rebellion against God.

And marriage doesn’t give either spouse permission to become cruel or neglectful toward a parent. Both commands have to stand. Honor your parents. Give your marriage the place God gave it. You don’t get to use either duty to erase the other.

I hate the kind of Christianity that calls this disobedience because the family didn’t get its way. It’s anti-biblical. When a family makes its approval the test of whether somebody is right with God, that is cultish.

That mentality can damn a family when it teaches people to trust being accepted by the household instead of Christ. A well-behaved son still needs to be saved. So does the father who taught him every rule.

The people who misuse his name need to answer for what they taught. A parent can be wrong. A preacher can be wrong. Their demands don’t become Christ’s demands because they know how to attach a verse.

Don’t make the person they hurt sort through all of that alone. Tell the truth about what was done. Open the Bible and let it correct the people who claimed to speak for it.

Jesus shouldn’t have to foot the bill for these sickos.

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