SERMON VII.

COLOSSIANS iii. 20.

Children obey your Parents in all things; for this is wellpleasing unto the LORD.

MY CHILDREN,

I HAVE one request to make this afternoon, it is that you will be very attentive and think seriously about a passage, a most important passage, in the word of GOD, which I am about to read to you, and then explain and enforce.

It is written in the 20th verse of the 3rd chapter of the Epistle to the Colossians :"Children obey your parents in all things for this is well-pleasing unto the LORD." There are two things to be noticed in these words,

I. The duty itself, "Obey your parents in all things."

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II. The motive for its performance, "this is well-pleasing unto the LORD."

I. The duty, "Obey your parents."

You very well know what is meant by obedience to your parents, therefore I need not take up time in explaining it; but perhaps you have not so clear an idea of what it implies, or in other words, what feelings you ought to have and cultivate in your minds, in order to ensure your doing at all times what your parents may desire or command. I will tell you, therefore, what those feelings are; two at least I will mention, and if they exist in and influence you, then I am sure you will not be disobedient.

The first is respect, the second is love.

If

you respect your parents and love them, I can ensure your obedience.

1. You are to respect your parents. This you are taught in your catechism, "Honour thy father and thy mother."

You should remember that they stand in the most venerable as well as the most endearing of all earthly relations to you as children. You should regard them as the persons to whose care and government GOD himself has been pleased to commit you; as those to whom, under GOD, you owe your being and

the greatest blessings you daily enjoy. If your parents be poor, you ought to think of them and behave to them with respect, and if they do what you know to be wrong, if they at any time do what is forbidden in GOD's word, still you are not at liberty to treat them with disrespect by word or deed; remember the wickedness of Ham and its punishment, nor indeed are you to indulge and encourage in your minds any feelings which are likely to lead you to think with contempt or irreverence of those to whom you owe so much.

Honour, venerate, and respect your parents. 2. There is another feeling, however, which you should cherish toward your parents in addition to that of respect. I mean you ought to love them truly, love them with affectionate hearts.

Think but a moment of their love to youif they are poor, they labour for you, to get food for you to eat, and clothes for you to put on; think of the kindness, care, and anxiety they have shown towards you from your earliest infancy; with what tenderness and patience they have attended to your little wants, your numerous daily necessities; how

sorrowful during your little illnesses, how delighted and thankful when you have become well again; you cannot at present perhaps fully understand all this, but be assured that most of your parents have shewn such affectionate regard to you, and therefore you should take care to love them in return.

In illustration of this, I will mention to you a narrative which I used to delight in reading when I was a boy, and since that time I have often heard little boys read it with great pleasure. It is very commonly known, but as it is not to be found in your schoolbooks, perhaps it will be new to most of you. There was a family, the account states, living near to a burning mountain,-a burning mountain, you know, is a hill which burns within, and sometimes it throws out hot ashes from a hole towards the top; and sometimes what is called lava, in such quantities, that it rolls down the sides of the hill like a torrent, and destroys every thing before it; it burns up every thing. Well, it happened that a man and his wife lived near to one of these mountains, and they had two children, both boys; their parents were much attached to them. When they were little ones, I have no doubt,

they used to treat them so affectionately, and I believe they used to teach them to do their duty to GOD, "to believe in him, to fear him, and to love him," and you know if children love God, they are sure to love their parents; and these little boys did so, and afterwards they shewed their affection in a very remarkable manner. They grew up to be men, and their parents were old and not able to move about, and then it was that one of those dreadful eruptions of the burning mountain took place; and all the people who lived near hurried away as fast as they could, lest they should be burnt to death-and they would of course all try to get away from the fire the things they valued most, and while one and another were running away and taking from their houses what they most wished to save, these two young men rushed into their parents' house to carry away what they thought would be most useful to them afterwards, and when they got into the house, they saw many things of their property that they would fain have carried off; and they saw also their poor parents who could not escape by themselves; and immediately one of them seized his father, and the other his mother,