Today’s Devotion
Topic: A Letter To The Youth
Text: Leviticus 19: 32
“Stand up in the presence of the aged, show respect for the elderly and revere your God. I am the Lord.” Amen
Over all the earth, Jehovah is glorified. What He says is received as the final word. This morning, our great God says to all, “Respect the elderly and revere your God”.
But wait a minute, what is the correlation between respecting the elderly and revering God? Of what interest is it to God if we show respect to the elderly?
Well, God in His wisdom has set the elderly over the young, so the latter may learn from the experiences of the former in order to be wise. He expects those of us who claim to honour and respect Him, to begin the entire process by respecting the elderly around us. For how can we justify our respect for God when we have little or no regard for the aged around us?
Actually, most of us will agree that this “modern culture” infiltrating our society clearly has little regard for the Word of God. It is therefore not surprising that it places no value on the elderly.
What it does is to make the individual youth glory in his own self; paying no attention to anyone in his surroundings.
In a bus, the youth cannot find reason to vacate a seat for the elderly. His reason: “We all paid the same fare”. Shallow as it sounds, he will be defiant to every plea from reasonable people around until he reaches his destination. And then arrogantly disembarks the bus being proud of himself for standing his grounds. It deludes him that he will grow also to be “elderly” and will equally need help when that time comes.
This culture of impunity allows young people to talk back at the elderly, “freeing their mind” on people who easily qualify to be their very parents. As far as they are concerned, the aged do not know “wasup” (the current trends) and have no “swag” (the desired style that should go with these current trends).
Now, the elderly may truly know no “wasup” nor have any “swag”, but they know LIFE. The very life that God has gifted them to see and can confidently tell each youth that THIS LIFE is not about “wasup” or “swag”. Neither is it about the material things we crave for.
It is all about Jesus and the righteousness, peace and joy He gives. It is about the wisdom that comes from fearing God, the blessings that come from giving, the hard work that comes from knowing that the hands that do not work should not eat, and the honouring of our fathers and mothers “that it may go well with us and that we may live long in the land” (Eph 6: 1-2).
When we fail to understand these as the principles of life, our peers who know next to nothing will succeed in convincing us to believe life is all about trends, fashion, sex, alcohol, drugs, fraud, violence and every other thing we see in movies.
Meanwhile, just as each movie takes its shape from the perspective of its makers, so life will always take shape from the precepts of God. He is the Inventor, Creator, Maker, Giver, “Taker”, Source, River, Fountain and Bread of LIFE. HE IS LIFE!
Is it not time that the YOUTH REVERED GOD, therefore? IS IT NOT TIME THAT THEY DEMONSTRATED A LOT OF RESPECT FOR THE ELDERLY so their days are prolonged on the earth?
Meditate on this word and begin to pray. Ask for grace to obey the Word of God: to revere Jehovah as God and to respect the elderly. Every blessing you receive from each act of kindness to the elderly makes “things go well” for you and also prolongs your life. Forget about “swag”, God ordains it so, and so it shall be forever!
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