R-E-S-P-E-C-T!

Upon reading Titus 2:1-15, the words respect, decency and dignity come to mind. In our schools, no matter what the grade level, respect for others is stressed. Yet, it becomes more and more difficult to instill this in children, with any kind of real understanding about being “civilized” and how a world should operate, when there is so little respect, decency and dignity portrayed in our world through the media and even through adult examples.

There are many reasons and sources for the loss of integrity in our culture. I am sure much of it started with my generation—you know-- the baby boomer, flower power, sexual revolution, hippie generation, anti-establishment, don’t trust anyone over 30, question all authority, protesting, liberal, anti-established religion generation who is now approaching retirement or is retired. Yes, we were the ones who dumped a lot of things upside down and opened a Pandora’s box of many other things that now we can wonder about, especially as we see that family life as we knew it growing up, is no more. As we liberated our culture, liberal views of sexuality led us to abortion, rampant and accepted promiscuity, live-in relationships with no marriage, and then, children who come out of these relationships (often devoid of any healthy family situation), divorce, sexual exhibitionism, acceptable foul language, homosexuality, and pornography availability anywhere and everywhere and stemming from this, an onslaught of sex crimes in our paper on a daily basis right here in little old Eau Claire. Quite a mouthful, but all true.

And where are we influenced the most by all of these things? Of course, it is our TV set and our cable or satellite systems that continuously provide us with what they consider to be really cool stuff—like say, the Dance Off, Pants Off Show, where people dance and take off all their clothing as they dance. How charming! Or Jerry Springer who has brought us one of the most vile shows on the air. And can we leave out Girls Gone Wild? Yikes!

But what has this to do with respect, decency and dignity, you may be asking yourself? The answer is seen in Titus 2:2-6 where Paul tells us: “ Teach the older men to exercise self-control, to be worthy of respect, and to live wisely. They must have sound faith and be filled with love and patience. Similarly, teach the older women to live in a way that honors God. They must not slander others or be heavy drinkers. Instead, they should teach others what is good. These older women must train the younger women to love their husbands and their children, to live wisely and be pure, to work in their homes, to do good, and to be submissive to their husbands. Then they will not bring shame on the word of God. In the same way, encourage the young men to live wisely.”

When I read this, it sounds like the hopes of most parents that their child would grow up to be an honest, trusted, person, who understands that character counts. Yet, here we are in a culture where character is less and less emphasized, but outward appearances seem to have been given all the meaning. Take for instance the admonition to women that Paul makes about living in the way that honors God. When he chastises women for drinking heavily, I can only think of the latest trend of women such as, the mother of Lindsey Lohan, who stopped being a mom, and became a party-girl pal, attending parties with her dysfunctional daughter. Then, there are the ‘cougar women,” a new trend, so called because they are older women on the prowl, seeking very young men. This seems to indicate that women, the more gentle of the human race, no longer seek dignity, grace, honorability, and being a lady, even at an age when grace and being dignified should be their gift to younger women. Do children really want a flamboyant grandmother, who dresses and behaves like she is sixteen? How can we model grace and wisdom when we do not practice it? Indeed, the whole concept of being a lady seems to have disappeared in our culture. You have to go back to old movies to find women who portrayed lady-like behavior. How charming Grace Kelly was in her day. Would she be as charming in current movies, looking tough, brazen, and speaking profanity?

In Philippians 4:8, Paul tells us “whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable—if anything is excellent or praiseworthy—think about such things.” It makes so much sense. But it is not what we are doing. We have crammed our culture with garbage. The literature that we teach today, is more often about current trends in the culture, then it is about a time-held great piece of writing. Most movies and TV commonly portray parents as dolts, especially fathers. Too often women are portrayed as mini-dictators in high-heals with little heart. How many characters on TV in the most popular shows would you like to have for a mother? Families often portray children who have no boundaries, no respect and who are all about materialism, fashion, and sexuality without character and conscience.

We have lost our way. In our attempt to ‘seek ourselves,’ as we used to say in the good old 1960’s, we have found that a lot of what we were seeking did not hold up. The ways of the righteous are just that—they are right. The good old ways work and the new ways are fraught with the very thing that we said that we hated the most in 1969- the lack of truth and honesty. Respect comes out of earning respect and being respectful, not in the childish demand that it be given to us, as commonly practiced in today’s culture.
Laurie Erdman