In many cultures, elders, those who are of senior age, are regarded with honor and sought for wisdom. However, in parts of the West older people can be regarded as a hindrance, kept in nursing homes, separated in churches to senior groups, and generally regarded as used up and on death’s door, so they are treated as if they have committed some sort of crime by just being aged. This is antichrist! Elders are as filled with Christ as younger people! There is no verse in Scripture that declares because someone is senior they are less full of the Spirit, or less of a brother and sister in Christ! Actually Scripture says, “But as for you, teach what accords with sound doctrine. Older men are to be sober-minded, dignified, self-controlled, sound in faith, in love, and in steadfastness. Older women likewise are to be reverent in behavior, not slanderers or slaves to much wine. They are to teach what is good, and so train the young women to love their husbands and children, to be self-controlled, pure, working at home, kind, and submissive to their own husbands, that the word of God may not be reviled.” (Titus 2:1-15), “In the last days, God says, I will pour out my Spirit on all people. Your sons and daughters will prophesy, your young men will see visions, your old men will dream dreams,” (Acts 2:17), and “ “You shall stand up before the gray head and honor the face of an old man, and you shall fear your God: I am the Lord.” (Leviticus 19:32). Scripture is clear that seniors have a place in the Church, that they will dream dreams, teach, and deserve proper honor.
I am not saying it is wrong for youths to want to spend time with youths or that you must treat all elders equally, there are wicked and cruel people in all age groups. What I am saying is before you are tenpted to label an old person as a has been who needs to just roll over, remember that at some point, you will be elderly, dealing with frailty and age related infirmities. So if you disdain senior citizens, remember that at some point you too will become aged and will not want to be treated as if you are yesterday’s news, or with contempt. So be kind to elders, help them, spend some time with them and help with their loneliness and needs, for a time will come when you will be in same shoes, granted if Christ doesn’t return before you see senior years. The point is elders deserve respect, and if they are cruel, well preach to them about the price of cruelness, and you have every right to treat them as any other person who is cruel by walking away and not receiving their abuse.
There is a balance. Be kind to your elders, but they are not to be obeyed if their advice and teaching & behavior contradicts Scripture, The Holy Spirit’s word to you, and your conscious. They deserve a voice having seen so much, but test every spirit even those in seniors, “Beloved, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God, for many false prophets have gone out into the world. By this you know the Spirit of God: every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God, and every spirit that does not confess Jesus is not from God. This is the spirit of the antichrist, which you heard was coming and now is in the world already.” (1 John 4:1-3). Just because someone is wrinkled does not mean they have wisdom, for all wisdom is in Christ, “..Christ, in whom are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge.” (Colossians 2:2-3), and if an elder rejects Christ, they have no wisdom at all! The kind of elders to seek are Titus 2:1-15, men and women who are humble, pure, loving, self disciplined, and love The Lord Jesus. Amen.
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