Whatever Happened to Respect?

   Comedian Rodney Dangerfield was famous for his “I get no respect” jokes. Here’s one: “I get no respect. There was the time that I went to see a psychiatrist. I told him, ‘Doctor, every morning when I get up and look in the mirror I feel like throwing up. What’s wrong with me? I don’t know, He said, but your eyesight is perfect.’”
   Dangerfield’s joke regarding respect may be light hearted, but in today’s world, respect is a lost virtue.  Nowhere is this more on display than in most of our churches.   
   The American Heritage Collage Dictionary defines “respect” as, “being regarded with honor or esteem.” As Christians, we are to hold God in higher esteem and honor than anyone or anything else in our lives. Revelation 4:11 states, “You are worthy, our Lord and God, to receive glory, honor, and power, because You created all things . . . “ 
   The first, and greatest of the Ten Commandments, (Exodus 20:2-3), is carved by God’ hand on tablets of stone, “I am the Lord thy God, which have brought thee out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage. Thou shalt have no other gods before me.”  Donating to missions, feeding the hungry, housing the homeless, and evangelizing are all good -- but they are all secondary to glorifying God. 
   When I was ...