For some, the reference to God as “Father” is a reference to God as “Creator.” Clearly the Bible teaches that God created the heavens and the earth and all that is in them.
But for the Christian, referring to God as “Father” has a completely different meaning. Humanly speaking we know there is a major difference between “fathering” a child and being a “dad” to that child. For the Christian, God is both “Father” and “Dad.”
Jesus provided insight into that unique relationship when He most frequently addressed God as “Abba,” a term used by family members most often translated “Dad” or “Daddy.” It is a personal term, an intimate term, a term indicating knowledge and activity between the one speaking and the one addressed.
Christian believers have such a relationship with God. The Apostle John wrote, “See how great a love the Father has bestowed upon us that we should be called children of God; and such we are” (1 John 3:1).
The Apostle Paul added, “You have received a spirit of adoption as sons by which we cry out, ‘Abba! Father!’” (Rom. 8:15).
This truth guides the church as the celebration of Father’s Day approaches on June 17, 2018. It is not the creative power of fatherhood that is honored. It is the personal, intimate relationship based on knowledge and involvement of a dad in the life of a child — the “Abba” qualities that bond parent and child.
Relating to children
God’s relationship to His children models how a Christian dad is to relate to his children.
Near the top of any list about God’s involvement with His children is the quality of provider. The psalmist quotes God as saying to Israel, “I am the Lord your God who brought you up out of the land of Egypt. Open your mouth wide and I will fill it” (Ps. 81:10).
In Philippians 4:19 the Apostle Paul declares, “My God will supply all your needs according to His riches in glory in Christ Jesus.” Paul wrote out of the confidence of his own experience. He had been cared for in persecution and prosperity, in want and in plenty. While not a promise of earthly wealth, it was a promise of God’s provision no matter one’s situation.
Providing for families
Christian dads follow God’s example in providing for their families. First Timothy 5:8 says, “If anyone does not provide for his own, and especially for those of his household, he has denied the faith and is worse than an unbeliever.” Again, the verse does not promise that every desire will be fulfilled but at least the Christian dad places the needs of the children before his own.
Jesus used the image of the shepherd to illustrate how God guides. Jesus said, the shepherd “calls his own sheep by name and leads them out. … The sheep follow him, for they know his voice” (John 10:3–4). Later He added, “My sheep hear My voice and I know them, and they follow Me” (v. 27).
God guides in every facet of life as one hears and responds to the voice of God. The psalmist wrote that even when the child of God falls “he shall not be hurled headlong because the Lord is the One who holds his hand” (Ps. 37:23–24).
Wisdom also comes from God. Proverbs 2:6 declares, “For the Lord gives wisdom; from His mouth come knowledge and understanding.” Proverbs 1:7 adds the beginning of wisdom is “fear of the Lord.”
The Apostle Paul continued this teaching in 1 Corinthians 1:30 when he wrote Jesus “has become for us wisdom from God.” That wisdom results in “righteousness, holiness and redemption.”
In addition to resulting in the quality of life the Christian believer lives, God’s wisdom also impacts one’s vocation. In Exodus 35:31, Moses talks about God filling people “with the Spirit of God in wisdom, in understanding and in knowledge and in all craftsmanship.”
He goes on to talk about God providing vocational skills such as working with gold and silver, cutting stones, carving wood, engraving, designing and more.
Sometimes we overlook God’s wisdom expressed in the believer’s vocation as well as in the believer’s righteous lifestyle.
An “Abba” kind of relationship also involves discipline. Indulgence is not love, not in an earthly relationship and not in the relationship between God and His children. Jesus said one of the functions of the Holy Spirit is to convict people of sin (John 16:8). Sin is other than the will of God and “all have sinned and come short of the glory of God” (Rom. 3:23).
The Holy Spirit also guides into “all truth” (John 16:13). Guiding into truth and convicting of sin are forms of discipline. But discipline is more. Discipline also is action. In Hebrews 12:6 the writer picks up the words of Proverbs 3:11–12. He urges readers not to “faint when you are reproved by Him for those whom the Lord loves He disciplines.”
God also restores the wayward. God’s discipline is not done in anger. It is like the father who disciplines “the son in whom he delights” (Prov. 3:12). It is always done for constructive results. It is never done destructively.
That is why God is like the father who welcomes the wayward son back into the family as described in Luke 15.
Nehemiah described the waywardness of Israel saying, “They refused to listen and did not remember Your wondrous deeds.” He adds, “But you are a God of forgiveness, gracious and compassionate, slow to anger and abounding in lovingkindness; and You did not forsake them” (Neh. 9:17).
Never should it be overlooked that God acts toward His people with kindness, compassion and care.
Ultimately God’s kindness is demonstrated in Jesus Christ.
Personal relationship
Titus 3:4–6 reads, “But when the kindness of God our Savior and His love for mankind appeared, He saved us, not on the basis of deeds which we have done in righteousness but according to His mercy, by the washing of regeneration and renewing by the Holy Spirit whom He poured out upon us richly through Jesus Christ our Savior.”
God’s love for us was demonstrated through Jesus Christ and we return God’s love through faith in Him. That is why the believer has an Abba-like relationship with his Heavenly Father; why the relationship is personal, intimate and active.
That is the kind of relationship God desires for families and the kind of relationships the Church honors on Father’s Day.
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