Knowing the Father

Knowing Our Father

The little boy was all excited as he came home from Sunday School. He told his Dad, “I know what God’s name is.” Thinking they had studied some obscure Old Testament Hebrew passage in the child’s third grade class, Dad asked, “Well, what is God’s name?”

The boy answered, “Howard.”

“Howard?” asked Dad.

“Yes, Howard.”

“Where did you learn that?”

“Jesus said it in His prayer, ‘Our Father, which art in heaven, Howard be thy name’…”

Well, I’m afraid some of us know about as much or as little about our “Heavenly Father” as this little boy. Another child was just as excited with his discovery of God’s name. He said God’s name was “Andy”. Why? Remember the song, “Andy walks with me, Andy talks with me, Andy tells me I am His own… and the joy we share as we tarry there, none other has ever known.”

A Christian classic Knowing God by J. I. Packer, is an extensive treatise on God. Every aspect of His being is explored. I wonder, do we really know our Father?

The Westminster Shorter Catechism answers the question, “What is God?” as follows: “God is a Spirit, infinite, eternal, and unchangeable in His being, wisdom, power, holiness, justice, goodness, and truth.” Charles Hodge described this statement as “probably the best definition of God ever penned by man.”

When the Bible tells us that God made man in His own image (Gen. 1:26–27) it means that God made man a free spiritual being, a responsible moral agent with powers of choice and action. God made man able to commune with Him and respond to Him, and by nature He made him good, truthful, holy, upright (Eccles. 7:29): in a word, godly.

Where have we gone wrong?

The moral qualities which belonged to that divine image were lost at the Fall of man in the Garden of Eden. God’s image in man has been universally corrupted. All of humankind has in one way or another lapsed into ungodliness. But the Bible tells us that now, in fulfillment of His plan of redemption, God is at work in Christian believers to repair His ruined image by communicating these qualities to them afresh. This is what Scripture means when it says that Christians are being renewed in the image of Christ (2 Cor. 3:18) and of God (Col. 3:10).

Dad, if you know Jesus Christ as your personal Savior and Lord, is the image of God being restored in your life? Dad, do you really know you Heavenly Father? Are you a spiritual person? Do you make the right moral decisions? Do you commune with your Father and respond to Him in a positive manner? Are you good, truthful, holy and upright? Do your children look at you and see the definition of “godliness”?

Do your children know their earthly Father? What kind of image are you giving them of the Heavenly Father? What secrets are you keeping from your family? Do you think God doesn’t know about those secrets?

Psychologists and Psychiatrists tell us that children form their beliefs and image of God the Father from their earthly Father. That is a sobering thought for me as a Father of four.

I have found this to be too true. As a pastor for over thirty years, I have counseled with many many people who have a completely tainted image of the Heavenly Father because of the failures of their earthly Father.

Men, Dad, do you know the Father? Do you really know Him? Do you imitate Him in your character and your actions? What greater compliment could be given to a Father than that his children would see Jesus in him.

Through the power of the Holy Spirit who indwells the born again believer in Jesus Christ, the earthly Father can emulate the Heavenly Father by yielding to the moment by moment control of the Holy Spirit. As a Dad, that is my daily goal, to be continually controlled by the Spirit of God.

If you do not know the Heavenly Father, I beg of you not only for your own sake but for the sake of your children and grandchildren, to get to know Him. Your godly influence can have a positive effect on many generations to come. The memories your family will have of you can be wonderful.