Shepherd's Lighthouse Church

But as many as received Him, to them He gave the right to become children of God, to those who believe in His name: who were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God. John 1:12-13

What is fatherhood?  It is the state of being a father.

The dictionary defines a father as:

1. One who has begotten a child, whether son or daughter; a generator; a male parent. 

That’s biological.

2. A male ancestor more remote than a parent; a founder of a race or family; -- in the plural, fathers, ancestors. – eg. Abraham – David.

That’s anthropolical.

3. One who, or that which, gives origin; an originator; a producer, author, or contriver; Father Abraham considered the “Father of Faith” as in Heb 11:8.

But only One uniquely qualifies for all three definitions – generator, founder, parent, and producer or originator, is Almighty God – YHVH.

The One True God is our Creator and our protector and our provider.

And He has made us in His own image – That is, He shares His moral attributes with us.

He is Spirit so He can take on any form He wants to but He always describes Himself in the Male gender.

That is why the Scriptures refer to God as “HIM” or “Father.” 

And if I can digress for just a moment …. 

For those who think that God should be addressed as She or It, it is to be understood that God is the Father of both man and woman so both are in Him. 

But as the uncaused cause God is the initiator of all that exists and as such represents the male attribute presented in Adam.

God declared that in the family unit the father is to be the head and the mother is to be responsive to the love of her husband.

Col 3:18 says, “Wives, submit to your own husbands, as is fitting in the Lord.”

And Col 3:19 says, “Husbands, love your wives and do not be bitter toward them.”

But the gender confusion of today considers the Biblical position to be archaic and contemptable.

Regardless of human opinion to the contrary, Divine Establishment declares that first came Adam and then came Eve.

And those who challenge God’s protocol do so at their peril.

Jude 1:6 And the angels who did not keep their proper domain, but left their own abode, He has reserved in everlasting chains under darkness for the judgment of the great day;

This gender thing is not about favoritism but about order.

In Exodus 6:3 God told Moses, "I appeared to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob, as God Almighty, but by My name LORD [yehovah] I was not known to them. 

God revealed Himself to mankind as El Shadai  (God Almighty),  but to those who walk before Him in covenant relationship, He reveals Himself as The faithful Father. 

In Exodus 34:6.  God describes Himself as Compassion, Kindness, Patience, Goodness, and Faithfulness. 

He is Yahovah, a term that equates to Father and Son in One.

To reiterate:

Since God made man in His image, and since 1Tim 2:13 tells us that Adam was first formed, then Eve, it follows that man should precede woman in Divine protocol.

For this reason God has decreed that the husband be the head of the family.

His position as leader in the family unit has nothing to do with superiority – it is only because Adam preceded Eve.

I find an interesting correlation with this in God’s choice of Israel to be first among the nations to reveal God as Creator and through Jesus, as Father.

It was a great privilege for Israel to be granted such a position in His plan; and it is a great privilege that man be called to leadership in the family unit.

But with great privilege come great responsibility.

Since it is preferred that a man be a husband before he becomes a father, we will look at God’s Word concerning the husband.

In Gen 2:23-24 when Adam saw Eve he said, This is now bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh: she shall be called Woman, because she was taken out of Man.  Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave unto his wife: and they shall be one flesh.

This was the beginning of Divine establishment regarding the family.

Eph 5:25   Husbands, love your wives, even as Christ also loved the church, and gave himself for her;

Eph 5:28-29 “….So husbands ought to love their own wives as their own bodies; he who loves his wife loves himself.  For no one ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it, just as the Lord does the church.”

Eph 5:33 ….  Nevertheless let every one of you in particular so love his wife even as himself; and let the wife see that she respects her husband.

1 Pet 3:7 …. Husbands, likewise, dwell with them with understanding, giving honor to the wife, as to the weaker vessel, and as being heirs together of the grace of life, that your prayers may not be hindered.

Eph 6:4  …. And you, fathers, do not provoke your children to wrath, but bring them up in the training and admonition of the Lord. 

It is by emulating our Father God that we men, as husbands and fathers fulfill our responsibility to our wives and our children.

God has not only given us instruction but has revealed to us His own character as a husband to Israel and as our Heavenly Father.

Consider Ezek 16:7-8 …. "I made you thrive like a plant in the field; and you grew, matured, and became very beautiful. Your breasts were formed, your hair grew, but you were naked and bare. "When I passed by you again and looked upon you, indeed your time was the time of love; so I spread My wing over you and covered your nakedness. Yes, I swore an oath to you and entered into a covenant with you, and you became Mine," says the Lord GOD.

God took Israel as a wife and remained faithful to her even though there was nothing special about her.

He provided for Israel and forgave her rebellion over and over again because He had entered into covenant relationship with her.

God has proven Himself as the consummate husband – leading Israel in love and blessing her in spite of her short comings.

As for fatherhood, He has told us in Jer 31:3 … The LORD has appeared of old to me, saying: "Yes, I have loved you with an everlasting love; Therefore with lovingkindness I have drawn you.

Our Lord God is the perfect model of both husband and father.

Yes, He has given us instruction and left us examples to follow – but more than that, He has given us His Holy Spirit that enables us to be the husbands and fathers that He wants us to be.

Phil 2:13 assures us …. it is God who works in you both to will and to do for His good pleasure.

Israel was to evangelize the nations and be the vehicle for the Messianic line.

But instead they put God in a box and played the harlot with their pagan neighbors.

God wants husbands and fathers to emulate His holy character as in the parable of the good shepherd in Luke 15:4-7; "What man of you, having a hundred sheep, if he loses one of them,  does not leave the ninety-nine in the wilderness, and go after the one which is lost until he finds it?

"And when he has found it, he lays it on his shoulders, rejoicing. "And when he comes home, he calls together his friends and neighbors, saying to them, 'Rejoice with me, for I have found my sheep which was lost!' "I say to you that likewise there will be more joy in heaven over one sinner who repents than over ninety-nine just persons who need no repentance.

This parable reveals a God who is every bit as concerned for one lost sheep as for 99. 

This is not a God of the majority

While human wisdom sees value in the many, God fixes His attention on the individual. 

He is not a democratic God, He is much too righteous to sacrifice goodness and truth to satisfy the appetites and agendas of the majority.

God is not a respecter of persons.  He is impartial. 

He cannot be influenced by either the most or the loudest. 

He looks beyond the externals to see what is inside. 

Isaiah 53:6 says, “All we like sheep have gone astray; We have turned, every one, to his own way..”

And why had they been so lost? Jer 50:6 says,  "My people have been lost sheep. Their shepherds have led them astray; They have turned them away on the mountains. They have gone from mountain to hill (another way of saying that the doctrines of God have been replaced by the traditions of men);They have forgotten their resting place.

He says in Joel 2:12-13,  "…Turn to Me with all your heart, …. So rend your heart, and not your garments;  Return to the LORD your God, For He is gracious and merciful, Slow to anger, and of great kindness; And He relents from doing harm.”

All the religions of the world worship gods that man must work to build a bridge to. 

But the One True God, the Father, came into the world that man might know Him and be saved.

He relentlessly seeks out the lost even when circumstances or forces that are hostile to Him draw them away. 

Two thousand years ago, a Pharisee named Hillel wrote a letter to the Sanhedrin after he heard the apostle Peter speak on the fatherhood of God. 

He wrote:

“I am going to make a most thorough examination into these things to see if they are so - if God has provided an easier and a better way to save the souls of men than the Jewish economy.  I feel that the subject is worth looking into; for of long time it has seemed to me (and my father saw and spoke of the same) that the ways of God’s service were exacting, and apt to make men become indifferent,  and almost to look on God as a haughty tyrant; while Peter’s illustration shows Him in such a lovely light it makes me love Him.”

Isaiah 49:15 says, "Can a woman forget her nursing child, And not have compassion on the son of her womb? Surely they may forget, Yet I will not forget you.”

And Psalm 27:10 says, “…When my father and my mother forsake me, Then the LORD will take care of me.”

Consider the difference  -  the pagan gods use man to their own ends and entice him to themselves like mythical sirens promising pleasures and rewards. 

But God the Father chose to come and tabernacle among us thereby showing that His desire is not to control us, but to guide us to adoption as sons and daughters. 

The Father sent the Shepherd, in Christ, to find lost sheep and carry them to safety on His own shoulders.

The Gospels reveal that God’s sole effort is to seek and to save the lost. 

To adopt them into the family which He calls ‘the Beloved’.

What a picture these Scriptures paint of our Father God!

This is infinite caring.  This is faithfulness in the extreme. 

For this reason we call Him “Abba”, Father.

 

Amen.