The Father’s Heart

by Col. Gary Nelson (ret), my wonderful earthly father!

 A few years ago, I was planning a Sunday school lesson on The Father’s Heart.  While I was driving home one day in rush hour traffic, thinking about the subject, suddenly a heavy burden came over me and a deep sobbing came up from within my chest.  I felt like my chest would burst if I didn’t let it out, yet I knew if I did I would have to pull over to the side of the road and stop and just sob.  After a while the burden lifted a little and I was able to stay on the road.  I inquired of the Lord what had happened to me, and the Heavenly Father seemed to be saying:  “I have given you just a little taste of My heart for this younger generation”.  I can tell you that it is a broken heart.

Supreme Example of Fatherhood

Ephesians 3:4, which says: “For this reason I bow my knee before The Father, from whom His whole family, derives its name.”  This scripture basically states that all fatherhood comes from the heavenly Father.  His character is that of a father.  He is the supreme example of Fatherhood. 

Luke 15:11 begins the well-known story of the prodigal son. This young man took his inheritance and squandered it in wild living. When he was destitute, he returned to his father.  But let me draw your attention to the father in this story, who represents the Father’s heart.  The father was waiting and watching for his son’s return. Finally, the father sees his son a great way off. Immediately he ran to meet him and lovingly welcomed him home.  He said:  “My son was dead and is alive again.  He was lost and is found.”  He then has a great dinner party to celebrate his son’s return.  This story is a great example of our heavenly Father’s love for us and the covenant relationship we have with Him.

 Psalm 68:5 says: “A Father to the fatherless, a defender of the widow, is God in His holy dwelling.”  He is a Father to the fatherless.

We all need a Father. Because of that, People can be deeply hurt by the rejection or absenteeism of their earthly fathers.  As we look to our heavenly Father, He is able to heal all those hurts and become a Father to the fatherless.  Our response to Him is to do the things that please Him.

Several years ago, my son David was on spring break from West Point, and we were skiing together in Colorado.  The last day of the trip, I woke up very sick.  I told David to ski by himself for a while, then come back to the condo and check on me.  As I lay in bed I asked God to let me ski this last day with my son.  When David came back I was feeling good enough to go out.  We took the lift to the top of the mountain and by the time we got to the top I was feeling fine.  As we stood admiring the wonderful view of God’s creation, I said to God, “Lord thank you for letting me spend this time with my son”.  He immediately responded to me; “That is just how I feel about spending time with you.”

 We all have a Father, a Heavenly Father, that is crying out to us “Come unto Me, My children”.  His Father’s heart yearns to spend time with us.

The Way To The Father

Recently, at a well-known Bible College, a seminary professor was surprised that so many of his students were having trouble conceptualizing God the Father.  It was obvious from their papers and sermons that they did not fully comprehend the teaching on the character of the Father. They did not understand His Father’s heart. Then he hit on an idea.

 So, He asked them to draw a picture of God the Father.  He was shocked!  Some drew a tyrant on his throne, with a giant club, waiting to lower the boom on His servants.  Others drew a wishy-washy man, with a confused, perplexed face, unable to make a decision.  While others drew an empty throne.  Only a few showed God the Father with open, outstretched arms and eyes of mercy and compassion, seeking to bless His children. 

 The students all had the same teaching on the Character of the Father. So, what was the difference?  As he interviewed them, he discovered that, despite the teaching, they were unable to overcome the reality of the dysfunctional homes in which they grew up.  They were unable to understand God as a Father.  They could not find the way to the Father.

In John 14:6 Jesus says:  “I am the Way, the Truth and the Life”.  If someone was coming over to your house you might ask him or her, “do you know the way”?  Jesus is saying that He is the Way, the path, the road, to the Father.  Jesus goes on to say:  “No one comes to the Father except through Me.  If you had known Me you would have known my Father also; and from now on you know Him and have seen Him”.

Our Heavenly Home

In addition to bringing redemption from sin; Jesus came to show us the way to the Father. Every way or path has a destination.  Our destination is the Father.  Our ultimate purpose is to become members of His family.    When we realize this, then we can grasp the fact that our home is really in heaven, with our Father, The Father.   When this revelation begins to sink in, we will have a longing to go home; to the loving arms of our heavenly Father. We will long to know the Father’s heart.

 In the book of John chapters 14 through 17, Jesus repeatedly talks about or to the Father.  Jesus is introducing His disciples to the Father. 

Ask The Father

 A few years ago, as I was teaching on God as a Father and used John 16:23 as a reference.  In this Scripture Jesus says:  “And in that day you will ask Me nothing.  Most assuredly, I say to you, whatever you ask the Father in My name He will give you; for the Father Himself loves you”.   A lady, (I’ll call her Darla) was in the class and this scripture blew her away.  She always prayed to Jesus, her Savior, her Redeemer, her soon coming Bridegroom.  Now Jesus was telling her to pray to the Father, ask the Father.  She had grown up in a fatherless home.  In her experience fathers were unreliable, uncaring, mean, liars, absent and not at all interested in her. 

 Darla knew that God was telling her to put aside her old stereotype of a father and to look to Him as the Father she never had, that she had always wanted.  As she began to relate to God as her Father she began to experience the love of God as she never had before.  Gradually she came to know a Father who loved her, embraced her, she could trust, was always there, and who never changed. 

 No one can say truthfully that they don’t have a father.  God is a Father to all who will come to Him.  When you pray The Lord’s Prayer, you start with, “Our Father who art in Heaven”.  He is a Father that loves all of His children with an unconditional love.  His love for us is not based on merit, but is based on a covenant relationship with Him through Jesus.  Jesus is the Way to the Father.

The Ever Present One

I was raised on a rural farm in South Dakota where both of my parents were “stay at home parents”.  I had a great relationship with my father.  As I was growing up, I was always with my dad.  He was my role model.  My mother called me his shadow as I was never more than a few feet away from him following close behind him as he worked around the farm yard.  When he was working in the fields my mother would send me out to find him in mid-afternoon sending with me sandwiches and a jar of drinking water.  He and I would sit in the shade of the tractor tires and eat “our lunch” together.  Those times of fellowship were always good, and mother would always include in the lunch bag a couple of pieces of chocolate cake with peanut butter frosting.  I felt that my father would always be there when I needed him.

As I grew older leaving home for an Air Force career he always showed great pride in my accomplishments.  He was always interested in my flying exploits and missions that I was doing and in my growing family.  He looked forward to the times when I went back to South Dakota to spend time with him.  Then, when I was 38 years old, he died.  I suffered the deep loss of a great father who I considered a very close friend.  I was living in Seoul, Korea when news came on the telephone that he had died.  He would no longer be there when I needed him. As I put down the phone and began to grieve and I said to the Lord, “Lord, now I don’t have a father”.  Then I felt a voice in my spirit, the voice of Lord, saying to me very gently, “I am your Father”. 

The scripture Psalm 68:5 has brought me great comfort, it reads:  “A Father to the fatherless, a defender of widows, is God in His holy habitation”.  I often miss my dad, but I have learned to relate now to my heavenly Father.  He is proud of my accomplishments.  He is interested in my career.  He looks forward to the times I spend with Him.  He is “The ever present one” willing to fellowship with us at any time.

My healthy relationship with my earthly father made it easy for me to relate to The Heavenly Father as someone who loved me and could be trusted.  But I know that many people have not had the same experience.

Instead, many people today feel forsaken by their parents and are crying out for a father, someone who loves them, a role model, who is proud of their accomplishments and will take care of them.  Psalm 27:10 says; “Though my father and mother have forsaken me, the Lord will take care of me”,  

For many the lack of a father happens too early in life because of illness, death, neglect or absenteeism.  In my case I had a good earthly father with whom I could relate and be friends; but he died and the time came, as it will in everyone’s life, when that father is gone.  The heavenly Father is always there, to heal the hurts and become a Father to the fatherless. He has a Father’s heart of love!

The heavenly Father’s heart is very big and full of love and compassion for His children.  He will always be there for us. The Heavenly Father wants to sit down with His children, even in the shade of the tractor tires, and fellowship over a piece of chocolate cake with peanut butter frosting.

God Is A Father

God is first of all a Father.  He is the Father of Jesus and a Father to all those who will come to Him.  His role as a Father is the most significant part of His loving nature.  The ultimate revelation of the New Testament is that God is a Father.  Jesus came to show us the Father, saying, “I am the Way, the Truth and the Life, no one comes to the Father but by Me”  (John 14:6).  In John chapters 14 through 17 Jesus is showing His disciples the Father’ nature and character.  Jesus refers to the Father 47 times in those chapters. This was a new concept because in the Old Testament the people of God did not know or relate to God as a Father.  Now Jesus was instructing His disciples to pray to the Father, beginning prayer with “Our Father”. 

In our culture and society today, divorce, abandonment, neglect or absenteeism of fathers in the family has tainted the perception of fatherhood.  This affects how people view God. They do not understand His Father’s heart. If their relationship with their earthly father is damaged or nonexistent, they view God in the same way.  They question whether God is even approachable.

Our Identity

A friend of mine who works as a counselor in the juvenile justice system recently told me that over 80% of young people in this system were raised in a home without a father.  One young man, I’ll call him James, never knew a father.  He was arrested several times on drugs charges and theft.  Now he has become a Christian, and has accepted Jesus as his Savior, but he still has trouble relating to God as a Father.  To him, a father is someone who is absent, uninterested, unapproachable and to be feared.

A very effective tactic of our enemy, the devil, is to distort the character of God so that we will live in constant fear of Him.  Too often, God is viewed as a strong Sovereign on a judgement bench, looking to zap people for any failure in life.  As a result, there is a common misconception that even our best efforts are probably not good enough.

People also view God as an impersonal and remote; a God who is far away, busy with very important things like wars and famines and much too busy to be involved in the everyday details of our meager lives.  Some think praying is like leaving requests on His heavenly answering machine, and God may or may not get to them.  They think we are left on our own to do the best we can and take care of ourselves.  We don’t really know whom we belong to, who we are; causing a real identity crisis.  Because many lack of a good father figure, they carry a traumatic sense of abandonment and have a void our heavenly Father wants to fill.

God created earthly families to reflect the heavenly family, with God as the Father.  He is the ideal Father, perfectly faithful, a generous provider, a patient teacher, a wise and understanding counselor, a loving and forgiving parent, intimate and affectionate; His Father’s heart is totally committed to His family, His Children. As such, earthly families and home should reflect that as much as possible.   None of us are perfect, but no matter our shortcomings, God is able to fix our mistakes and bring healing to our hurts when we approach Him as our Father. 

To call Him our Father we must recognize and accept that Jesus went to the cross, for our sins, to bring us to the Father.  Only through Jesus can we access the Father.  He is the one who sent His beloved Son to die for us; so that we can come into His family, and have intimate fellowship with Him. He saved us from a life of sin so that we may have a relationship with Him. 

Our identity is who we are (children of a heavenly Father) not what we do.  Our Father is also a King, The King of Kings.  That makes us royalty. 1 Peter 2:9a says; “But you are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people belonging to God . . . Once you were not a people but now you are the people of God.”  He has a Father’s heart for us. Knowing this solves any identity crisis and gives us worth!

Unchanging 

On day my oldest daughter said to me: “Dad, you never change!”  She probably meant that my physical appearance hasn’t changed much over the years, but I thought about the heavenly Father as being one who never changes.  I want to reflect that kind of stability for my children; one who never changes, who is always there for them, whose love never changes, who is reliable and stable, faithful, a good provider, intimate and affectionate.  That is the kind of heavenly Father we have!