“What does the Bible say about God the Father?”

May 2012 – Grace & Truth Magazine

QUESTION: What does the Bible say about God the Father?

ANSWER: The Old Testament refers to God a few times as the Father of the nation of Israel (Isa. 63:16; Mal. 1:6). The New Testament goes far beyond this. The Persons of the Godhead are distinctly named and differentiated there in several passages. One vital part of the ministry of the Lord Jesus was to present God the Father as His own Father. Through His death on Calvary and His resurrection He has brought us into this same intimate relationship with God as our Father. By the Holy Spirit we now are privileged to address Him just as our Lord did, as “Abba Father” (Mk. 14:36; Rom. 8:15 NKJV ). Let’s take a closer look at some of these glorious truths.

As a twelve-year-old boy, Jesus stayed behind in Jerusalem after the Feast of the Passover. Joseph and Mary anxiously sought Him for three days. When Mary asked Him why He had stayed behind, He replied, “Why did you seek Me? Did you not know that I must be about My Father’s business?” (Lk. 2:41-50). Being both God and Man, He knew fully who He was and why He was on earth. Later, when He was baptized by John, the heavens were opened, the Spirit of God, in the form of a dove, descended upon Him and a voice from heaven, God the Father, said, “You are My beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased” (Mk. 1:9-11). Shortly thereafter, when He cleansed the temple (Jn. 2:13-21), He told those He drove out, “Do not make My Father’s house a house of merchandise!”

The Lord Jesus taught His followers about the Father. The Sermon on the Mount has many references to the Father, among them are these:

• “Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works and glorify your Father in heaven” (Mt. 5:16).
• “But I say to you, love your enemies ... that you may be sons of your Father in heaven; for He makes His sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the just and on the unjust” (Mt. 5:44-45).
• “You shall be perfect, just as your Father in heaven is perfect” (Mt. 5:48).
• “Pray to your Father who is in the secret place; and your Father who sees in secret will reward you openly” (Mt. 6:6).
• “Your heavenly Father knows that you need all these things” (Mt. 6:32).

No Old Testament believer ever addressed God in prayer as “Our Father in heaven.” But the Lord Jesus taught His disciples to do so (Lk. 11:2).

Although He repeatedly set the Father before His disciples, we find that even after more than three years with Him, they had understood very little. In John 14 after the Lord spoke of going to His Father’s house and of preparing a place there for them (and for us, too), Philip said to Him, “Lord, show us the Father, and it is sufficient for us” (Jn. 14:8). The Lord used this occasion on the last night He was with His disciples to open His heart to them about the Father. John 14-17 shows us many lovely things about that One whom we now call our Father. There is an intimacy in these chapters; the Lord no longer spoke of “your heavenly Father,” but of “My Father” or simply, “the Father.”

After His resurrection Jesus gave Mary Magdalene a wonderful message to carry to the disciples whom He now called “My brethren”: “Go to My brethren and say to them, I am ascending to My Father and your Father, and to My God and your God” (Jn. 20:17). His Father is now also our Father, but He did not say, “Go to our Father,” for His relationship to the Father is that unique relationship of Only-Begotten Son, while we have been elevated to be, “sons of God ... children of God ... heirs of God and joint-heirs with Christ” (Rom. 8:14-17).

In His parables, Jesus occasionally referred to the Father. For example, in Matthew 22:1-14 He referred to “a certain king who arranged a marriage for his son.” In Luke 15:11-32 He told the well-known story of the loving father who welcomed his prodigal son home and whose older son refused to join in the festivities that followed. The vineyard owner in Mark 12:1-11, whose servants were mistreated and whose only son was killed, also depicts the Father for us.

A number of Paul’s epistles begin with “Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ” or a very similar salutation. Ephesians goes on to say, “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ.” It continues by enumerating some of these wonderful spiritual blessings the Father has brought us into (Eph. 1:2-14). Paul prayed to “the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory” in 1:17-23 and to “the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ” in 3:14-21. In 2 Corinthians 1:3 He is called “the Father of mercies and God of all comfort.” Indeed, Paul’s epistles are rich in references to the Father, far too many to mention here.

James refers to “the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation or shadow of turning” (Jas. 1:17). And Peter speaks of believers who were “elect according to the foreknowledge of God the Father,” and of the Father who “according to His abundant mercy has begotten us again to a living hope” (1 Pet. 1:2-3). John in his First Epistle mentions the “manner of love the Father has bestowed on us, that we should be called children of God!” (1 Jn. 3:1). He reminds us too of the wonderful news that “the Father has sent the Son as Savior of the world” (4:14).

Thus we can see that in a close reading of the New Testament we get acquainted with “God our Father” (Eph. 1:2). We rejoice in the intimacy between the Father and the Son: “The Father loves the Son, and shows Him all things that He Himself does ... the Father raises the dead and gives life to them ... the Father ... has committed all judgment to the Son, that all should honor the Son just as they honor the Father” (Jn. 5:20-23). What a glorious Father we have!

Answered by Eugene P. Vedder, Jr.