"WE MAY FREELY APPROACH OUR FATHER IN HEAVEN ."

120. Q. Why has Christ commanded us to address God as Our Father?
A. To awaken in us at the very beginning of our prayer that childlike reverence and trust toward God which should be basic to our prayer: God has become our Father through Christ and will much less deny us what we ask of Him in faith than our fathers would refuse us earthly things.[1] [1] Matt. 7:9-11; Luke 11:11-13. 121. Q. Why is there added, Who art in heaven? A. These words teach us not to think of God's heavenly majesty in an earthly manner,[1] and to expect from His almighty power all things we need for body and soul.[2]
[1] Jer. 23:23, 24; Acts 17:24, 25. [2] Matt. 6:25-34; Rom. 8:31, 32.

Scripture Reading:
Hosea 11:1-9
Matthew 6:5-15

Singing:  (Psalms and Hymns are from the "Book of Praise" Anglo Genevan Psalter)
Psalm 42:1,5
Psalm 43:3,4
Psalm 103:4,5
Hymn 8:2,3,14
Psalm 68:3 &  Hymn 47:1,10

Beloved Congregation of the Lord Jesus Christ!

We are allowed to pray, to speak to God. More, we must pray. Lord’s Day 45: prayer is necessary for Christians, indeed, God will give His grace and the Holy Spirit only to those who ask Him….

But: prayer can be so difficult. The Lord tells us that He is God, so holy that the angels Isaiah saw covered their faces with their wings in His presence. God, the almighty who spoke and this world came to be, and who still upholds it by His counsel and providence. Over against Him we are but dust, sinful, unworthy…. He’s too great for us, so far off…. That makes speaking to God awkward, difficult….

It’s precisely this point, brothers and sisters, that the Lord Jesus Christ addressed in His opening instruction about prayer. In the face of the distance sinners feel between themselves and God, the Lord Jesus told His people to address God as Father. With this title the Lord reassures us that God is approachable.

I summarize the sermon with this theme:

In our society today we have different distances between ourselves and persons in authority over us, and we express those different distances by the titles we give particular people. The judge in court is addressed as "Your Worship", and we dare not be disrespectful in his presence. We dress up in the best we have, speak only in answer to questions asked, and always reply with "Yes, your worship" or "No, your worship". It’s clear to us: there is distance between us and the judge.

The policeman who stops us on the road, or even the teacher at school, evokes in us a somewhat different response. We may call him "Sir", a title that also suggests distance, but we’ll not be quite so formal and stiff in our replies to the policeman or the teacher than we would be to the judge.

A family friend is closer to us. That closeness may receive expression in children calling him "Uncle" – whether he’s related or not. You go camping together, eat marshmallows at the campfire, talk about anything and everything, relax together. "Uncle": the term reflects familiarity, a relaxed atmosphere, even while you retain a measure of respect.

The closest relation we have with another in authority is caught in the word ‘father’. Many strangers can be "your worship" or "sir", and various family friends can be "Uncle", but there’s only one man in the world that you call "Father", "Dad". He’s the one who may tuck you in at night, the one who cuddles you, listens to you, comforts you. "Dad": the term describes closeness, describes love, care, interest.

Jesus gave His disciples instruction about prayer. How ought sinners to address God? Should they use a term that reflects distance, a term like "Your worship"? Or a bit less distance and call God "Sir"? Or "Uncle"? None of that. "Father," said Jesus, "Father": that’s what you need to call God. That title you use day by day for that one person closest to you, the person you can work with and laugh with, the person who guides you and in whom you can confide: the title you use for that person is the term you need to use when you speak to God! "Father".

"Father." We all have particular thoughts about ‘fathers’, thoughts based largely on our experiences with our own fathers. Some of us have a father who is (or was) very approachable, very interested in us, very caring. Others of us have (or had) a father who was distant, remote, uninterested in us. When Jesus instructs us to address God as ‘Father’, would He have us load the term with the baggage of our youth? Was Jesus thinking of His own relation with His earthly father Joseph? Were James and John to think of their relation with Zebedee?

Thankfully, the answer is No. For our fathers, just like Jesus’ father Joseph, are sinful men who need the blood of the Savior so very much for the forgiveness of their sins. The Lord Jesus does not instruct us to see God as a Father in the image of our earthly fathers. Thankfully not!

What then? Jesus, brothers and sisters, tells the disciples to address God as "Father", and loads the word "Father" with God’s revelation in the Old Testament. It’s to that revelation we need to turn if we are to appreciate the gospel of Jesus’ instruction to call God ‘Father’.

We need to turn first to Ex 4. When His people groaned under their bondage in Egypt, the Lord instructed Moses to go to Pharaoh and say: "Thus says the Lord: ‘Israel is My son, My firstborn. So I say to you, let My son go that he may serve Me’" (Ex 4:22f). Notice: if Israel is God’s son, God is obviously Israel’s Father. By sending Moses to Pharaoh, the Lord shows something of His feelings, His care for that nation of slaves. The depth of His feelings for His son Israel comes out in the next words Moses must speak: "if you refuse to let [My son] go, indeed I will kill your son, your firstborn" (vs 23). Clearly, here’s some depth of feeling for Israel!

In the course of the years that followed, the Lord God demonstrated more of His feelings for Israel. He brought that nation of slaves out of Egypt, fed them in the desert, led them to Mt Sinai, established His covenant of grace with this people, and so on. When Israel stood at the borders of the Promised Land, Moses taught God’s people a song. Dt 32: God "is the Rock, His work is perfect" (vs 4). But the people? "They have corrupted themselves; They are not His children, Because of their blemish; A perverse and crooked generation" (vs 5). The reference, of course, is to their sins in the desert, their complaining about the food, their harlotry with the Moabites, etc. Then Moses asks this question: "Do you thus deal with the Lord, O foolish and unwise people? Is He not your Father, who bought you? Has He not made you and established you?" (vs 6). "Is He not your Father," says Moses, and then goes on in the following verses to explain what kind of a Father the Lord has been for Israel. Vs 10: "He found [Israel] in a desert land, And in the wasteland, a howling wilderness; He encircled him, He instructed him, He kept him as the apple of His eye." It’s the language of protection, of care, of interest, of love! The manna and the water, the protection from the Amalekites and from Balaam, the covenant God made and the gospel of the tabernacle in their midst: those 40 years in the wilderness spoke of love, of compassion, of care, of interest – despite Israel’s persistent rebellions! And that, says Moses, is what God’s Fatherhood is all about! "Father": the point is not: what does my child deserve; the point is rather: what does my child need?

So, when David so many years later prayed the words of Ps 103, he felt free to compare God to a father. He was familiar with the material of Ex 4 and Dt 32, knew that Israel was God’s son and God was Israel’s Father, and so He could sing those glorious words of God’s merciful fatherliness.

Was David wrong to compare God to a father? Was it wrong to picture God as a father who has pity on his wounded and disobedient son? Not at all; this was precisely the picture Moses drew in Dt 32. A father gives his toddler strict instructions not to play in the mud with his Sunday shoes. But the child does anyway, falls in the puddle, and comes wailing to the house. Who of us, brothers, will then act like a stern judge or a callous policeman? Will our heart not be touched with compassion so that we comfort little Johnny and clean up his nose? Then there may be need for words of admonition, but they shall come in a context of fatherly love. So, says David, is the Lord God! "As a father pities his children, So the Lord pities those who fear Him."

In the years that followed David, the people of Israel stumbled from one bad king to the next, gave themselves from one transgression against God to the next. According to the promises of His covenant, the Lord was about to send the Assyrians to destroy Samaria. In that context the Lord sent the prophet Hosea to speak to His people. Says God to stubborn Israel in Hosea 11: "When Israel was a child, I loved him, And out of Egypt I called My son" (vs 1). We recognize the reference; that’s the Exodus. God continues: "They sacrificed to the Baals, And burned incense to carved images" (vs 2). Here the Lord describes Israel’s apostasy in the desert, in the days of the Judges and the Kings; God’s own people turned from God to serve idols. How God feels about that? Hurt, so deeply hurt! Why? Vs 3: "I taught Ephraim to walk, Taking them by their arms; But they did not know that I healed them." Here God pictures Himself as doing what every father in our midst has done; letting our little boy, little girl hold our fingers and teaching our little darling to walk – step, step, step. Though Israel didn’t deserve it, though Israel was an obstinate child from the beginning, the Lord stayed with His covenant, and so –vs 4- "I drew them with gentle cords, With bands of love, And I was to them as those who take the yoke from their neck. I stooped and fed them."

Do you see, brothers and sisters, something of what it means that God is Father? Look at the gentleness, look at the care, look at the compassion God displayed for His child! That care comes out also in the discipline God administers to Israel. Vs 5ff: "He shall not return to the land of Egypt; But the Assyrian shall be his king, Because they refused to repent. And the sword shall slash in his cities, Devour his districts, And consume them, Because of their own counsels." Yet the Lord has no pleasure at all in needing to discipline His people. Look at the fatherly emotion described in vs 8:

"My heart churns within Me, My sympathy is stirred": see there, beloved, something of the depth of God’s feelings as a father! Who can read this and not be touched by God’s tender feelings toward His son Israel? The passage is so plain: that something is wrong with His children, that there is disobedience or pain or affliction with His children, touches God to the pit of His stomach!

One more text: according to the prophet Isaiah, the people of Israel in exile would take precisely this message to heart. Is 64: "But now, O Lord, You are our Father; We are the clay, and You are our potter; And all we are the work of Your hand. Do not be furious, O Lord, Nor remember iniquity forever; Indeed, please look – we all are Your people!" (vss 8f). "We are the clay, and You are our potter": the imagery is that of distance, creature vs Creator. Yet the prophet describes Israel-in-exile as confessing that God is "Father" –and Ex 4, Dt 32, Hos 11 have shown what compassion is caught in the word ‘Father’- and so pleading with God to forgive and restore them – to be Father!

This is the material, brothers and sisters, which Jesus lays before the disciples in Mt 6. We read a number of verses from that chapter, and it will have struck you how often Jesus refers to God as "Father". What this Father is like? 6:3f: when you do a charitable deed, do it in secret, don’t announce it, "and your Father who sees in secret will Himself reward you openly." Point? He sees you all the time, even in secret; such is His care. And He is so gracious as to reward you, and will even do so openly. So too with prayer. Vs 6: close the door of your room and pray in secret. God is so interested in you that He hears you even then – for He’s Father. Nor do you have to use some sort of mantra you keep repeating to get His attention (vs 7). He’s Father, and so knows your needs even before you ask. Instead, go straight to Him –He’s interested, compassionate, has heart-felt feelings for you- and address Him as "Father" and ask Him whatever you need. He’ll even forgive you –for He’s a Father to the core of His being- He’ll forgive you if you forgive sinners around you (vss 14f).

How should sinners speak to God? Should they emphasize His holiness and majesty, and so feel great distance between themselves and God – such distance that they scarcely dare to tell God their needs and ask for this or that? Should they imagine God as a Judge and so address Him as "Your worship"? Should they imagine God as a policeman, and so address Him as "Sir"? Jesus’ instruction is emphatic: No! The disciples should remember the covenant God established with them in their childhood, how God promised to be Father for them. The disciples should remember what the Lord God had revealed in the Old Testament about His being a Father, how God involved Himself emotionally with His people, how He felt for them, how He was interested in them, cared for them, loved them. And that knowledge from the Old Testament should give the disciples courage to pray; they were to know that God was even more approachable than one’s earthly Father!

We come to ours second point:

Given the rich content of the title Father, the question comes back to us with greater urgency: on what grounds may we use this title when we address God? God is in heaven; must there not be distance in the way we address Him?

Congregation, the reason why we are to address God as "Father" –and then have in mind all the rich data of Old Testament chapters as Ex 4, Dt 32, Ps 103, Hos 11, Is 64- is because Jesus told us to! Mt 6: "In this manner, therefore, pray: ‘Our Father in heaven….’" If Jesus told us to address God as "Father", we dare not do otherwise!

As to why Jesus told us to address God as "Father", there are two comments we need to make. In the first place, Jesus is our Chief Prophet and Teacher, who has fully revealed to us the secret counsel and will of God (Lord’s Day 12). That is: if Jesus tells us to address God with the word we use only with the closest man in our life, then it’s obviously the will of holy God Himself that we sinners see Him as Father, see Him as close to us as a father, as approachable.

In the second place, God Himself sent His Son to earth for the specific reason of paying for our sins. Christ accomplished His mission, and so obtained reconciliation for sinners with God. Reconciliation: that means there is peace with God, harmony. What does a relation of peace look like? A father-child relation depicts that peace as good as any other relationship we might find on earth. What’s between a father and his toddler? I know: in the brokenness of life there are strained relations even at that age. But, thankfully, that’s not common. Even in unbelieving homes the relation of a father to his toddler is one of love and care, and the relation of a toddler to his father one of trust and dependence. In a moment of need and danger, the youngster cries out for his Dad (it’s an expression of trust and dependence), and his Dad is there is a flash – an expression of love and care. Christ has paid for sin, and so restored us to God. The reconciliation Christ obtained, that harmony and peace, has color to it, and a father-child relation describes that color well – says God. That is why He is pleased to call sinners His children, and commands sinful covenant children to call Him Father.

So it’s clear, beloved, that behind the word ‘Father’ lies the whole gospel of Jesus’ work on the cross! Indeed, when we take the word ‘Father’ on our lips, we are confessing His work! He can be Father only for Jesus’ sake, He will hear our prayer only for Jesus’ sake, He is eager to hear us only for Jesus’ sake, He is compassionate to us only for Jesus’ sake. Father: the word has the whole gospel of salvation tied up within it!

That leaves yet our last point:

What, brothers and sisters, does all this mean for our prayers? The first obvious implication is that the Lord would have us speak to Him as readily as we would speak to an earthly father. Yes, God is in heaven and we are on earth, and Yes, God is holy and we are sinful. But the Lord God does not want that reality to hinder our speaking to Him; He gave His Son to pay for sin, to overcome the distance, so that the relation of Paradise –where God and man spoke together freely- might be restored. Here our conviction that Christ triumphed on Calvary needs to translate into concrete action, the activity of speaking readily and freely to God as a child to his father, telling Him our circumstances, asking Him for our needs.

To be clear: this does not mean that God becomes a friend, a buddy, with whom we can engage in social banter. We are to feel free to speak to Him freely, readily, indeed. But the honor and respect that belongs to His being Father must most certainly affect the manner of our talk to God. He is Father "in heaven", and so we need to combine a freedom to speak to Him with speaking to Him respectfully. God is our Father, and our Father is God!

The second implication flowing from the title ‘Father’ is that we should dare to ask Him for all we need. There is no topic, no need, in which He’s not interested. As children grow up there may be topics they’d rather not discuss with their parents, for whatever embarrassing or not so embarrassing reason. But the Lord God is a Father of deep compassion, His heart goes out to His children in whatever need they may find themselves, and so He wants to hear from us on any topic that concerns us.

There’s a third encouragement here. Exactly because He’s Father as described in Ex 4, Dt 32, Ps 103, Hos 11, He most certainly will supply the needs of His children. I refer here to Jesus’ words in Mt 7:

That’s your Father in heaven, beloved: He will give you what you need far, far more thoroughly than your own father ever could! Romans 8: "If God is for us, who can be against us? He who did not spare His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all, how shall He not with Him also freely give us all things?" (vss 31f).

See there the glories of the gospel, beloved! Whatever you need, speak to your Father in heaven about it, and He will certainly hear and give you what He in wisdom knows you need.

Hesitate to pray? God too holy, too remote, too busy to approach? We too sinful, too earthly to speak to God? No, beloved, No! Jesus Christ has triumphed on the cross so that we might be children of God once more and God be our Father. And since He’s our Father, we may speak to Him freely, openly, repeatedly, and ask Him for all we need. Father: He’s approachable. Amen.