Fathers’ Day 2022
By Matt Watson
“Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ, who gave himself for our sins to deliver us from the present evil age, according to the will of our God and Father, to whom be the glory forever and ever. Amen.” -Galatians 1:3-5
God The Father
Not that long ago I wrote an article on the gospel in fatherhood where I explain my struggle to relate to God as a Father but also express how I’m growing in seeing him like that, rather than just a king, through the experience of having a son and striving to make him a disciple of Jesus. I’m a firm believer in lifelong cultivation, meaning there is always something more to learn and grow in. Gardening, home repairs, parenting, music, and repentance all have that in common: they are lifelong pursuits where there is always room to go further up and further in. So, God is still teaching me, and will keep teaching me, how to be a dad and thus how to relate to him as my dad.
The world has some messed-up concepts about dads. It sees them as patriarchal dangers, and thus they try to demean the order of creation instituted by God by saying that being a man is toxic, men shouldn't be men, a child can have two dads as a married couple, men can have babies, and parents can transition genders based on the truth they express.
However, we Christians also can have messed up concepts about what it means to be a father, because of how our own fathers raised us (or not). My biological dad was abused as a child, which wounded him and led to him having had 10 wives and many affairs. My mom was number four. My stepdad was physically abused as a child, and that has wounded him with anger and insecurity. What happened to my dads impacted how they related with their dads, and then how my dads related to me, even though in ways they didn’t intend. This impacted how I relate to God. I still often wonder “Is God angry with me? Is he going to yell at me? Is he going to run out on me and abandon me? Is he going to be emotionally manipulative with me?”
Father Figure
I want to see God like the dad in the Disney movie Brave, this big Scottish king named Fergus who delights in and is tender with his wife and children, but also very ready to hunt and kill bears. Instead, sometimes I see him as the villain Mor'du, the big, evil, possessed, demon-bear that is just bent on destruction and killing. Likewise, I want to be like King Fergus to my son Sam, but my biggest fear is that I will be more like the demon-bear.
The statistics say that my wife and I won't last in our marriage because we come from divorced families. The stats also say the abused often (but not always) becomes the abuser. Yet, praise God, I’ve seen the effects of generational sin lessened and lessened over time in my family by the grace of my heavenly Father through the justifying death of his Son, and the ongoing equipping and ministry of the Holy Spirit which sanctifies sinners. I had it much better than my dads did, for one thing, because they both tried their best to not repeat the cycle. They sometimes failed because of a lack of gospel discipleship combined with deep wounding.
For another thing, God is equipping me and making me a disciple by his Word. It reminds me that “God gave us a spirit not of fear but of power and love and self-control” (2 Tim 1:7). I do not have to lose self-control and vent my full frustration (Prov 29:11). I do not have to be weak and insecure, because I have been given a spirit of power. And I do not have to keep records of wrong, insist on my own way, because I have the spirit of love.
What’s more, no matter my experience with my fathers on earth, or their experiences, our Father in heaven is far different. In Galatians 1:3-5 we read that God is “our Father,” that is, he is the church’s Father. Everyone in the church, everyone who has faith in God, he is their Father. Additionally, as a Father, he gives grace and peace, but also he gives God the Son himself “for our sins to deliver us from the present evil age.” This was God the Father’s will, that he gave his only Son that we may be justified and in turn, made into sons and daughters (John 3:16; Rom 3:26, 4:5; Eph 1:5).
Heavenly Father
This is a great and wonderful Father, to do all these things for a sinner such as I. He is also good in giving me two dads who loved me, albeit imperfectly, but in so doing showed me the truer love of God. He is good to give me a son, and hopefully, other children, to teach me and make me more of a disciple. My love for Sam is but a small grain of sand to the coastline long beach that is God’s love for me and Sam. As I delight in my son, I am reminded of how God delights in his sons and daughters. As I love spending time with Sam, holding him, making him giggle, and as I look forward to all the things I want to do with him as he grows older, so too does God enjoy spending time with his children, making them laugh, giving them joy, and the like. Lastly, as I want what is best for my son, a life of growth, maturity, and discipleship, as free as possible from the woes of the world, I know God wants the best for each of us and proves that by giving us his own Son.
That is my continued hope and prayer for myself and others this Father's Day. Whether a new father or one that has been at it with his hand to the plow for many years, may we fathers strive to know and love Jesus, that we will raise our children to know and love Jesus. For mothers and single men and women, I pray that we see the superior goodness of God the Father regardless of the goodness of our earthly fathers. Let us all take Father’s Day Sunday as a day to worship our one true Father in heaven, and pray that he makes us more like him.