Definition
God is our Father not only in that he is our Creator but that he is also our Redeemer; this is what distinguishes the Christian’s relationship to God and what allows us to relate to him as Father.
Summary
In the Old Testament, God is the Father of Israel (and Israel is his son) in the context of God forgiving and redeeming Israel. While the Jews of Jesus’s day were hesitant to call God their Father (and angry at Jesus for doing so), Jesus claimed God as his Father and taught his followers to do the same. God is the Father and is also the Son, whom the Father sent to carry out his plan of redemption. What distinguishes the Son from the Father is not the quality of his being, which is just as divine as the Father’s is, but the functioning of their relationship, according to which the Son had come into the world to do the Father’s will. We relate to God as Father, therefore, through Jesus the Son, sharing in his sonship through the adoption we receive through Christ’s redeeming work for us.
Courses
We Believe in God
Learn What We Can Know About God, His Attributes, His Plan, and His Works
Videos
Jen Wilkin on Why It’s Good News That God Is Not like Us
Jen Wilkin talks about the essence of idolatry, the attributes of God, and how Christlikeness hinges on the way Christians view God.
Why Sam Storms Loves Jesus
Sam Storms explains that the Christian’s love for God is grounded in the reality that God himself is preeminently lovable; God’s attributes are perfect.
Articles
When You Don’t Have a Good Dad on Father’s Day
You aren’t fatherless. You are loved.
Is God the Father Like My Father?
For a child of God, it should be pretty great that God is like a dad, right? Not for me.
Why You Should Read J. I. Packer
Meet the man behind the 20th-century Christian classic ‘Knowing God.’
Don’t Waste Your Fathering
God the Father has made himself God our Father through the gospel. Let’s reflect him, Dads.
Podcasts
Book Reviews
God Is Not Like You—And That’s a Good Thing
Our primary problem as Christian women is not that we lack self-worth, not that we lack a sense of significance. It’s that we lack awe.
God Is Impassible and Impassioned
Rob Lister’s ‘God Is Impassible and Impassioned’ is an outstanding primer on this topic.
God with Us
Theology proper should begin with Christology.
The Glory of God
The pages of Scripture are drenched with the story of divine glory.
