Your Heavenly Father is Perfect
Bless and glorify the God of our fathers, who has been a perfect Father to us (Mt 5:48). He is our Father, who is in heaven and whose name is holy (Mt 6:9).
The children of God are the ones who have been given the right to call God their Father (Jn 1:12; 1 Jn 3:1, 10). This right has been granted by God predestining His chosen people to adoption as sons before the foundation of the world (Eph 1:4–5; Rev 13:8; 17:8). This adoption is manifest by one’s receipt of the Holy Spirit (2 Cor 1:21), the Spirit of adoption by which we cry out, “Abba, Father!” (Rom 8:15).
Sonship in the family of God is not earned, it is bestowed, not by one’s autonomous free will choice (a myth), but by God’s free will and gracious choice (Jn 1:12–13; Rom 11:5). Everything changes for the soul who has been sent the Spirit by both the Father and the Son (Jn 14:26; 15:26). The Spirit is the gift of God granted to the elect, redeemed who the Spirit causes to be born again of God (Acts 2:38; 10:45; 1 Pet 1:3).
Being born again of the Spirit is new life for the elect soul (Jn 6:63), who has been baptized by the Spirit (Mt 3:11) and baptized into Christ’s church (1 Cor 12:13). This is the manifestation of one’s true identity. Prior to conversion, the sinner is considered a child of wrath, by nature, controlled by the spirit working in all the sons of disobedience (Eph 2:2–3). It is the Spirit of God who teaches Christ’s church the Word of God (Jn 14:26), producing a transformation the Bible labels “sanctification.”
Sanctification is the exclusive work of God’s Spirit to craft the child of God into conformity with Jesus Christ (Rom 8:29). Jesus prayed that all whom the Father had given to Him would be sanctified by the truth (Jn 6:37; 17:2, 6, 17, 24). The Word of truth (2 Tim 2:15) ministered by the Spirit of truth (Jn 16:13) is the catalyst of separating sinners from saints, children of the devil from the children of God (1 Jn 3:10).
Fatherhood in America, in our generation, is in crisis. Single parent homes, primarily caused by premarital sex and divorce, are dominated by women (80%). With an ever more obscure view to God the Father in the Bible, American fathers are destroying the proper understanding for responsible parenting in our families. The next generation, increasingly reared in fatherless homes, will be ignorant of the role and function of a proper father.
Christian marriage and family is a vivid picture of the perfect community of the Triune Godhead. God in community is glorified by those who claim the name of Christ and who do truth, as a witness of light in the devil’s domain of darkness (Col 1:13). Godly marriage and family is counter-cultural to the kingdom of this world because it seeks to glorify the Persons and good works of God in covenant communion.
A covenant is an agreement whereby the parties are to be found faithful to the terms. A covenant formed on the foundation of righteousness (all parties do the right thing) produces peace in the communion of covenant partners. Stated another way, God is in peaceful union (Persons of the Trinity) based on the common state of perfect doing of right.
The plight of man in community is sin. People are unfaithful toward one another, according to the terms of whatever covenant by which they have agreed to live in community. They cheat, steal, and kill — thus, destroying the union. Families are ruined, and when enough families are ruined, the village disintegrates into a jungle of self-serving survival of the fittest.
The remedy to America's crumbling union is the restoration of a view to the perfection of God the Father. This view is exclusive to one’s study of the Bible. Men will never be better husbands and fathers without God’s revelation of Himself in His Word, as taught by His Spirit in the communion of saints. Together, we look to Jesus, who ever shows us the Father.
Jesus taught that our heavenly Father is perfect (Mt 5:48), and our task is to shine before men so they might join us in glorifying our perfect Father in heaven (Mt 5:16). To shine is only possible when the heart has been filled with the Spirit (2 Cor 4:6; 5:5). It is the Spirit who is willing and doing God’s good pleasure in His holy nation of royal priests (Phil 2:13; 1 Pet 2:9). So, what does the Spirit reveal to us about our Father’s works?
In His providence, God governs His Creation, caring for the most minute details (Mt 5:45; 6:26). Our heavenly Father knows our most intimate needs (Mt 6:32), and He cares for us (1 Pet 5:7). Our heavenly Father gives good and perfect gifts (Mt 7:11; Eph 4:8; Jas 1:17).
Knowing there is nothing good in our flesh because of sin (Rom 7:18), we acknowledge that only God is able to fully forgive all of our sins against Him (Mt 26:28; Eph 1:7; Heb 9:22), therefore, we are to forgive others in the same manner and scope to which our heavenly Father has forgiven us (Mt 6:14). It is Christ Jesus, our Advocate with the Father (1 Jn 2:1), who pleads our case (Mt 10:32). We confess that our trust is in Jesus Christ, our Lord, who will present us holy and blameless before the Father on the last day (Eph 1:4; 5:27; Col 1:22).
In truth, we have one Father, who is in heaven (Mt 23:9). He has appointed a day for Christ to return to judge the living and the dead (Mt 24:36; Acts 10:42; 2 Tim 4:1; 1 Pet 4:5; Rev 19:11–21). For those who have done the will of God, as revealed to them by God (Lk 10:21), in the Word of God, there is a life of sanctification (Rom 15:16; 1 Thess 4:3, 7; 5:23; 2 Thess 2:13; 1 Pet 1:2), in order to be holy as God our Father is holy (1 Pet 1:15–16). As for those dads who best resemble our perfect Father, the more they see of Jesus, the more they become like the Father and Son.
In conclusion, we need to honor our earthly “fathers” and encourage them in their representative roles to be like our Father in heaven. The more they see the perfect Father, the more they become like Him and that is good for the whole family and the whole community.
David Norczyk
Spokane Valley, Washington
June 19, 2022
