Becoming Like Jesus: Who Is God?Sample

The Love of the Father

It’s amazing that God chooses to define Himself throughout the Biblical story as a God of covenant-keeping love. He could champion any of His traits. His power, because He is powerful. His wisdom, because wisdom has been His from the beginning. His radiant purity, because He is totally incorruptible, incapable of mistake or error. All these things are true and we know them about God because He has made them known to us. They all matter. God wants us to know He’s strong and mighty and wise and wonderful. But chief among these descriptors is the simple phrase we find in 1 John…God is love. Love is not just what God does. It’s who He is.

From the very beginning, God created everything in an act of love. Our Heavenly Father didn’t want slaves to work for Him, He wanted children to live with Him. To walk with Him, talk with Him, and learn from Him.

On Mt. Sinai, as God is revealing Himself and the way to relate to Him to a bunch of slaves He has just liberated from Egypt, this is was He says is true about Him: And he passed in front of Moses, proclaiming, “The LORD, the LORD, the compassionate and gracious God, slow to anger, abounding in love and faithfulness, maintaining love to thousands, and forgiving wickedness, rebellion and sin. Yet he does not leave the guilty unpunished; he punishes the children and their children for the sin of the parents to the third and fourth generation.” Exodus 34:6-7 NIV

God abounds, He overflows, He has more than enough love—the kind of love that doesn’t run out or give up. The kind of love that delights in and works for the good of the beloved. That’s exactly what we see God do throughout the Biblical story on a micro-level in the lives of individuals—like Abraham, Hannah, and David—and on a macro-level in the way that God constantly pursues and redeems His creation. His voice echoes throughout history: “I have loved you with an everlasting love; I have drawn you with unfailing kindness.” Jeremiah 31:3 NIV

And He doesn’t just say it. He shows it—in likely and extremely unlikely ways. His love is evident in the way He deals justly with sin and evil… and at the same time in the way He is so incredibly patient with sinners and wrongdoers.

There is no clearer demonstration of His love than what is depicted in one of the most famous passages in the entire Bible: “For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him.” John 3:16-17 NIV

The love of the Father is seen in the sending of the Son. Jesus came, not to condemn a world that was destined for destruction, but to save it. To enact God’s plan to rescue humanity and restore creation so that we might have the opportunity to experience all of the goodness the Father had in store for us.

More than anything, Jesus demonstrated how to relate to God the Father. He taught us how to pray and trust. He taught us what it looks like to surrender and obey. He showed us it’s possible to live rightly in relationship with God. He fully embraced the love of the Father on every level of His being. And with His own body and blood, invited us to know and experience God’s eternal, undying love for us.

What you need to know is that God loves you. He loved the idea of you before you were even born. He thinks about you. He’s attentive to you. He knows what you need before you ask and He delights in giving good things. He pursues you, daily, with His love. He will never get sick of you or tired of bringing you home. He allowed His son to die for you and has placed His very Spirit inside of you to remind you of His love. You are loved by God the Father who does not change like the shifting shadows.

Yes, the word Father can carry a lot of baggage, but remember, God invented the idea. The fact that God the Father is part of the Trinity means that God has eternally existed as the perfect dad. He’s been doing it longer than anyone and is better at it than everyone. He’s not just a bigger version of your dad, He’s the perfect version of your dad. He chooses to define Himself by His love for you. That’s ridiculous.

“Father” is the most significant name of the God of the Bible. It is the name that sets Christianity apart from all the other religions of the world. Other religions invite us to worship their gods, allahs, creators, or metaphysical forces, but Christianity invites us to believe in a Son and to enter into an intimate family relationship with a loving Father. Jesus, the Son of God, came so that we could meet His Father, be adopted into the family of God, and relate to the almighty God of the universe in an intimate, personal, concrete way as sons and daughters (2 Cor. 6:16, 18). - Mary Kassian