Living in the Glory of God as Father
Introduction https://youtu.be/XIhDcyRzFlc
Today we commence a 3-part series on “Living in the Glory of God”. It deals with living in the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. It is an exposition on living in intimacy with the Lord[1]. [Since the glory of God is all that the Godhead has enjoyed in the fullness of their perfect love communion in eternity,] this is a series on enjoying the Trinity. Is might seem arrogant to speak of dwelling in the infinite Life that has been an exclusively divine prerogative for eternity prior to our creation? This is more or less how non-Christian religions see things. For [the great pantheistic Eastern religions,] Buddhism and Hinduism equate everything with the divine being so there is no interpersonal fellowship/relationship with God at all. Islam, for whom Allah is far beyond all words and thoughts, such talk is completely blasphemous, so the Christian worship of the prophet Jesus is the worst form of idolatry. It is absolutely imperative in a world full of experts, including “religious experts” that we turn with single-hearted devotion to Christ alone, who promised that those who believe in him will receive nothing less than all he has ever enjoyed of the glory of God as Father[2]. Any other way answers results in unnecessary and ungodly confusion (1 Cor 14:33).
Generation of Glory
In John 17, Jesus prays, “Father, glorify me in your own presence with the glory that I had with you before the world existed.” The New Testament writers unanimously testify the one to whom Jesus prayed is “the God/Father of glory” (Acts 7:2; Eph 1:17). All glory begins with the Father. That God is the Creator of all things beautiful and good[3] is part of the “natural knowledge” of God in which all those made in the divine image share (Isa 44:24), but no one has ever known God in the way Jesus spoke of God as his own personal Father[4].
Paul preaches that God’s mercy and kindness is poured out on all people, “he did not leave himself without witness, for he did good by giving you rains from heaven and fruitful seasons, satisfying your hearts with food and gladness.”” (Acts 14:17). Yet, no pagan has ever looked on the wisdom and glory of God radiating out of creation[5] and worshipped[6] a Holy and Righteous Father (John 17:11, 25). Why then didn’t the all-wise God (Rom 16:27) reveal himself in a way that was undeniable to everyone? Why has “the plan of the mystery”, to quote Paul, been “hidden for ages in God, who created all things” (Eph 3:9).
It is because the revelation of God as Father requires the entry into our hearts[7] of his Word through the deepest depths of faith and trust[8]. Where there is resistance to the revelation of God as essentially “Father” no-one can know the glory of the Lord.
Contested Glory
The sad and sorry reality is that for many people to say that God is “Father” is not good news. Traditional Jews were offended by the ease in which Jesus spoke of “the heavenly Father” as accessible to all who believed in him. Islamic teaching rejects the thought, In truth the Fatherhood of God is a universal problem[9]. The story is told of a group of Africans who slipped whilst moving a stone idol so it became uncovered. In terror one of their witch doctors cried out “Look away lest you behold the face of “your father”. When Australian evangelist John Smith was asked by a rough street kid to explain what God is like, he replied, “He is like a father.” To which the youth said, “If he is like my old man who beat my mum and raped my sister, I want nothing to do with him.” Only the Bible reveals how humanity fell into such depths of confusion.
The Fatherhood of God has been an arena of intense conflict from the beginning of creation. Jesus spoke out to the Pharisees, “Why do you not understand what I say? It is because you cannot bear to hear my word. 44 You are of your father the devil, and your will is to do your father’s desires. He was a murderer from the beginning, and does not stand in the truth, because there is no truth in him.” (John 8:43-44)[10]
Though without sin, Adam and Eve were never perfect and had much growing to do into mature God-likeness[11]. Since the procreative power of their heavenly Father (Luke 3:38) had not yet been fully expressed[12], they felt flattered by the interest of the serpent in their future spiritual growth[13]. When Satan spoke to Eve, ““You will not surely die. 5 For God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.”” (Gen 3:4-5), she experienced a rush of excitement like the one you can still remember from your first serious romantic encounter. The rush was exhilarating and addictive, but it gave birth to what scripture calls “the lust of the flesh” (1 John 2:16 cf. 2 Pet 1:4), a powerful selfish desire which leads to sin and death (James 1:15).
Instead of resisting the devil in the power and authority of God’s revealed Word (Gen 2:17), in selfish ambition[14] and without fear of the discipline of their Creator-Father[15] they exchanged the glory God had given them[16] for images of a God of lesser glory[17]. Whenever we abandon the revelation of a Holy Father and manufacture[18] false father images for themselves. (If not religiously or philosophically, at least psychologically.)[19] God resists us because as the Father of true glory he must oppose weak mortal human beings attempts to steal his sovereign glory[20]. [God is not mocked (Gal 6:7),] the all-wise all-loving Father has always had a plan[21] to share his glory with all who will believe in him through Jesus.
Identity Formation
Today we live in an ever-increasingly complicated culture filled with identity confusion. The turmoil about gender and sexuality in all its dimensions[22] (e.g. Perth Anglican Church Synod 2022 male/female/gay/trans are all thought to be fluid) but must be seen as an attempt by the devil to block human beings made in the image of God from coming to know him as their heavenly Father. It is a revelation of the Father that consolidates our human self-understanding. A young woman confided in a pastor on a Christian camp that she was lying to people that her father was a multi-millionaire about herself whilst she was actually addicted to shoplifting and involved in an adulterous relationship. Even though she had confessed her sin the pastor sensed there was a deeper root to her problems (cf. some people here today). During the camp’s praise and worship, she suddenly gasped and ran out of the meeting. It turned out that she’d had a vison of God enthroned in glory looking directly at her and he was smiling. It was a blessed Father-daughter scene. (cf. Ken F) When the pastor ran into her six months later, she explained the vision had marked the end of her life in sin. She no longer felt the need to create a story about her dignity or look to sex for belonging. She was assured of her value and worth through a revelation of God as her own eternal Father
Returning to the Father of Jesus
Personally, I am tired of hearing Christian leaders pray things like[23] “Dear God” or “Loving God”[24], whereas we always hear Jesus praying… “Father”. At the tomb of Lazarus, “Jesus lifted up his eyes and said, “Father, I thank you that you have heard me. 42 I knew that you always hear me” (John 11:41-42) and so he commanded the dead man to come out of the tomb[25] because the Son knew the heart of his Father was filled with the power of the immeasurable love which had sent him from heaven in exchange for the fallen life of sinners (John 3:16; 2 Cor 8:9).
What then are we to make of the single time Jesus did not speak to God as “Father” ? “when the sixth hour had come, there was darkness over the whole land until the ninth hour.7 34 And at the ninth hour Jesus cried with a loud voice…“My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”” (Mark 15:33-34). This is the point when “he who knew no sin became sin” (2 Cor 5:21) when he became a curse for us (Gal 3:13; Rev 22:3)[26], by taking upon himself the most profound of all cursed states, fatherlessness (Mal 4:6 NKJV, NLT). The cross is the place where Jesus experienced the “far country” of the prodigal son (Luke 15:13) unable to enjoy the sweetness of the heavenly Father’s embrace (Rev 21:7). This was truly a “descent into hell”[27]. But hell could not be the End (eschaton ἔσχατον) for the Son of living God.
By refusing to take advantage of his equality with God, by refusing to follow the way of Adam, Jesus humbly emptied himself and by becoming obedient to death on the cross, has revealed a new image of God[28]. The revelation of the God’s total love as Father came through Christ’s resurrection from the dead and exaltation at the right hand of power. This is our destiny. If this is the power of the gospel (Rom 1:16), why is so much of the Church in a weakened state?
Losing the Father
A chapter on the revelation of God as Father speaks with raw power to a politically correct generation, “But if ye be without chastisement, whereof all are partakers, then are ye bastards, and not sons.” (Heb 12:8). No-one enjoys discipline, but it is in receiving it is an indispensable ingredient to maturing in the revelation[29] that we understand that God loves you and will allow anything to happen to shape you into greater Christlikeness! (JY unpleasant shocking dog attack example last week. Still got the scars. About a deeper dependence on Christ.) The dreadful lack of mature firm loving discipline across the Church (JY meeting last week wrt a sinning brother unfit for leadership.) is nothing less than an attempt to bypass the scandal of the cross for nothing but the word of the cross can communicate the immeasurable love of God Father (1 John 1:1-2). The message of the cross (1 Cor 1:18) alone concentrates and makes tangible to the crushed human conscience that God is essentially Father, Father through and through. As Jesus was leaving this world he said, “go to my brothers and say to them, ‘I am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God.’”” (John 20:17)[30].
Conclusion
We all need a breakthrough revelation of God as our/my Father.[31] I recall being on a youth group camp when the leader paused and after a moment of silence deeply moved said, “For the first time in my life I understand that God is my Father”. Have you had such a revelation? If not, we can pray for you, and if you need more of the power of the Holy Spirit[32] to communicate God’s Fatherly love (Luke 24:48; Acts 1:8), we will be more than pleased to pray for that too.
[1] The “Lord” has revealed himself as Father (Luke 10:21), Son (Phil 2:1) and Spirit (2 Cor 3:18).
[2] “And this is eternal life, that they know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent….The glory that you have given me I have given to them, that they may be one even as we are one” (John 17:3, 22).
[3] The power of idolatry is beholding the wondrous handiwork of God apart from the revelation of Christ crucified. As Revelation 4-, especially 5:, expounds.
[4] “Some of them wanted to arrest him, but no one laid hands on him. 45 The officers then came to the chief priests and Pharisees, who said to them, “Why did you not bring him?” 46 The officers answered, “No one ever spoke like this man!” (John 7:44-46) It was Jesus claim to know God as his own Father that led to the attempts to stone him for blasphemy in John 8 and 10.
[5] “The heavens declare the glory of God, and the sky above1 proclaims his handiwork.” (Ps 19:1)
[6] “But the hour is coming, and is now here, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in Spirit and truth, for the Father is seeking such people to worship him. 24 God is Spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth.”” John 4:23-24
[7] Ps 119:130; Paul prays “that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith” (Eph 3:17).
[8] Cf. “The Lord opened her (Lydia’s) heart to pay attention to what was said by Paul. 15 And after she was baptized” (Acts 16:14-15)
[9] The famous Liberal Christianity’s bomFoG, “brotherhood of man and Fatherhood of God” has little to do with genuine Christian fellowship in the Church and with God through Christ.
[10] Cf. Matt 13:38; Eph 2:2; 1 John 3:8, 12, 23.
[11] They were neither created sinful nor perfect, but perfectible.
[12] They were not yet in the fulness of the likeness of the relationship between the Word-Son and the Father in the Spirit’s power.
[13] Which is why there will be no lack of dictators, cult leaders, celebrities, “influencers” and so on until the coming of the antichrist who, “who opposes and exalts himself against every so-called god or object of worship, so that he takes his seat in the temple of God, proclaiming himself to be God” (2 Thess 2:4).
[14] They exercised a wisdom that was “earthly, unspiritual, demonic… (full of) jealousy and selfish ambition exist” (James 3:1-16).
[15] “The fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom, and the knowledge of the Holy One is insight.” (Prov 9:10).
[16] “they exchanged the truth about God for a lie and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever! Amen.” (Rom 1:25)
[17] As if the finite mind of the snake, and/or themselves, could ever grasp the testimony of the seraphim, ““Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts; the whole earth is full of his glory!”” (Isa 6:3), or the prophetic witness, “the earth will be filled with the knowledge of the glory of the Lord as the waters cover the sea.” (Hab 2:14).
[18] “Man’s nature, so to speak, is a perpetual factory of idols.” (Calvin) endless ingenuity and creative abominations, “God made man upright, but they have sought out many schemes.” (Eccl 7:29).
[19] Before the fallen human conscience the highest good has become supreme self-love, which is considered the ability to freely decide for oneself. Which however is a condition of rebellion, “They promise them freedom, but they themselves are slaves of corruption. For whatever overcomes a person, to that he is enslaved.” (2 Pet 2:19).
[20] “I am the Lord; that is my name; my glory I give to no other, nor my praise to carved idols.” (Isa 42:8)
[21] Far greater than anything humans can think or imagine (Eph 3:20).
[22] Male/female/gay/trans (Matt 19:3-6).
[23] As if they had not received the Spirit of Jesus!
[24] That Paul always couples “Father” with something like “God our Father“ “Our God and Father” shows “Father” is not an equivalent term for theos, but a specification of the role God plays in relationship to believers, he is “our Father”.
[25] cf. Jesus “rejoiced in the Holy Spirit and said, “I thank you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth” (Luke 10:20).
[26] Cf. “God has done what the law, weakened by the flesh, could not do. By sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin, he condemned sin in the flesh” (Rom 8:2-3)
[27] Calvin interpreted this phrase from the Apostles Creed as referring to the cross.
[28] This is the message of Paul’s great Christ-hymn in Phil 2:-11 , how in Christ there is a new revelation of God through Jesus in a world that has only ever witnessed a distorted likeness of Godhead.
[29] For he is “Father of spirits” (Heb 12:9), and not of intellects.
[30] This is not a statement that there are two sorts of Fatherhood, but that the one Fathering is natural, between God and his Son, and the other is by grace and gift, Jesus and those whom he has adopted.
[31] Jesus’ high prayer, “The glory that you have given me I have given to them, that they may be one even as we are one” (v.22) has been answered by God in himself already, but will be imparted to us degree by degree throughout eternity (John 17:5; 2 Cor 3:18).
[32] “If you then, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will the heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him!”” (Luke 11:13)