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What Does It Mean To Call God Our Father (Colossians 1:12a)
Our text for this morning's message is taken from Colossians 1:12: “Giving thanks unto the Father, which hath made us meet to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in light.”
In the preceding verses, the Apostle Paul spoke about receiving news regarding the wonderful testimonies of the Colossians. He had heard about their faith, love and hope. And since he heard, he had prayed without ceasing for their spiritual growth, that they will be filled with the knowledge of God's will in all wisdom and spiritual understanding, and walk worthy of the Lord, producing fruit in every good work.
Well, all these things—the wonderful testimonies, the spiritual growth, the increase in knowledge, the producing of spiritual fruits—were possible only because of one thing: their salvation. They were saved from sin, Satan and the world.
[We are born with a sinful nature]
Every man or woman born into this world is born with a sinful nature and dominated by this evil world system, which is ruled by Satan. As Ephesians 2:1-2 says, we were dead in sins and we walk according to the cause of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air—that is, Satan. We were the children of disobedience.
It does not mean that people have no control of themselves or they are demon-possessed. What it means is that Satan can easily use our sinful nature, inclinations and desires to manipulate us to do his will.
“The power of the air” means the realms of influence, the realms of ideas and beliefs which Satan operates as the prince, the ruler. People are enslaved by this evil world system which is opposed to God.
A man has three great adversaries: Satan, the world, and the flesh. The flesh is the natural life each person has inherited from Adam by birth. It is this flesh, it is this sinful nature that makes him a willing follower of Satan and the world—to live in sin, to commit sin, to be the children of disobedience.
That is why you do not need to teach a child to tell lies. Sometimes when a child does something wrong and he is being confronted by the parents, he will say, ‘It is not me, it is my sister, she's the one who did it.’ The parents will then respond, ‘Who taught you to tell such a lie?’
Even children have this sinful nature. As the child grows up, his mind will be exposed to more and more sinful things, and the intensity of his sins will increase.
In the state of spiritual death, he is dead in trespasses and sins. Just as a physically dead person cannot make a choice to be physically alive, a spiritually dead person cannot make a choice to be spiritually alive. The only thing he can do is to continue in his sins.
And there is a price to pay for sin. The wages of sin is death—physically, spiritually and eternally. Man has to die physically. Spiritually, he is separated from God. And on judgement day, he will be cast into the lake of fire for all eternity. If nothing is done, that will be his life and destiny.
[Because of God’s love, He points us towards the Saviour]
“For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish but have everlasting life” (John 3:16).
Dear friend, if we want to know how much God loves us, just look to the cross and consider how God sent His only begotten Son, our Lord Jesus Christ, to die at Calvary to save us from the penalty of our sins through the shedding of His precious blood.
Jesus died to redeem our souls from the pit of hell. If that is not enough, God sends Christians by the millions to testify to us the gospel of His saving grace. If that is not enough, God plants churches all around the world to remind us that He loves us. If that is not enough, God calls preachers—preachers who live and die—but God would call others to warn the people of the coming judgement.
If that is not enough, God raised up hymn writers to write spiritual songs that would captivate our attention. And then he would bring us to a worship service like this, and the Holy Spirit would use the Word of God to convict our hearts of our sins and point us to the Saviour who died for us.
That is just how much God loves us, and He wants to save our souls. The moment we believe in the gospel and we cried out to Jesus to save us from our sins, we are saved.
Martin Luther called it the wonderful exchange, where Jesus bore our sins on the cross and His righteousness is imputed onto us. From that moment onwards, we are no longer the children of Satan but the children of God. And as his children, we call upon Him, Father.
This is what we want to learn from this phrase: giving thanks unto the Father.
Today we want to focus only on this word—Father.
The title of our message is: ‘What Does It Mean to Call God Our Father?’
- The concept
Firstly, we want to understand the concept of calling God our Father. This reminds us of our Lord Jesus, who taught the disciples to pray, “Our Father which art in heaven” (Matthew 6:9). It does not mean that our Father is only in heaven and He does not know what is happening on this earth.
God is omnipresent—all-present—as in, we are always in his presence. What it means is simply, heaven is His dwelling place.
[The use of the “Father” in the Old Testament]
We must understand that when Jesus taught the disciples to pray and call upon God, Father, it was something new to the Jews because they would not address God directly as my Father.
God was referred to as the Father only fourteen times in the Old Testament, and even then, it was not personal. The word Father was used with reference to God's relationship with the nation of Israel.
For example, Israel was the firstborn son of God. God said in Exodus 4:22, "And thou shalt say unto Pharaoh, Thus sayeth the Lord, Israel is my son, even my firstborn."
The psalmist David said in Psalm 103:13, "Like as a father pitieth his children, so the Lord pitieth them that fear him." - referring to the children of Israel because at that time, only the Israelites would worship the one living and true God.
The prophet Isaiah said in Isaiah 64:8, "But now, O Lord, thou art our father; we are the clay, and thou our potter; and we all are the work of thy hand."
It was always used in the context of the nation of Israel. You can search through from Genesis to Malachi and you will not find any individual Israelite addressing God directly as my Father.
But essentially, if God was the Father of all the believers collectively, then he was also their Father individually.
Sadly, over the centuries, because of their disobedience, the nation of Israel had turned away from their heavenly Father. They had turned away from Him to worship idols. So much so that most of the Jews had lost the sense of God as their Father.
Until the time of Jesus Christ, the distance between God and men seemed so far apart that the Jews felt that calling God "my Father" was strange, irrelevant and even blasphemous.
[The false teaching of the universal fatherhood of God]
Is God the heavenly Father of everyone—meaning to say, the entire humanity?
In our generation, we have to be aware of the false teaching of the universal fatherhood of God. Those who teach the universal fatherhood of God deny that Jesus is the only way to salvation and the only way to heaven.
They believe that God is the Father of everyone, whether they are safe or lost—it doesn't matter. Everyone is our brother or sister, whether they are believers or not. People do not need to be converted in the first place to have God as their Father, because God is already the Father of all, according to them.
They would tell you that it is absolutely unnecessary to believe in Jesus Christ, because you are already a child of God, whether you have faith in Him or not.
That is a terrible lie of the devil.
Scriptures make it very clear that God's fatherhood in relation to the unbelievers is only in the sense of him being the creator. Man is made in the image of God.
According to the Bible, most certainly God is not the Father of all men. He is uniquely the Father of the Lord Jesus Christ, and he becomes the Father only of those who believe in Christ and are united to Him by grace through faith in His only begotten Son.
On one occasion, in John 8:44, Jesus spoke directly to the unbelieving Jews who thought they were God's children because they were physical descendants of Abraham. But actually, they were the children of the devil.
These were the words of our Lord Jesus: "Ye are of your father the devil, and the lusts of your father ye will do." (John 8:44)
What a strong statement - ye are the children of the devil.
[We either have God or the devil as the Father]
There are only two families in this world—having God as the Father, or having the devil as the Father.
There is the family of Adam, into which all men are born. And there is the family of God, into which some men are reborn by faith in the Lord Jesus Christ.
As we have mentioned a while ago, before our conversions, we were dead in trespasses and sin. We were walking according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air—that is, the devil. We were by nature the children of God's wrath.
But God, by his grace and mercy, has saved us through his Son. We are now the children of God. And only the children of God can call upon him, Father.
Dear friend, which family do you belong to—the family of God, or the family of the devil?
If you do not have Jesus Christ as your Lord and Saviour, then you are still lingering in the family of the devil. There are only two families and only two destinations: heaven or hell. People do not like to hear this, but it is a reality.
When Jesus said, "I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh to the Father, but by me" (John 14:6). He makes Christianity exclusive—and indeed, Christianity is exclusive. Only Jesus saves. Apart from Jesus Christ, no one can save us from our sins.
[Jesus always addressed God as “Father”]
Jesus always addressed God as Father. He never used anything else. All his prayers addressed God as "my Father", except the one when He prayed on the cross of Calvary, "My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?" (Matthew 27:46)
That was a quotation of the messianic Psalm 22:1, and it was a fulfilment of the messianic psalm.
He always prayed, "My Father". And other times Jesus addressed God as Abba. Like in Mark 14:36, he said, "Abba, Father, all things are possible unto thee; take away this cup from me." - which refers to the cup of suffering – “nevertheless not what I will, but what thou wilt.”
Abba was an Aramaic word. It was like the child calling his or her father in a loving and endearing way. In our modern-day equivalent, it would be probably ‘Dad’.
To the Jewish mind, Jesus' prayer was blasphemous.
Now consider this: God was referred to as the Father only fourteen times in the Old Testament. And even then, it was always as the Father of Israel—not individually or personally.
But Jesus taught his disciples to pray individually, "My Father", and corporately, "Our Father". By doing so, he was teaching the disciples about sonship. In other words, you are a child of God. And as a child of God, you speak to your heavenly Father in a familiar, trusting, loving and endearing way—like the child speaking to his or her father.
- The application
Our second point is the application: How does it apply to us? What does it mean to us when we call God our Father?
[Calling God our Father is a mark of our faith]
Firstly, calling God our Father is a mark of our faith. Dr Martin Lloyd Jones said, ‘No man can truly say, “My Father”, save the one who knows the Lord Jesus Christ and who is in Christ.’ It is only those who are true believers who can say “Our Father”. The unbeliever will not be able to do that; even if he does, it would not mean anything.
In other words, it speaks of a relationship—the relationship between the Father and child—which is the result of faith.
We understand this in the physical realm, don’t we? If a child comes up to me and says to me, ‘Father, it is not only strange but wrong, because I do not know Him, nor am I related to Him. Only my children, who are related to me, connected to me, will call me Father in a most meaningful way.’
[Calling God our Father is through the work of the Holy Spirit]
Secondly, calling God our Father is through the work of the Holy Spirit. Every believer has the indwelling Holy Spirit. Romans 8:9 says, “If any man have not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of His”. He does not belong to Jesus Christ. And because of the indwelling of the Holy Spirit, the believer can call out to God as His heavenly Father.
How do we know? Romans 8:15 says, “For ye have not received the spirit of bondage again to fear; but ye have received the Spirit of adoption, whereby we cry, Aba, Father.”
Galatians 4:6 says, “And because ye are sons, God hath sent forth the Spirit of His Son into your hearts, crying, Abba, Father.” Can you fathom that thought? God sent the Spirit of His Son into our hearts, and we cried out, ‘Abba, Father.’
I remember before I became a Christian I had some theological understanding of God. I heard the gospel of Jesus Christ but did not believe in it. I studied the life of Christ as a religious subject in my school; in fact, I got an A for my general Cambridge examination. I did very well, but I never knew God.
I was studying in a Roman Catholic school and I lived in the boarding home. Every morning, every afternoon and every night we had to recite the Lord’s Prayer. Whenever we misbehaved ourselves, we were punished by reciting the Lord’s Prayer one hundred times. I did not mind to do that because I thought it was a very light punishment, but those words meant nothing to me.
When I grew up, someone shared the gospel with me. I was convicted of my sins. I turned to Jesus for salvation and embraced Him as my personal Lord and Saviour. And for the first time when I prayed, “My Father”, it was the most wonderful experience. The difference between this experience and the countless times I had called, ‘Our Father’ before my conversion is the indwelling of the Holy Spirit, who enables me to cry out, ‘Abba, Father.’
Dear friend, it is such a privilege to call upon our God, ‘My Father, Our Father’, because we are in Christ and we have the indwelling of the Holy Spirit. Only the believers can do that.
There may be times when you come to God sadly—like a child who has done something wrong—or there may be times when you come to God happily—like the child who sits on the Father’s lap at the end of the day—or there may be times when you come to God with a heavy and broken heart because you have received some devastating news.
However, no matter how you come, you cannot change that relationship. He is yours. He is your Father.
[Calling God our Father means He will help us as we live our lives on this earth.]
Thirdly, calling God our Father means He will help us as we live our lives on this earth. It is inevitable that there will be troubles, trials and afflictions. God will help us physically; He will strengthen us emotionally; He will teach us to walk spiritually. When you and I fall down, He will pick us up and direct our paths securely.
The law of Australia recognises that a parent must care for his or her child. How much more our heavenly Father will care for us, His children.
Dear friend, perhaps there’s something troubling you this morning. There’s nothing that worries people more than provisions. People are always worried about whether they will have enough for the future.
Listen to the words of our Lord Jesus in Matthew 6:25–32. After He taught the disciples to pray saying, “Our Father which art in heaven,” these were His words:
“Therefore I say unto you, Take no thought for your life, what ye shall eat, or what ye shall drink; nor yet for your body, what ye shall put on. Is not the life more than meat, and the body than raiment? Behold the fowls of the air: for they sow not, neither do they reap, nor gather into barns; yet your heavenly Father feedeth them. Are ye not much better than they? Which of you by taking thought can add one cubit unto his stature? And why take ye thought for raiment? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow; they toil not, neither do they spin: And yet I say unto you, That even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these.”
“Wherefore, if God so clothe the grass of the field, which to day is, and to morrow is cast into the oven, shall he not much more clothe you, O ye of little faith? Therefore take no thought, saying, What shall we eat? or, What shall we drink? or, Wherewithal shall we be clothed?”
But how can we not be worried, and on what basis can we not be worried? Jesus said, “For your heavenly Father knoweth that ye have need of all these things.’”
In other words, your heavenly Father, who has saved your soul. Do not worry. He knows everything about you. He knows what you truly need and what is best for you.
[Calling God our Father will assure us of His forgiveness]
Fourthly, calling God our Father will assure us of His forgiveness.
Do you remember the parable of the prodigal son in the Gospel of Luke 15?
It is very significant that the first word that came from the mouth of the prodigal son when he returned to his own house was this: "Father, I have sinned against heaven and in thy sight, and am no worthy to be called thy son." (Luke 15:21)
Did the father forgive him?
Jesus said, "But the father said to his servants, Bring forth the best robe, and put it on him; and put a ring on his hand, and shoes on his feet. And bring hither the fatted calf, and kill it; and let us eat, and be merry. For this my son was dead and is alive again; he was lost and is found. And they began to be merry.” (Luke 15:22-24)
Sometimes when we sin against God, we feel so miserable, so grieved in our hearts. We feel as if the whole world has collapsed on us and we may question, ‘will God ever forgive me?’
If God is our Father, He is always our Father. He will never forget, neither will he forsake us. He is most willing to forgive us if we repent of our sins and come to Him, like the prodigal son, ‘Father, I have sinned against thee.’
[Calling God our Father means we need not be fearful in life.]
Fifthly, calling God our Father means we need not be fearful.
In life, we can be troubled by so many things. We can be afflicted with physical pain, tormented with financial difficulties, vexed by relationship issues, plagued by loneliness, devastated by bad medical news, results that we receive from the hospital—with no peace of mind and no comfort for our souls.
Maybe the greatest fear is the fear of death. How can we not be troubled when we lose a beloved family member? How can we not be troubled when we are lying on our death beds?
Well, Jesus said in John 14:1-3, "Let not your heart be troubled: ye believed in God, believe also in me. In my Father’s house are many mansions: if it were not so, I would have told you. I go to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again, and receive you unto myself; that where I am, there ye may be also."
Where’s the place that Jesus has gone to prepare for us? “In my Father’s house.”
If the Father of our Lord Jesus is our Father, that means we have the mansion in heaven where Jesus has gone to prepare for us. Instead of being afraid, we look forward to the blessed hope of heaven’s glory.
All of us are aware that our dear beloved sister Gek is currently in the ICU after she suffered a brain aneurysm, and she is unconscious. When I received the news that she may not be able to survive, I was both shocked and heartbroken.
But I remember some months ago, when my own dad was admitted to hospital, the doctors asked the family whether we were willing to sign the papers not to resuscitate him in the event he stopped breathing.
The reason was because the resuscitation process could be very invasive and aggressive, and due to my father's old age he might not be able to survive it, to take it.
I shared this with sister G, and she said to me very confidently and emphatically, "Well, I've already made it very clear. If I ever stop breathing, please do not resuscitate me, because it is time for me to go. I want to go home."
She’s ready and looking forward to go home. Where? To her Father’s house. To be with the Lord Jesus Christ. We do not know if it is God’s will that he will take her. But if it is, it is her desire too. That was what has comforted my heart. She’s ready to go home.
[We can pray to God as ‘Our Father’]
Finally, remember Jesus taught us to pray, "Our Father which art in heaven", which means he is the Father of all the believers—not just you, but the rest too.
When we pray ‘Our Father’, we are reminded not only to look upward, but also to look outward for our brothers and sisters in Christ.
Sometimes when we encourage people to attend the prayer meetings, it is so sad to hear them say, ‘I can pray at home. I can pray on my own. I do not need to attend prayer meetings.’ It is not just for your own needs. It is also for other people’s needs.
There may be some brothers and sisters in Christ who are so traumatised and troubled and depressed that they cannot pray on their own, and they need you to come alongside and together you cry out, ‘Our Father’.
Not just look upward, but look outward for others as well.
On your own, you can only pray ‘My Father’. It is only in the church setting, or as a family, or with other believers, that you and I can pray "Our Father".
"Our Father which art in heaven" also teaches us that He is watching over all of us at all times.
The best parents we have cannot always be present with us. They may be too busy. They may be preoccupied. They may be sick and unwell. They may be somewhere else. They cannot be in two places at once. Or they may have been taken home to be with the Lord.
But God our Father is always with us, watching over us. Every prayer of His child is like the only prayer He is listening to. There is nothing that will escape His knowledge. He knows everything.
There’s nothing that will escape his eyes. He knows what we are going through right now, at this moment. He knows what will happen in the next moment. And He wants us to pray, ‘My Father’, or ‘Our Father’.
Dear friend, what does it mean for us to call God, ‘our Father’?
This is what it means. And He hears. And He will answer.
Let us pray.
Our Father who art in heaven, indeed as our Lord Jesus has taught us, we look to thee and call out to thee, ‘Our Father, my Father’—whether it be individually or corporately as a church.
Thou belongest to us and we belong to thee. This relationship cannot be broken. And because we are able to call thee, ’our Father’, it is a mark of our faith through the work of the Holy Spirit who indwells in us, enabling us to cry out to thee, ‘Abba, Father.’
And because we call upon thee our Father, there is nothing for us to fear, including death. Because our Lord Jesus has gone to prepare a place for us in thy house, and there are many mansions.
We call upon thee, ‘our Father’, assures us that thou wilt forgive us, and thou wilt help us as we live our days on this earth.
And as we call upon thee ‘our Father’, we are also looking out to others, because we are not the only child—there are other children who belong to thee likewise.
And when we come together as a church, we call upon thee, "Our Father which art in heaven", and thou wilt hear our prayers and answer them according to thy sovereign will, time and purpose.
Thou art always watching over us at all times. And this is what will comfort our hearts, strengthen our faith and help us to live our days on this earth, looking up and looking outward as well.
All to the glory of thy precious name we give thee thanks and we pray all this in Jesus' name.
Amen.