|
|
|
|
|
#351, 11th September 2018
|
|
Run to Him!
 Most countries including the U.S.A., the UK, Canada, India and Japan celebrate Father's Day on the third Sunday in June, while Father’s Day in Australia is celebrated on the first Sunday in September. Both days were here and have gone, but we're not concerned about that. The Father of all believers is praised and honored every day somewhere in the world! God the Father of Jesus Christ is our father too, and in this issue we've chosen to present three articles which speak to that wonderful relationship.
We've included a "launching" with each article, and a link afterward to take you to the complete text. We hope you'll be as excited at this wellspring of great news as we were!
|
|
A Father and His Family
by Peter Wade
|
|
In John chapter 1 and verse 18, we have this tremendous statement: “No one has seen God at any time. The only begotten son, who is at the Father’s side, has made him known.” The son whom the Father loved, made known by God as a Father.
The intriguing thing to us is that Jesus brought a different concept of God that had been known in Old Testament times. You can read right through the Old Testament and will find only three clear verses that speak of God as a Father: these are II Samuel 7:14; Psalm 89:26, and Isaiah 9:6.
For example, in Psalm 18 we have what is generally considered a picture of the nature of God. “I love you, O Lord, my strength. The Lord is my rock and my fortress and my deliverer, my God, my rock, in whom I take refuge, my shield, and the horn of my salvation, my stronghold” (Psalms 18:1b-2 ESV). Notice all those tremendous figures of speech and yet no mention of the fact of God as a Father. The truth was foreign to the Hebrew nation simply because God had not revealed Himself in that way.
However, when Jesus came, the Bible says, “He has made him known,” as a Father. The word “father” is used of God 244 times in the New Testament; 112 times in the Gospel of John alone. Matthew uses it 43 times, Mark 5, Luke 14, and other New Testament books 70 times.
It is certainly true that God made the heavens and the earth. He is the Creator and Sustainer, and is worthy of our adoration and worship. Yet the Word reveals that the moment I accepted Jesus as my Lord, I became a member of the family of God. Thus the emphasis should be upon the fact that God is my Father, rather than on His almighty being.
Most Christians have a low estimation of our God. They think of Him as a policeman with a stick, ready to deal with them if they step out of line; or that He causes disease, suffering, and death.
Very few Christians have the greatness of the understanding that God is their Father, that He desires to treat them as a loving, heavenly Father, that He wants the best for His children all the time, and will not force upon His children anything that would be harmful to them.
God is our Father. He is not going to let us get into a situation that is harmful to us, if we will walk by the greatness of our believing and follow the revelation that He gives.
|
|
When you've finished reading, we'd love to hear your thoughts about
A Father and His Family by
Peter Wade. |
|
|
The Father Within
by Walter Lanyon
When Jesus lifted up His eyes unto heaven and said, “Thank you, Father,” this all-embracing statement was so filled with revelation that it burst the shell of a thousand limitations.
As Jesus grew in awareness of His unique parentage, He unfolded the glorious truth that God desires to be the Father of every man and will dwell in your consciousness and mine. He spoke of His body as a temple, with the Father indwelling His consciousness in the manner foreshadowed when the Shekinah glory filled the old covenant temple.
When the Father indwells our consciousness, we too are called “temples” of the living God. Just as Jesus was the embodiment of divinity, we too are the place where the transcendent God is stepped down into visibility. As soon as we recognize that through the new birth we have come into union with God, we begin to bring forth the manifestation, even as the human Jesus manifested the eternally begotten Christ who is the very image of the Father.
Just as the principle of radio had always been there, but had to be recognized before it could be brought forth, God indwells all who are His sons by new birth and only awaits our ability to conceive of His manifestation in our temple-bodies. He is in each of us, but He has to be recognized.
With Jesus the man, as with each of us, nothing is possible, for Jesus said that He could do nothing of Himself. But when He arrived at the place of recognition that He was the Christ, then all things were possible because that is the point of contact – recognition – between God and man. Without this recognition of indwelling divinity, nothing can take place; with it, anything can happen.
The function of divinity is above the limitations of human law. It is never necessary to consider the laws we are so accustomed to functioning by. Jesus, who could no more walk on water that you can, found this possible because He was conscious of oneness with the Father within. This transforming influence lifted Him entirely out of the bondage of law which knows gravity, cohesion, adhesion, and so on.
 “You must be born again,” said Jesus. To be born again is to become one with the Father, so that you express divinity. We are called “partakers of the divine nature.” It is impossible for you to do the things that you cannot do as long as you remain in your natural human consciousness, limited by the five senses and three dimensions. It is possible to accomplish all things when you recognize that through being joined as one with Christ you have become one with divinity — the Father within you.
|
|
When you've finished reading The Father Within by Walter Lanyon, we'd love to know what you're thinking.
.
|
|
|
The Glory of God’s Paternity
by F.E. Marsh
What does God say about Himself ? God only can reveal Himself. The Unknown and the Unknowable can only make Himself fully known.
There are three great names and their relatives in the Old Testament, and one in the New Testament, by which God has been pleased to reveal His character. The three in the Old Testament are “Elohim,” “Adonai,” and “Jehovah”; and the one in the New Testament is “Father.” These names form a beautiful and expressive cube of God’s nature.
George Macdonald says: “The name of our Lord God should lie a precious jewel in the cabinet of our hearts, to be taken out only at great times, and with loving awe.” Jehovah Himself sets a great store upon His name. He prohibits us from taking His name in vain (Ex. 20:7), and attaches significance and meaning to the several names by which He calls Himself (Ex. 6:3).
Father
In Elohim we have revealed the glory of God’s power, in Adonai the glory of the Lord’s possessions, in His name of Jehovah we have made known the glory of His Divine Person, and in Father we have brought to us the glory of His loving Paternity.
In the first there is made known the skill and strength of His hands as Creator; in the second there is made known the claim and call of His authority as Lord and Master; in the third we see the grace and constancy of His immutable purpose as the unchanging One; and in the fourth we have the hand and heart of our Father’s love and aid. “The Father of Glory” (Eph. 1:17) is one of the designations of Himself, but the glory of the Father is only known as we are in intimate fellowship with the Father of Glory.
|
|
When you're finished reading The Glory of God’s Paternity by F.E. Marsh, we'd love to read your thoughts.
|
|
|
OUR NEWSLETTER
SUBSCRIBE NOW!
Get the latest perceptive insights from Peter Wade's study of the Word of God, plus ministry news. Subscribe above or read past issues.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
