03.33. Our Father In Heaven

Our Father in Heaven

There is no lowering of His majesty in the intimacy of the family relationship. He is still the Holy and Most High God; the High and Lofty One, that inhabiteth eternity. The Sermon on the Mount, with its relation of God to sparrows and lilies, detracts nothing from the majesty of Isaiah’s vision of Him: "The everlasting God, the Lord, the Creator of the ends of the earth." He is still "the King eternal, immortal, invisible, the only wise God. . . . the blessed and only Potentate, the King of kings, and Lord of lords; who only hath immortality, dwelling the light which no man can approach unto; whom no man hath seen, nor can see" (1 Timothy 1:17; 1 Timothy 6:15-16).

There are many such revelations of the divine glory and majesty, and it is well to ponder them in adoring worship; but Jesus Christ turned them .into terms of filial value. He is our Father! That is the crowning fact. To the child he is just Father. Others may cringe in fear, but the child heart is a stranger to terror. I have never forgotten the dread that gripped me when, as a youth, I was invited to go for an interview at the parsonage. I walked past the door several times before I had courage to ring the bell, and as I stood at the door my heart throbbed in my ears. Imagine my surprise when shown into the room to find the great man on all-fours, giving a ride to riotously happy children, who turned his long beard into driving reins! He was their father! They knew nothing of the awe in which others stood of him, and as they grew older and knew something of his greatness their reverence deepened, but their fearlessness was not diminished. The children of the House are free and fearless.