Who is God the Father?
God is never presented in the Bible simply as a distant power; He is made known by a name that carries relationship. The question "Who is God the Father?" reaches into who God is in Himself, how He came to be known, and what place He gives to those who believe.
One God, Three Persons
The Father is not a mode or a mood of God, but one of three distinct Persons who together are the one God. Writers on the subject state the balance carefully — full deity for each, without dividing God into three.
H J VineThe Father is God, the Son is God, and the Holy Spirit is God; yet there are not three Gods, but one God, "God is one" (Gal. 3:20; 1 Tim. 2:5). "Baptism is to the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit," we are told in Matthew 28:19. This shows us the trinity of Persons in the Godhead, all of whom share in that supreme glory.
Source of All, Known Only Through the Son
Something of God as origin and giver can be grasped by faith apart from the gospel. The specific name of Father, though, comes to us by one route only.
H J VineFaith might grasp Him as the Source of all things — the "one God and Father of all"; and as "the Father of mercies" and "the Father of lights"; but by the Son alone is the Father made known, according to His own divine pleasure. The world is not able to know the children of God in their relationship with Him as such; but God's children know the Father, and His Name is made known to them.
That revelation is not a side topic in Christian teaching. It is the centre of it.
An Outline of Sound WordsThe Son had come to make the Father known, and in this revelation is the substance of the truth of Christianity. How often the Name of Father was on the lips of the Son! While this showed the public nature of the declaration of the Father's Name, that holy, precious Name was not known to all, but only to those "to whom the Son" was pleased to reveal Him. Many heard the Son speak of the Father, but few entered into the knowledge of the Father's Name.
Father Before Time Began
If the Son came to reveal the Father, the relationship must already have existed. Commentators press this point against the idea that God only became Father when Jesus was born.
Bob CostenThis blessed One came into this scene to reveal the Father. Dear friends, God had to be the Father before this, otherwise it would not be a revelation. I know some people think that the Lord Jesus only became the Son when He came into the world, and that may sound very nice as far as human wisdom is concerned, but for the Lord Jesus to reveal God the Father, He always had to be the Father back in eternity, and the Lord Jesus had always to be the Son.
The Father Who Gave His Son
The Father's character is measured by what He parted with. The love inside that eternal relationship is exactly the love He set out to share.
J T MawsonWhat is beyond all dispute is that He, the Son, was loved by the Father before the world's foundations, and that the Father sent Him out, born of a woman. He gave His only-begotten Son, so that the love of the eternal relationship might be revealed to us, who without it would have remained in the power of darkness for ever.
"My Father and Your Father"
After the resurrection Jesus sent a message that had never been true before, and its ground was the finished work of the cross.
William John HockingHe said, "I am ascending to My Father and your Father, to My God and your God" (John 20:17), a declaration not made nor true before. But now atonement for sin had been made… and it was consistent with the glory of God that a new relationship of believers should be announced. Through the work finished upon the cross, our Lord linked His feeble and failing disciples with Himself as His brothers.
This knowledge is not a prize for advanced Christians. It belongs to the youngest in the family.
An Outline of Sound WordsWriting to the babes, the apostle John says, "I write to you, children, because you know the Father" (1 John 2:13). This is not knowledge gained by spiritual growth, but communicated by the Son of God to all in the divine family… As the apostle Paul says, "And because you are sons, God has sent the Spirit of His Son into our hearts, crying, Abba! Father!" (Gal. 4:6).
A Father Seeking Worshippers
The Father is not passive in this relationship. He takes the initiative and looks for a response.
Raymond K. Campbell"The true worshippers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for the Father is seeking such people to worship Him" (John 4:23)… He has made Himself known as a Father seeking and adopting children to worship Himself. God has gone out in His own redeeming love in search of worshippers, seeking them under the gentle name of "Father," and placing them in a position of nearness and freedom before Himself as the children of His love.
Summary
- Eternal. He was Father before creation — otherwise the Son's coming would have unveiled nothing.
- Revealed. No one reached this Name by searching; the Son alone makes the Father known, and that revelation is the heart of Christianity.
- Giving. He gave His only Son so the love of that eternal relationship could reach us.
- Sharing. Through the cross the risen Christ said "My Father and your Father," and the Spirit teaches even the youngest believer to cry "Abba! Father!"
- Seeking. The end of it all is worship — a Father searching out children who will worship Him in spirit and truth.