Do You Know God as Father?

David Platt got me thinking. He posted to the Brooks Hills Global Blog yesterday, working out the subject "Do You Know God as Father?" [Very good read, which I highly recommend].

As I thought about his question, my immediate answer was, "of course I know God as Father," but the more I thought about it, the more I realized that I had assumed the fact that God is my father, but never worked through what that might actually mean to me. In other words, I had a very shallow understanding of what it means that God is my [for me when I say my, I am thinking very personally] father.

This called for desperate correction. Especially in light of J. I. Packer's comments, as quoted by Mr. Platt:

What is a Christian? The richest answer I know is that a Christian is one who has God as father. If you want to [know] how well a person understands Christianity, find out how much he makes of the thought of being God's child, and having God as father.

[Gulp!] Kind of guilty on that account. I could wax eloquent on what it means for God to be my father, but honestly, did I make much of that fact? No.

This called for a serious effort to think through and grasp what it means that God is my father. So for the next year [well 13 months], as I do my McCheyne Bible reading plan, I'm going to focus on how the Scriptures reveal God as our Father.