From the first of God's instructions to His people He has made it clear that He desires those who believe in Him to consider Him as their Father. Deuteronomy 14:1,2 states, "You are the children of the LORD your God; you shall not cut yourselves nor shave the front of your head for the dead. For you are a holy people to the Lord your God, and the Lord has chosen you to be a people for Himself, a special treasure above all the peoples who are on the face of the earth."

Throughout his book Isaiah described our position as children of the living God, as in Isaiah 63:16 "Doubtless You are our Father, though Abraham was ignorant of us, and Israel does not acknowledge us. You, O Lord, are our Father; our Redeemer from Everlasting is Your name.". He continued in Isaiah 64:8,9, "But now, O Lord, you are our Father, we are the clay and You our potter; and all we are the work of Your hand. Do not be furious, O Lord, nor remember iniquity forever; Indeed, please look - we all are Your people!" In this passage Isaiah was calling for mercy from the Lord God because of the grievous sins of the people. He acknowledged that their sins were so terrible that they deserved to be destroyed. He called upon god to remember that we are imperfect clay vessels to be worked by God as the Father-potter. As the potter develops the clay in forming a vessel He works the clay over and over, removing the stones and imperfections until the potter has a perfect vessel. Isaiah here calls for God to continue to work with us, not to become so angry as to destroy the vessel completely as the imperfections continue to interfere with the development for us that God has in mind. Isaiah calls upon god for mercy because God is our Father and we who believe in Him are His children.

The Fatherhood of God was discussed periodically throughout the old testament, but the full extent of the relationship between the Father God and His children strongly was emphasized repeatedly by Jesus Christ during His ministry on Earth. The apostles continued this emphasis after Jesus' resurrection and ascension. Throughout the New Testament we are exhorted to enter into the Christian lifestyle as regenerated sons and daughters of God who exhibit the nature of God to a lost and dying world for whom Jesus Christ gave His life at Calvary.. In Matthew 5:43-48 Jesus stressed the responsibility of Believers to reveal God's nature to mankind, "You have heard that it was said, `You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.' but I say to you, love your enemies, bless those who curse you, do good to those who hate you, and pray for those who spitefully use you and persecute you, that you may be sons of your Father in heaven; for He makes His sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the just and on the unjust. For if you love those who love you, what reward have you? Do not even the tax collectors do the same? And if you greet your brethren only, what do you do more than others? Do not even the tax collectors do so? Therefore you shall be perfect, just as your Father in heaven is perfect."

Jesus continued this concept in His sermon on the mount In Matthew Chapter 6 where He taught His followers to pray. Reading from verse 6 through 15, "But you, when you pray, go into your room, and when you have shut your door, pray to your Father who is in the secret place; and your Father who sees in secret will reward you openly. And when you pray, do not use vain repetitions as the heathen do. for they think that they will be heard for their many words. Therefore do not be like them. for your Father knows the things you have need of before you ask Him. In this manner, therefore, pray: Our Father in heaven, hallowed be Your name. Your kingdom come Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread. And forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors. And do not lead us into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one. For Yours is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever. Amen. for if you forgive men their trespasses your heavenly Father will also forgive you. But if you do not forgive men their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses."

In His model prayer [see Prayer] Jesus points out the necessity for us to give God recognition and honor as the creator who deserves all honor and praise. Only after this recognition of the Father God's true position at the seat of all power and glory are we to present our requests to Him. We are to believe God to provide us with our daily food and other needs. We are to recognize and confess our shortcomings, asking God for forgiveness which He promises to do just as we extend that same forgiveness to other human beings who have offended us. Here God is expecting us to exhibit the godlike attributes which he extends to us. As children of God we are expected to show a family resemblance that can be recognized by others.

The Father God knows that in our own knowledge and strength we cannot assume the loving, godly attributes He expects of us. Therefore Jesus follows with instructions concerning how to achieve the characteristics demanded of us. Jesus stated in Matthew 7:7-12, " Ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives, and he who seeks finds, and to him who knocks it will be opened. Or what man is there among you, who, if his son asks for bread, will give him a stone? Or if he asks for a fish, will he give him a serpent? If you, then, being evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father who is in heaven give good things to those who ask Him! therefore, whatever you want men to do to you, do also to them, for this is the Law and the Prophets."

In Luke 11:13 Jesus is quoted as stating, "If you, then being evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your heavenly Father give the Holy spirit to those who ask Him!" In this passage Jesus recognizes the fact that the exhibition of the nature of God through His children is impossible without the enabling infilling of the Holy Spirit Who was sent by Jesus Christ after His ascension. Jesus fully acknowledged that Christians could not develop a Christ-like nature on their own, but that this can be accomplished through the infilling of the Holy Spirit Who is known as the comforter. Through the subjection of our lives to the guidance of the Holy Spirit we are to exhibit the fruit of the Spirit which is described by St. Paul in Galatians 5:22-25, "But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, long-suffering, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control. Against such there is no law. and those who are Christ's have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires. If we live in the Spirit, let us also walk in the Spirit."

The description of the fruit of the Spirit can be recognized as the attributes of our loving Father in heaven, the Lord God of all creation. As expressed in our colloquialisms such as "Like Father, like son." or, "The apple doesn't fall very far from the tree." If God truly is our Father through the regenerating forgiveness in the blood of Jesus Christ then we'll begin to look like true children of God. If the attributes of our natures do not resemble those expressed as the fruit of the Spirit then we should begin to consider who our father must be. According to Jesus Christ there are only two fathers for mankind. One is the Father God and the second is Satan. We should question ourselves to see if we truly have submitted our lives in an intimate relationship with the Lord Jesus Christ through Whose blood we gain access to the throne of God for all of our needs.

On the night before His crucifixion Jesus had prepared for Himself and His disciples a meal which is called the last supper. Here Jesus talked at length with His disciples about their need to maintain close fellowship with the Father God as they carry out His mandate to be His witnesses. Jesus reminded them in St. John 15:16, 17, "You did not choose Me, but I chose you and appointed you that you should go and bear fruit, and that your fruit should remain that whatever you ask the Father in My name He may give you. These things I command you, that you love one another."

The whole concept of salvation and fellowship with Jesus Christ and the Father God is based on the love of God which we are to assimilate into our own beings through the Holy Spirit anointing. Jesus expanded this idea in St. John 16:23-28, "And in that day you will ask Me nothing. Most assuredly I say to you, whatever you ask the Father in My name He will give you. Until now you have asked nothing in My name. Ask, and you will receive, that your joy may be full. these things I have spoken to you in figurative language; but the time is coming when I will no longer speak to you in figurative language, but I will tell you plainly about the Father. In that day you will ask in My name, and I do not say to you that I shall pray the Father for you; for the Father Himself love you, because you have loved Me, and have believed that I came forth from God. I came forth from the Father and have come into the world. Again, I leave the world and go to the Father."

Jesus ascended to the Father God in Heaven after the crucifixion and resurrection. He left to His followers down through the ages the task of spreading the Good News of Jesus' forgiveness and salvation which brings us back into fellowship with God. It is God's desire that mankind be reinstated into the original fellowship that God and man enjoyed in the Garden of Eden before mankind fell away from fellowship with God through rebellion.. Now mankind can return to this one-with-one relationship with the Father God on a one-person basis as each of individually makes a conscious choice to forsake the ways of rebellion and sin, repent and confess our sins and receive forgiveness and acceptance and adoption into the family of God through faith in the purpose and sacrifice of the Lord Jesus Christ.

In His last, agonizing prayer in the Garden of Gethsemane Jesus prayed earnestly to the Father God that His followers would have the direction, guidance and protection that they would need to conduct themselves as believers in the future. Jesus prayed, St. John 17:20-26,

I do not pray for these alone, but also for those who will believe in Me through their word; that they all may be one, as You, father, are in Me, and I in You; that they also may be one in Us, that the world may believe that You sent Me. And the glory which You gave Me I have given them; that they may be one just as We are one: I in them, and You in Me; that they may be made perfect in one,and that the world may know that You have sent Me, and have loved them as You have loved Me. Father, I desire that they also whom You gave Me may be with Me where I am, that they may behold My glory which You have given Me, for You loved Mebefore the foundation of the world. O righteous Father! the world has not known You, but I have known You; and these have known that You sent Me. And I have declared to them Your name, and will declare it, that the love with which you loved Me may be in them, and I in them."

Paul reiterated the idea of the Fatherhood of God to Believers in Christ Jesus in Romans 8:11-17 "...if the spirit of Him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, He who raised Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through His Spirit who dwells in you. Therefore, brethren, we are debtors-not to the flesh, to live according to the flesh; for if you live according to the flesh you will die; but if by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body, you will live. For as many as are led by the Spirit of god, these are sons of god. For you did not receive the spirit of bondage again to fear, but you received the spirit of adoption by whom we cry out, `Abba, Father'. The Spirit Himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God, and if children, then heirs-heirs of God and joint heirs with Christ, if indeed we suffer with Him, that we may also be glorified together."

This adoption into the family of God earlier was discussed in St. John 1:10-13, speaking of Jesus Christ, "He was in the world, and the world was made through Him, and the world did not know Him. He came to His own, and His own did not receive Him. But as many as received Him, to them He gave the right to become children of God, to those who believe in His name: who were born not of the will of man, but of God." When we refer to being `born again" we refer to this adoption into the family of God with God as our Father and Jesus Christ as our senior Brother. We truly take on a new, rich existence through the mercy, grace and power of God because of Jesus' willingness to make the supreme sacrifice for us on the cross of calvary. On the [see sermon on the Cross]cross Jesus, as the sacrificial lamb for the sins of mankind gave His blood for us that our sins might be washed clean, forgiven and forever forgotten as Jesus' death became our death to sin and degradation. Even as Jesus Christ rose from the dead even so do we arise into new life in belief in Christ Jesus as joint heirs with Him in the family of God.

Paul discussed this concept in greater detail in Galations 3:26-4:7,

"For you are all sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus. For as many of you as were baptized into Christ have put on Christ. There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is neither male nor female; for you are all one in Christ Jesus. And if you are Christ's, then you are Abraham's seed, and heirs according to the promise. Now I say that the heir, as long as he is a child, does not differ at all from a slave, though he is master of all, but is under guardians and stewards until the time appointed by the father. Even so we, when we were children, were in bondage under the elements of the world. But when the fullness of the time had come, God sent forth His son, born of a woman, born under the law, to redeem those who were under the law, that we might receive the adoption as sons. and because you are sons, God has sent forth the Spirit of His son into your hearts, crying out, `Abba, Father!' Therefore you are no longer a slave, but a son, and if a son, then an heir of God through Christ."

Few Christian believers truly achieve the full rights we have through this adoption as sons and heirs into the family of God, partly because we have been taught to believe that being humble equates to being poor, sickly and down-trodden. The truth is that we have been promised health and spiritual and material abundance as evidenced in 3 John v.2, "Beloved, I pray that you may prosper in all things and be in health, just as your soul prospers". God is aware that His message cannot be carried throughout the World by poverty-stricken believers. It requires a strong financial base to effect communication with the world's masses and to travel throughout the world with Christ's message. If Satan can convince Christians that they need to live in poverty there will be no money to evangelize the world. Christians are to enjoy abundance not so that they can focus on the pleasures of this world but so that they can work lovingly, effectively and efficiently for our Father's kingdom to bring redemption to lost souls.

While not proposing false humility through living in abject poverty and sickness, both James and Peter advised us to humble ourselves before God and not to have a haughty and proud spirit. James 4:1-10 states, "Where do wars and fights come from among you? Do they not come from your desires for pleasure that war in your members? You lust and do not have. You murder and covet and cannot obtain. You fight and war. Yet you do not have because you do not ask. You ask and do not receive, because you ask amiss, that you may spend it on your pleasures. Adulterers and adulteresses! Do you not know that friendship with the world is enmity with God? Whoever therefore wants to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of god. Or do you think that the Scripture says in vain, "The Spirit who dwells in us yearns jealously'? But He gives more grace. Therefore He says: God resists the proud but gives grace to the humble. Therefore submit to God. Resist the devil and he will flee from you. Draw near to God and He will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners; and purify your hearts, you double minded. Lament and mourn and weep! Let your laughter be turned to mourning and your joy to gloom. Humble yourselves in the sight of the Lord, and He will lift you up."

Peter, discussing the same concepts encourages us, 1 Peter 5:6,7 and 10,11: "Therefore humble yourselves under the mighty hand of God, that He may exalt you in due time, casting all your care upon Him, for He cares for you... but may the God of all grace, who called us to His eternal glory by Christ Jesus, after you have suffered a while, perfect, establish, strengthen, and settle you. To Him be the glory and the dominion forever and ever. Amen."

Both James and Peter here are encouraging us to have the same attitude toward the world and toward mankind that Jesus exhibited. Jesus was rejected by the world because mankind had the wrong idea about what the Son of God should be and of how He should act. They were looking for a strong warrior-type of figure who would with power and authority smash their enemies, crushing them to powder and then exalt His people who would rule as conquerors over their enemies. This was not the role that Jesus was to perform at that time, nor is that the role that Christians are to perform at this time. Jesus, exemplifying the love of God, came to seek and to save the lost. He came to offer us a way out, to offer pardon from the judgment of death for the life of sin that we had chosen. He came to rescue the lost sheep of this world, to bring them back to the sheepfold of God so that they might be reinstated into the family of God.

To reveal the true nature and power in the love of God He healed the sick, fed the hungry, raised the dead, and brought deliverance to those who were held captive by Satan. He commanded His followers to do the same so that the Love of the Father God might be exhibited to mankind. All of this was to be done in Humility, recognizing that the power to do these works come for God. Jesus emphasized this in Luke 10: 17-20 after seventy followers were sent out to perform miracles in Jesus' Name. "Then the seventy returned with joy, saying, `Lord, even the demons are subject to us in Your name.' And He said to them, `I saw Satan fall like lightning from heaven. Behold, I give you the authority to trample on serpents and scorpions, and over all the power of the enemy, and nothing shall by any means hurt you. Nevertheless do not rejoice in this, that the spirits are subject to you, but rather rejoice because your names are written in heaven.'"

Jesus has extended to present day believers this same command to bring the delivering and healing power of God to the masses of the world so that others may believe and be saved from their sins and brought into the family of God. The command has never been rescinded and will continue to be a requirement of believers until Jesus returns.

The day when Jesus Christ returns as Warrior-King shortly will arrive. At that time Jesus will perform the role of Judge of the living and of the dead. But on that Day the time of mercy and grace will have ended. The world then will be cleansed of all who prefer to live in sin and pride and in disobedience to the will of God. Those who have chosen to humble themselves before God as obedient children throughout this church age will be exalted. They shall rule and reign with their Lord and Savior Jesus Christ in the Father God's eternal Kingdom of joy and peace here on Earth and in the new Earth which is to come after the 1000 years' reign.

[Go to the Altar] If you never have taken the opportunity to accept God' offer of forgiveness for all of your sins and to be brought as a child into the family of God and would like to have the assurance that your soul is secure for all eternity, please repeat these words, "O, God, I believe that Jesus Christ is your only conceived Son Who came to Earth to be The sacrificial Lamb of God to take away the sins of all who believe in His substitutionary death for our sins. I confess that I have sinned. I have come short of your requirements for my life. I accept the death of Jesus Christ on the Cross for my sins. This makes me Your child, adopted into the family of God through Christ Jesus Whom I now make Lord of my life. I will follow You in all of my ways from this day forward." If you meant that prayer God accepts you into His family. God is your Father. Jesus is your senior brother. Your sins are washed away, forgotten and never to be remembered against you anymore. May your life be a witness to the power, authority and love of the Lord Jesus Christ.