Scripture: “And will be a Father unto you, and ye shall be my sons and daughters, saith the Lord Almighty.” – 2 Corinthians 6:18
Examination of Chapter: In this second letter to the believers in Corinth, Paul writes urging them to remember that God’s grace has saved them and will allow them to serve Him regardless of circumstances. He instructs them to associate only with those who are like-minded, that is, to be separate from the carnality of the world and to remember that they are the children of God… He is their Father.
Application: Although Mother’s Day was recognized in the early 1900s, Father’s Day was not made a holiday until 1972. However, it was in 1908 that the first occasion of honoring fathers happened as a result of the dead of hundreds of coal miners in West Virginia. A year later, Sonora Smart Dodd of Spokane, Washington sought to have a day to celebrate fathers. She urged the Spokane Ministerial Association and the local YMCA to do exactly that, and on the third Sunday in June 1910, the first recorded recognition of fathers from the pulpit occurred.
Father’s Day had a hard time becoming a national holiday. It was introduced to Congress in 1913, but did not pass due to opposition from President Wilson. 8 years later, President Coolidge signed a resolution regarding Father’s Day, and in 1962, President Johnson signed an executive order designating the third Sunday in June as the official day of celebrating fathers, but it wasn’t until 1972 that Congress passed it as a national holiday.
While we all have fathers, they are not all worthy of celebrating. While some fathers have been thoughtful and devoted to their children, some fathers are absent from the picture. Some have been uninvolved in their children’s lives intentionally; some have lacked the ability to be loving and caring; some have even been abusive. Some fathers simply don’t know how to show love. But there is one Father who will always love, always care, and never leave His children: God, our Father in heaven.
Our heavenly Father promises to love us eternally as it states in Jeremiah 31:3, “The LORD hath appeared of old unto me, saying, Yea, I have loved thee with an everlasting love: therefore with lovingkindness have I drawn thee.”
Our heavenly Father promises to care for us. Matthew 6:26 records Jesus’ words, “Behold the fowls of the air: for they sow not, neither do they reap, nor gather into barns; yet your heavenly Father feedeth them. Are ye not much better than they?”
Our heavenly Father promises to be with us always. In John 10:30, Jesus states, “I and my Father are one.” He then states in Matthew 28:20, “…lo, I am with you always”, thus the Father will never leave us.
Lastly, when God created man, He did it differently than anything else He had made. All of creation had been spoken into existence, but not Adam. To create him, the Bible records in Genesis 2:7 that God first physically molded man with His hands out of the dust, and then, unlike the animals, to give him life, God breathed into the body He had fashioned. It was, as the Bible records, “the breath of life”… God’s life! “And the LORD God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul.”
Each individual who has ever lived has the breath of God within their body. Regardless of one’s relationship with Him, the physicality of God exists in each human being! And then, when an individual places his faith and trust in Jesus as Lord and Saviour, we are adopted into God’s family, and our heavenly Father’s Spirit comes to dwell within us! 1 John 3:1 declares, “Behold, what manner of love the Father hath bestowed upon us, that we should be called the sons of God”.
Regardless of your relationship with your earthly father, your heavenly Father desires a personal relationship with you that began as a thought in His mind and continues for all eternity. Jeremiah 1:5 confirms,“Before I formed thee in the belly I knew thee;” and He sacrificed His only Son, Jesus, to make possible an eternity with Him as stated in John 3:16, “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.” Oh, what a Saviour! Oh, what a Father!
Moments with God: My dearest heavenly Father, thank You for loving me so much. Your Word tells me again and again how precious I am in Your sight. Thank You for your tender loving care, and the promises You have given me, assuring me that You will always be with me, from now until forever. I am so happy to be in the family of God! In Jesus’ precious name, I pray. Amen.