Regional Synod of Canada - Reformed Church in America

Pioneer Christian Monthly

Date - June/92

Contributor - Donald Crowhurst

Title - Fathers

Topic - Parenting

(The first observance of Father's Day took place in Spokane, Washington, June 19, 1910. Jane Addams wrote: "Poor father has been left out in the cold. He doesn't get much recognition. But regardless of his bread-winning proclivities, it would be a good thing if he has a day that would mean recognition of him.") Editor

In a recent interview on "The Hour of Power", Robert Schuller asked William Franklin Graham, "What was it like growing up as a famous evangelist's son?" Among other things, Franklin replied, "Many people when they see Billy Graham on the great silver screen, wonder, 'Is that the same Billy Graham that we see at home?' Well, he's the same!" He went on to say "I'm kind of glad I'm not working for my Daddy. I love him. I serve on his Board, but God called me to a work started by Bob Pierce called "Samaritan's Purse." He told how this organization takes aid to places affected by wars and famines, and uses the opportunity to present Jesus Christ.

"Billy Graham the third", as Schuller insisted on calling him, is now a father himself with four growing children. "My mother said that I deserve every one of them!"

"Daddy...... Dad." A preacher whose name eludes me was standing near the arrival section of a Middle East airport when he heard, above the usual airport noises, an excited high-pitched boyish voice shouting, "Abba! Abba!" When he looked in the direction of the voice he saw a lad running, and then saw him gathered up into the welcoming arms of the man to whom he'd been shouting "Abba! Abba!" The preacher said that while he knew that this Aramaic word for father was akin to "Daddy" or "Dad" in our language, and was the name used by Jesus when praying to the heavenly Father, hearing it in real life, it electrified him. (Mark 14:36; See also Romans 8:15; Galatians 4:6)

Accepting that there is a God, what kind of God is He? The answer from Jesus is "father." The name is given 150 times in the gospels. In the temple at age 12, Jesus said to his earthly parents, "Wist ye not that I must be about my Father's business?" On the cross He cried, "Father, into Thy hands I commend my spirit." In the model prayer He instructed His disciples to pray, "Our Father who art in heaven." Jesus wasn't the first to speak of God as Father. Under the Old Covenant, God was Progenitor, Father of all creation and Father of His chosen people Israel. However, when Jesus chose to refer to God as Father He gave the name a much fuller meaning and it became a high point of revelation. James S. Stewart wrote, "He took this thought that had been a stray guest hovering uncertainly on the dim borderland and circumference of men's minds, and made it the centre of everything... The likest thing on earth to God's relationship to us, said Jesus, was the family relationship, the life of a father and his children... and it changed the whole face of religion." Surely Joseph must have been a man of strength, tenderness and goodness.

Jesus learned more from him than how to plane wood and mend chairs in a carpenter's shop.

"Father" as Jesus used it conveyed the sense of a cherished bond pervaded by love and intimacy; at its best one of earth's loveliest relationships. Such, are my own recollections as I remember my father. When my brother and I last visited, we laughed and wept as we reminisced about our Dad. He was a carpenter, a builder, a lay preacher. While working he sang gospel hymns that expressed his personal faith. He was a good man and kind. Even when he disciplined us we knew he loved us. Maybe the paddling he administered at times did hurt him as much as it did us, even if we doubted it, but we never doubted that he was always there for us; generous, forgiving, encouraging, going the mile as a Dad, and always proud of us. I feel sorry for anyone who hasn't experienced this. It enlarges meaning for me whenever I say, "God my heav enly Father is like that, only more."

And now I, too, am a Dad with three grown children. They call me "Dad" and the word is special because it speaks of a relationship I cherish. A doesn't have to; I didn't request it. I would love her whatever she chose to call me but "Dad" is special. A time ago, I said to my married son, "I know that you know that I love you, but you won't know how much I love you until you look into the face of your own child, feel in yourself the flow of the millennia, and the miracle. The loving tenderness extra that swells in you then will be indescribable. At that point you can say, 'That is how 1, myself, am loved'." He knows now, because now he's a Dad. daughter-in-law calls me "Dad." She

One day when my three were young they cornered me on sofa in the den. "Daddy, who do you love the most?" The only answer I could give, I gave. I said, "I love you all the most" and I elaborated on it. And it was true. I would have died for any one of them. "God loves each one of us as if there was only one of us to love," wrote Augustine in a well-known line. A father wants his children to know that whatever his imperfections, his love is true, consistent, without qualification and never withheld. He hopes that his "love covers a multitude of sins," his sins.

Such love is an incomparable gift for life and it provides the best kind of example. Money and things can't be a substitute for that. As a father I have memories of the days when my children thought me the best. Once when a neighbour kid boasted, "My Dad could beat up your Dad." not to be outdone, he was told, "My Dad is older than your Dad!" We wanted to be examples of the best. One father remembered a time when his boy was an example to him. I dimly recall the poem he wrote about it:

The other night would love her whatever she chose to my son confessed to me some childish wrong, And kneeling at my knees he prayed with tears,

"Dear God, make me a man like Daddy, wise and strong; I know you can."

Later, while he slept, I crept, into his room

I knelt beside his bed and prayed with low bowed head,

"Dear God, make me a child 'like my child here,

transparent, pure, trusting Thee with faith sincere."

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