“DADDY!!DADDY!! Save Me!” screamed the little boy dangling from the cliff!
“Now son, what have I told you about playing by the cliff!" says the dad as he kneels by his child. “If you would’ve listened to me and OBEYED my command, maybe you wouldn’t be in this situation right now kiddo!”
“Dad, I’m sorry! I promise I will listen to you! Just please save me!!” shouted the frightened kid.
“No! Son, what kind of father would I be if I didn’t teach your brothers and sisters why they shouldn’t play next to the edge of the mountain! After all, you reap what you sow!” said the irritated and annoyed dad as he walks away from his soon to be a goner son.
*Slip*
*There goes one hand*
“AAHH!!” shrieks the terrified young man! “Please Dad!!
“You don’t understand my boy! This hurts me more than it hurts you! You’ll understand why I allowed this when you get to heaven! Good bye son! I’m going to your siblings now so I can mourn with them and let them know it will be okay!”
*Slip*
DADDY OR DICTATOR
This sounds like a crazy episode of Law and Order where in the end the dad gets lock up in a psyche ward!
But isn’t it funny that this is the example, preached in many churches, of who Abba Father is. It’s just fancied up with lots of “intelligent sounding” theological terms!
If this is the example of our Father, then I don’t want Him as my Daddy. That is not a loving daddy, That is a dictator! That’s a bully throwing a temper tantrum when he doesn’t get the lunch he demanded!
I hope this illustration will helps us understand why so many people reject the message of Jesus, well really, they are rejecting the message of the institutionalized church, and I don’t blame them. We are told that God kills because people’s bad behavior pisses him off (abortion, homosexuality,).But then He turns around and tells us to be imitators of Him, but then he also says, thou shalt not kill. Which one is it?
SANTA CLAUSE
Our theology has come down to this: if we obey, “sit down, lie down, roll over,” then we will get our cookie. If we don’t, NO TREAT FOR US! We know in our hearts that this is not unconditional love, yet we accept this message as being the heart of the One who IS LOVE itself.
We’ve taught people for long enough that God is like Santa-Clause. “Which list are you on? Naugty or Nice? Ok, you were bad this year Jake so you get a heavy ol’ bag of coal!” For us the bag of coal might look like stage four cancer, a family friend dying, or our house getting ripped apart by a mile-wide tornado!
Daddy is not Mr. Clause measuring our performance, checking the list twice. His will for us isn’t based upon our own righteousness, but it’s based on His heart for ALL of humanity! He is Abba, and like any good Daddy, He wants His kids to be prosperous, healthy, to achieve their dreams and do what they love!
Yet we think that God’s will changes every time we go to the doctor! When we first heard we had cancer, “Well it’s just God teaching me a lesson.” But then when we found out that we actually didn’t have cancer and they mixed up the test results, ”Well, I guess it wasn’t God’s will for me to have cancer.” How can we be sure of anything (aka…have faith) if we are ALWAYS questioning God’s will?
KRYPTONITE
We’ve created a Father who looks like more like a child-abuser than a caring Dad!
Could it be because we are afraid of what love truly looks like?
Could it be that we are afraid to stare deep into the eyes of Mr. Goodness Himself?
I think we are so caught up in our own view of ourselves, that we can’t see us as He see us! We continue to alienate ourselves from Him, coming up with stupid man made theologies about why we deserve punishment! We have such a low sense of self-worth that we’ve created a god who needs to satisfy his “holy justice” against us. After all, this would make sense since sin is his kryptonite.
We’ve based our worth on how well we can please a deity who has been pleased with humanity since the Garden of Eden when He said man was VERY good! Instead of awakening to the gospel that reveals our worth as humans, as children of Abba Father, instead of a worth based on performance!
UNMERITED FAVOR
I think we are afraid to stand naked before him, still ashamed of sin that He
- 1: Doesn’t Hold Against Us.
- 2: Doesn’t Even Remember.
- 3: That He Obliterated In His Death and Resurrection
Maybe it’s because we haven’t stared long enough into His burning eyes of love, that consume everything He glances at?! Maybe it’s because we have yet to understand what GRACE is really about, or better yet, who GRACE really is?!
We have to look at Daddy through the lens of Christ (who He is) and Christ crucified (what he accomplished). Including all the OT scriptures that “claim” Daddy killed people.
GRACE, or the person of Jesus, didn’t just come to die on a cross so we could one day go to a “safe place way up in the sky.” He came to reveal the heart of the Father! He came as the heart of the Father! And with every step, He beat back hell and destroyed that which caused us to alienate ourselves from Him!
GRACE isn’t a cool church word or a lyric in a song. It is the nature of Abba! Grace as a noun means unmerited favor! In other words, the blessings of Daddy come or rather have come to us, through Jesus regardless of how good or how bad we are! It’s simply because of how good HE is! All the time!
HERO
When we read the short story above, did our hearts burn with passion towards the falling boy? I know mine did! I wanted to jump straight out of my seat and slide to the edge of the cliff, grab his wrist and pull him safely into my loving embrace!
If we think that our own hearts want to save this little boy, just on the premise of him being human, with NO regard to his behavior good or bad, why do we think Daddy God is any different? Why do we make Him out to be the enemy instead of the loving, compassionate hero that He is?
DADDY. IS. LOVE. PERIOD.
