Modeling the Heavenly Father to Earthly Children
A Thoroughly-Incomplete Guide for Christian Dads
by
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Modeling God: COMMUNICATIVE
The Mighty One, God, the LORD speaks … and will not be silent. (Ps. 50:1,3 NIV)
From the beginning, when speaking light into creation, imparting blessing, and commanding the ones made in His image to be fruitful, our heavenly Father shows Himself to be a communicative God. He is not silent. He candidly expresses His thoughts and feelings and shares His design for our lives. The LORD directs us in the right way to go. He praises good and condemns evil. With His words, God consoles the sorrowful and suffering. He readily voices His love for all.
God speaks and makes Himself known to us in many ways. Through the universe, He conveys His unfathomable grandeur and unlimited power. Through the Scripture, He reveals His character, His interaction with His creation, and His will for our lives. Through His people, He provides words to admonish and exhort one another. Through His Spirit living in us, He answers our prayers and speaks directly to our hearts and consciences. The LORD discloses Himself to us.
Fathers and all of God’s people should model this trait of being open and communicative. Humans are meant to live together, and verbally sharing with one another is a crucial aspect of that life. Our LORD has given us the ability to articulate ideas and emotions and to hear one another, and we are to make good use of it. Our words can be a soothing balm of encouragement and healing, or they can be a heart-piercing sword of criticism and degradation. Let our words always be spoken for the good of others. The LORD blesses us with His words, and we are to bless one another with ours, so it is important to remember not to abuse our communicative ability sinfully by spreading discord or gossiping, by lying or hurting, by making false promises, or by taking God’s name in vain. Our voices must be used constructively if we are to model our heavenly Father’s true nature.
When encountering the discouraged, let us dads seek to speak words of support, uplift, and inspiration. When we are aware of those suffering, let our words be comforting, consoling, and restorative. When people are beset by worry and fear, let us voice words of calm, courage, and cheer. When someone is confused about what to do or feeling lost in their life, let us proffer advice and guidance and sympathetically ask them questions, as sometimes just talking through things with someone leads to greater clarity. When others share their feelings of rejection and isolation, let our words of love embrace them and reassure them that they are most welcome.
Our voices should also be used to confront evil; we should never remain silent in the face of wrongdoing or injustice. Just as God condemns wickedness, we too must boldly and vocally oppose any malicious actions. Speaking against wrong can be a first step in stopping its spread.
God openly expresses Himself to us, and we should express ourselves to others, but there must be a balance of judicious disclosing and prudent silence to avoid extremes of speaking and nonspeaking. Being communicative does not mean we have to always be blabbing about whatever pops into our little brains. Let’s not become the over-chatty co-passenger on a long-distance flight who shares his life story with his new, best-buddy seatmate. Nor should we allow our thoughts and emotions to remain bottled-up inside us until we explode like a soda or beer shaken and opened on a hot day. There might be a tendency for some of us, perhaps due to fear or shame or anger, to remain quiet and keep our feelings to ourselves, but let us seek to emulate God’s character of communicativeness and create stronger bonds between us by sharing our inner thoughts and emotions.
This notion of being communicative is especially germane for us men, as we tend to close down rather than open up when it comes to feelings (unless it’s feelings about the new point-guard the home team just acquired). We dads must make extra effort to be willing to share how we feel. We love the idea of the quiet hero, the man of mystery. But God is not that way, and neither should we be. Don’t hide or punish behind a wall of silence. And let us make certain our lines of communication are always open with our children. They need to hear from us, and we need to show that we are eager to listen to them. Communication must be a priority for parents, and we must not let the cares of this world take precedence over spending time just talking with and listening to our kids – not in a cursory way, but really, intently communicating.
God is communicative. Let us seek to be more open with those that the LORD places in our lives, especially with our boys and girls. In doing so, we will be modeling our heavenly Father’s true character and will be guiding them to be confident and free as they share with others.
Takeaways (Communicative)
- God is not silent: He communicates through His creation, through the Scripture, and through His Spirit.
- We dads can model this characteristic of our heavenly Father by being communicative with others, especially our children, openly sharing with them and hearing their words, too.
- We should always use our voices to do good, never evil.
- Communicating freely with our kids will help them to understand the LORD’s nature and will also encourage them to be open and sharing.
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About the Book
Jesus said, “I praise you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth …” (Lk. 10:21 NIV) Jesus called God his Father, and he taught his followers to think of God as their Father too, saying, “This, then, is how you should pray: ‘Our Father in heaven …’ ” (Mt. 6:9 NIV)
The Scripture describes our Father God as loving and compassionate, just yet gracious, merciful and forgiving. But what if hearing the words “Father in heaven” evokes in our children’s minds negative images from adverse experiences they have had with their own fathers on earth? As explained in MODELING THE HEAVENLY FATHER TO EARTHLY CHILDREN, we Christian dads, as well as grandfathers and other influential male adults, have the responsibility and privilege to raise our boys and girls, sons and daughters of all ages, in such a way as to give them an accurate and positive understanding of who God really is. We do this by emulating and modeling divine attributes like justice and abhorrence of evil, but also kindness, wisdom, communication, compassion, and most certainly love. This will take dedication and perseverance; nonetheless, we must rise to this challenge, for our kids will be watching us and learning about what “heavenly Father” really means.
About the Author
Kevin Anthony Keating has worked as a teacher in fifteen countries around the world. He is also author of MUSTARD SEED: A Story of Jesus’ Little Sister (written under a pen name) and of THE HANDS OF JESUS: A Scriptural and Pictorial Devotion and Meditation.