The Hebrew Scriptures normally depict God, not as the Father of individuals but as Father to his people, Israel. Pious Jews, aware of the gap between a holy God and sinful human beings, would never have dared address God as Ab (Hebrew) or Abba, the Aramaic word for “Daddy,” which gradually came to mean “dear father.”
Jesus shocked and offended the religious leaders of his day by claiming that he had a Father/Son relationship with the God whose name they feared even to pronounce outside of the temple. Rather than depicting God as a typical Middle Eastern patriarch who wielded considerable power within the family, Jesus depicted him primarily as a tender and compassionate father who extends grace to both the sinner and the self-righteous.
The first recorded words of Jesus, spoken to his earthly parents, are these: “Didn’t you know I had to be in my Father’s house?” (Luke 2:49). In John’s gospel, Jesus calls God his Father 156 times. The most frequent term for “father” in the New Testament is the Greek word pater. The expression “Abba, Pater” is found three times in the New Testament, all in prayer. It is the form Jesus used in his anguished cry in Gethsemane: “Abba, Father, everything is possible for you. Take this cup from me. Yet not what I will, but what you will” (Mark 14:36).
By inviting his followers to call God Father, Jesus made this the primary name by which God is to be known to those who follow him. Because of Jesus, we can boldly pray the prayer he taught his disciples, “Our Father who art in heaven....”
Praying to Ab, Abba
Most of us have heard the story of the prodigal son numerous times. But have you ever noticed that Luke 15:20 states that the father saw his son while he was still at a distance? The NIV says that his father spotted him while he was still a long way off. This detail is there for a reason. It implies that the heartbroken father has been eagerly looking for his son, longing for him to come home.
Though not a prodigal, April Antoniou-Becker experienced something similar.1 April hadn’t seen her father since she was an infant. She knew his name was Scott Becker but that’s a pretty common name so she had few leads to go on. What April didn’t know was that her father had been searching for her for the last thirty years. He’d spent thousands on private detectives who were never able to locate her, so he launched a website entitled “AprilBecker.com” hoping it would eventually lead him to her. Eventually, April googled her own name and guess what? The opening line of AprilBecker.com came up on the screen: “Scott Becker Looking for April.”
When the two were reunited, here’s how April characterized her experience: “He is absolutely my father. I just felt like I wasn’t complete and now I feel peace.” Both father and daughter felt the anguish of being separated for so many years. Her father echoed her experience, saying: “I found my daughter. I am finally complete.”
I like to think of God this way, as an eager father searching for his child. We may think we have strayed too far for God to take us back, but he is beckoning us home, watching for us even while we are still a long way off.
- April Becker-Antoniou: Woman Finds Dad by Googling Herself” filed by Bianca Bosker, posted on http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/11/11/april-becker-antoniou-wom_n_354541.html accessed on February 14, 2022.
