Toward Fatherhood

So if you sinful people know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your heavenly Father give good gifts to those who ask him?

~ Jesus

John Eldredge points out in his latest book, Beautiful Outlaw (which I highly recommend), a great irony of Christianity: in our honest and earnest desire to honor Jesus fittingly, we defy the approachability he worked so hard to demonstrate. We take him by force, shove him back, back, away from us, up to the isolated pedestal we’ve set up for him. THIS is where a KING belongs, we declare, dusting off our hands and bowing, at last satisfied with the severity of our sacrifice.

We gave him up, set him in a high and lonely place, above all others.

He is exalted.

Except this was never what he wanted. Jesus crossed over from the majestic realm of Heaven, to that of men and fallen angels. He put on a smelly, tired human skin. He learned to talk, to walk, to sweat, to yawn, to hurt, to obey. He traveled on foot with men both learned and unlearned, arms around their shoulders, patiently teaching and talking and listening. They fished together, camped in wild places, hiked mountains, sailed seas, rowed boats…healed men. Fed the poor. Raised the dead. Cast out devils. All so these men could know, and teach others, how fiercely and deeply the Father loved them.

“So…” said one of them after a while, “…when do we get to see what the Father is like?”

Anyone who has seen me has seen the Father! So why are you asking me to show him to you?

~ Jesus

It seems silly to me when I read the story.

But not unfamiliar.

“Father, come near!” we cry, “come down from heaven and show who you are!”

“Rain down!”

“Fall on us!”

And on and on.

I don’t say this to denigrate our songs by any means; I LOVE those songs, so raw in their passion and longing and love for the One Who Loved Us First. What I’m saying is that we’ve ALREADY seen the Father. He HAS shown us who he is. But we shove him away, then cry plaintively, “Where are you? When will we finally get to meet you?”

So I have to ask…what if we’re being the standoffish ones in this relationship?

What if he’s already visible and relatable and understandable in this, the real world?