FATHERHOOD IN GOD AND IN MAN
[p. 186] FATHERHOOD IN GOD AND IN MAN
John 14: 6 - 11; 1 Corinthians 4: 15 - 17; Genesis 4: 16 - 22; 1 Chronicles 2: 50, 51
These scriptures speak of fatherhood, a subject of particular importance in the Scriptures and of particular importance where there are those who love God. For amongst them fatherhood is a great necessity. You will observe that I began with the supreme thought of fatherhood in God as having come out in Christ, for aside from the incarnation we could not have any true knowledge of the fatherhood of God. Then I moved on to a man like ourselves, Paul, who appropriates the idea of fatherhood to himself over against ten thousand instructors in Christ. There were not many fathers; they might have that many instructors for it is much easier to multiply instructors in Christ than it is to multiply fathers.
Then I moved on to Genesis to show how the thought is seen in the world. The world has always imitated. Even Satan is largely imitative in his operations. It can be seen that even in Cain’s family there were persons named fathers of certain industrial lines. In 1 Chronicles we shall see the same thing, only there they are said to be fathers of towns, the great need at the present time! I hope to keep in mind in all this the idea of fatherhood in towns or districts. The thought is spiritual in 1 Chronicles. That is, it is pointing to the time in which the testimony of God should be developed in assemblies and these assemblies are necessarily in towns, or cities, or villages, or sometimes in country districts.
The working out of the divine economy requires fatherhood and I might add motherhood in a spiritual sense. The term ‘father’ is very much used in the Scriptures and is also held to by the leaders of the [p. 187] world. In fact the first son mentioned by the term ‘son’ is Cain’s. Of course, Cain was the first son, too, but he is not called son. His son is the first to have that designation.
Now to come to the New Testament thought of all this, I just wish to speak a little about the Lord Jesus. John the apostle was chosen by the Spirit of God to enlarge on this great subject in the New Testament, obviously because he was the brother who knew love. Then he knew what it was to be the object of it himself. He designates himself under that heading, “The disciple whom Jesus loved”. He was amongst those whom the Lord designated as ‘children’. For instance, He says, “Children, have ye any meat?”. John knew love so well in the Lord and that is where it is fully and rightly known, “Hereby we have known love, because he has laid down his life for us”, 1 John 3: 16. It is there that we know love. John gives us not only the great fact of the Lord’s laying down His life for him, but what he experienced in lying in the Lord’s bosom. One marvels at the liberty he had with the Lord. It was because love was in the Lord. Not only friendly love, the love of brethren, but parental. The love Christ bore for John was parental. John lay in His bosom in that love, parental love.
This is a special gift, John’s being used to bring out these family relationships. It was because he knew love. He says himself, “Hereby we have known love”. One who does not know love is in a very poor way. I am speaking of love as in God, coming out in Christ parentally and shared in a family way by the saints. So shared that it introduces liberty, such liberty, to be, as it were, familiar with the Lord Jesus. So that John can go on to say “That which we contemplated, and our hands handled, concerning the word of life”, 1 John 1: 1. He refers to the Word and the holy liberty which love vouchsafes to us: ‘handled’ the [p. 188] Lord Jesus; so as to place his hand on the Lord and lay his head in the bosom of Jesus.
Well now, I would speak of these words of Jesus which I have read in John 14. The Lord answers Thomas and Philip and says in replying to Thomas, “No one comes to the Father unless by me”. Did Thomas ever know that way? Did he ever lay his head on the bosom of Jesus? That is a question to come home to each of us.
“No one comes to the Father unless by me”. What a statement that was! The Lord goes on to say, “If ye had known me, ye would have known also my Father, and henceforth ye know him and have seen him”; that is how the disciples come into it. It is very interesting to see how the disciples are to be brought into this, and you are to be one of them. I believe heaven is still grouping. One has been in many a group. Not the photographic groups so popular today, but how much more blessed to be seen in heaven’s grouping. The Spirit of God groups people and this disciple whom Jesus loved is particularly placed, in relation to another, the Lord’s mother. It was when the Lord Jesus was on the cross, that He grouped these two persons together. He looks on Mary His mother, of whom Simeon had said, “A sword shall pierce through thine own soul”. How it entered her soul as she stood by the cross of Jesus. Standing by the cross of Jesus, He looked on her and called her, “Woman”: “Woman, behold thy son”. Some of you may have in your minds that He meant His mother to look on Him, but He was directing her attention to John, “Behold thy son”. How beautiful! The Lord is grouping these two persons in a holy bond of love as mother and son. That was one of the most precious acts of Jesus on the cross, placing these two together in love, in the relation of mother and son. He said to John, “Behold thy mother”. That is Mary the mother of Jesus is now John’s [p. 189] mother. How thoroughly John understood it. He took her to his own home from that moment. She was not to be without a son. She is never again to have Jesus as a son; He has taken up a new condition to which that relationship is not attached. But she is not to be without a son. The Lord on the cross rises above all the sorrow and the pain to bring these two together in the bond of holy love. He is doing that all the time. He even comes to natural relations and affections. If the Lord does not bring two together it would never be done. If the bonds are to be in Him, He must do it. That is all I have time to say as to grouping.
Now John the apostle was qualified to deal with this great matter of family relationships. So he speaks to us about Jesus, “The Word became flesh, and dwelt among us (and we have contemplated his glory, a glory as of an only-begotten with a father), full of grace and truth”, John 1: 14. There is very little contemplation, dear brethren, of what is divine. But John says “We have contemplated”. There it was in the midst. We contemplated His glory, and as well there are these words I have read to you, these words of Jesus; He goes on to say, “Am I so long a time with you, and thou hast not known me, Philip? He that has seen me has seen the Father”. Was John here? Very likely. But the Lord speaks to Philip, and He is speaking to me and everyone here tonight, too. Have I been so long a time with you and you do not know Me? Where are we? Christianity is a question of Persons. Principles and doctrines, of course, but Persons. But if we are to know right principles we must be in company with Jesus. The Lord groups us. Local assemblies must be grouped by the Lord. We know who they are and we know the Lord. The Lord says, ‘Have I been so long a time with you and you do not know Me, Philip?’ You say, but the Lord was in the midst of the disciples. Of [p. 190] course He was. In a certain sense the Lord’s home was amongst them. He came in and out amongst them. He would say, as it were, ‘Were you there, Philip, on that day when heaven opened upon Me and proclaimed, Thou art My beloved Son? Were you there then?’ Yes, Philip was probably there, ‘Have you known Me and not gained anything?’ It is a direct question. ‘Didst thou not know Me, Philip?’ ‘You’ may mean any number but it is ‘thou’. Let each answer for himself. How have you been getting along since you began? What have you learned?
Well, the Lord goes on to say, “He that has seen me has seen the Father; and how sayest thou, show us the Father? Believest thou not that I am in the Father, and that the Father is in me? The words which I speak to you I do not speak from myself; but the Father who abides in me, he does the works. Believe me that I am in the Father and the Father in me; but if not, believe me for the works’ sake themselves”, John 14: 9 - 11. He is dealing with Philip, dealing with you or me. He wants to go to the finish in this matter. You began, but how are you getting on? What headway are you making in the truth?
Then the Lord specifies. He does not say ‘My Father and Myself are one Person’. Anyone saying that is wrong. They are not speaking truth but falsehood. There are two Persons. The Lord is dealing with a mediatorial system. So anyone who has seen Him has seen the Father. You say, Well, They are the same Person. But that is not so. There are three Persons in the Deity; the Father, the Son and the Spirit. “The Word became flesh and dwelt among us (and we have contemplated his glory, a glory as of an only-begotten with a father)”. What divine wisdom! so that we can be sons, in the place of nearness prepared and provided so beautifully by Himself. So the Lord says, “He that has seen me has seen the Father”: so perfect was His representation of the Father. That is, you see the Father in that way characteristically, the Fatherly qualities, the parental qualities are seen in that way as He calls them children. The Father’s affections are to be poured into our souls by the son, who has drawn so near that we might be in His bosom — a most delicate, holy and excellent subject. I hope the brethren are beginning to see the idea of fatherhood. “His name is called Wonderful, Counsellor, Mighty God, Father of eternity, Prince of Peace”, Isaiah 9: 6. That is, Father of the age. That is fatherhood in Christ. The disciples, especially John, saw all this as they came into the understanding of the Father. Parental qualities were inherent in Christ Himself, but not simply the representation of the Father’s parental qualities: He had them Himself. He was the Father of the age. So fatherhood is brought very near to each of us.
First we have the contemplation of His glory as of an only-begotten son with a father, the relation of Father and Son. What affections were seen there! How it must have impressed them! One has often thought of the conversations which would take place with Mary the mother of Jesus and John who was now her son. One might well picture that home of love, the holy love instituted by the Lord Himself in His dying moments, “Woman, behold thy son”, and, “Behold thy mother”. That disciple did not hesitate a moment but took her to his own home. What scenes of enjoyment they must have had together as Mary conversed with her son, John no doubt calling her, Mother. She was to know no other home while here below. The working out of that bond must have been wonderful. The thought of both fatherhood and motherhood comes out there.
The idea of fatherhood brings us so close to the Lord that we can be lovers. Wonderful love, that one can lay his head in His bosom. So that is another [p. 192] thing to be seen, there is no distance to be covered there. Fatherhood was there representatively, mediatorially and also inherent in Himself: He was the Father of the age.
Then this is worked out in us, dear brethren. That is where Paul comes in. He shows the gain of fatherhood amongst the saints. He uses the word, ‘children’, the most distinct family name. Paul takes the ground of fatherhood in 1 Corinthians with the most difficult of children. I know how parents feel bringing up their children. The family at Corinth were the most unruly children. He says, You may have ten thousand instructors (I do not suppose they actually had ten thousand instructors, but it would be a prophetic utterance, pointing to the many instructors turned out by the seminaries of today), but he says, You have not many fathers. In Christ I have begotten you through the gospel. That was a heavy piece of work, one of the heaviest pieces of work Paul did. The Lord said to him, “I have much people in this city”. He did not say, many children for you. But I have much people, potential children. Paul went into that city to get these people. All that was common in Corinth was participated in by these people until Paul went there. Then the Lord appeared to him by night: ‘No one will hurt you, Paul, I will be with you’. Paul set to work to get these people. As Paul walked down the street, he would see a man and say, Is that one of them? That would be the current of his mind. He and two others started there and preached the Son of God. Why did he preach the Son of God? Because he had the family side of the truth in view for them. The Son of God is Son over the house.
So Paul, Silvanus and Timotheus preached the Son of God. As preaching the Son he would bring in the Holy Spirit, too, and so he says in 1 Corinthians 8, “To us there is one God, the Father”, ‘To us’ — that is, christians. And then “one Lord. Jesus Christ”. He would keep that before them and he would bring out the affections that existed between the Father and Son. The Lord says, “Thou lovedst me before the foundation of the world”, John 17: 24. Oh, you say, then He was Son then. That is saying more than Scripture says. “Add thou not unto his words, lest he reprove thee, and thou be found a liar”, Proverbs 30: 6. That Person was there before the foundation of the world. Love was there then, love between the Persons. Sonship is, however, a matter of time. The Lord Jesus entered into it to bring the Father to us. “The only-begotten Son, who is in the bosom of the Father, he hath declared him”, John 1: 18. So that fatherhood may be really known, and sonship known, too.
So that Paul preaches the Son of God at Corinth. He, Silvanus and Timotheus all preached the Son of God. Paul would delight to listen to the other two. But there was a threefold testimony to the great truth of the Son of God, to the family idea. So these three preachers stress the thought of the Father, Son and Spirit. So that in setting down worship for us, it is one God and Father. Think of Paul, Silvanus, and Timotheus sitting down with the disciples at the Lord’s Supper on the first day of the week. One would have loved to have heard what they said. We have indeed heard what they said, the Holy Spirit has carried it down, what they said, how they worshipped by the Spirit of God. You can see, dear brethren, how Paul brought this, the thought of the Father and Son, in at Corinth amongst such an unruly group of christians. He does not include the ten thousand instructors, not even Silvanus and Timotheus, but he says, as taking the matter up in fatherhood, “I have begotten you”. He does not say that Timotheus has begotten you. No, he brings out real fatherhood. We might say that he was the father of [p. 194] Corinth. It is wonderful how the Holy Spirit has handed all this down, to bring out the wonderful qualities of this father. Paul says, ‘There is my son Timothy, he will come among you. He is a child of mine, I have been a true father to him’. Paul and Timotheus together, what a relationship! ‘You have seen this’, Paul says, ‘Now I have sent him back to you as my child. You know by my child what a father he has’.
That is in measure what is seen in Christ. You see the Father in Christ in that way, only that the Lord Jesus is never called a child of God. In Matthew He is called the little Child; but never a child of God. It was the Son who revealed the Father. He is in the bosom of the Father. All those affections come from the Father to the Son and from the Son to His own. That is the real thought of fatherhood and sonship. Paul says, ‘That is what I want amongst you at Corinth. You want fatherhood there’. Timotheus is not called a father but a child, ‘I have sent my child Timotheus, to bring all that back, that he may train you and that you may see my fatherly ways in him’.
Now to come to this matter of fatherhood in the world, we do not want it to come in amongst us. Cain had a son and he called his name Enoch. As we drew attention to it before, this is the first mention of the word ‘son’. This Enoch is Enoch the third from Adam, on the natural side. We get Enoch the seventh from Adam on the spiritual side. This Enoch’s name is plastered all over the town. I do not want my name to be down in this world. A spiritual man would not want to be mayor of the town. I am not saying a word against mayors; I thank God for them. I am speaking of christianity. The world places their sons in front of the city, as doctors, lawyers, politicians. Make them something, that is line of Cain, the first son mentioned. There [p. 195] is the natural again; it is always first. Then we get Lemech, he introduces polygamy. He has two wives, Adah and Zillah. The firstborn is Jabal, father of a certain line, of a certain class, the industrial or farmers. Then his brother, Jubal, the father of music, the father of concerts; that was to occupy the farmers. Farmers are liable to be depressed; we usually find it so. Well, give them some music, you see, keep them going and leave God out. Leave out the Lord but keep these farmers up, they provide the food. We must keep them going. Well, you see, he is the father of all that. Then we have another one, Tubal-Cain. Cain’s name is carried on. He was an instructor in brass and iron, a mechanic, the forger of every tool. The word ‘tool’ is being used much lately. If you can make tools, you can find employment. But then you must have the wheat. We must have food. The prominent thought of the world is food. This country has a wonderful place in that way. God has been pleased to use it for humanity, as the storehouse of the food supply. So it comes to this, that you must have food to keep the people alive. Then plenty of music, and so on, but never a thought of God; let it take the place of God. I am speaking of fatherhood in the world.
A forger of every tool: think of that, the product of the man who introduced polygamy, the satisfying of his own unbridled lusts. That is Cain’s world and it has all come back again under the guise of Christianity. You will never get the family thought there. If you shut God out you will never get the idea of father and son properly.
So I come to Chronicles to show how you get the spiritual genealogy of persons who are fathers. “These are the sons of Caleb, ... Shobal, the father of Kirjath-jearim”. This is the divine genealogy. We all want to be in that. You will discern in all this the wonderful exodus from the natural to the spiritual.
[p. 196] In the first chapter we get the sons of Japheth and Ham, before the sons of Shem. The spiritual is last. That which is first is natural. Then when you get to Abraham’s line, you get Ishmael’s generations before Isaac’s. When you come to Isaac, his sons are Esau and Jacob, Esau first. That is the natural is first. It is always that way, but God can afford to be last. The devil comes in first, but God says, ‘I have Mine, too’. So we come to the second chapter here, to the sons of Israel. The name is changed. It is a spiritual world. God called him Israel instead of Jacob. Among all this you get fathers, fathers of towns. Now that is the point of greatest importance in all I have to say. You need fathers in this town, fathers of the place on the spiritual line as seen in this chapter. We have the sons of Caleb, not Caleb the son of Jephunneh but Caleb the son of Hezron. He has sons who were fathers of towns. The great need of the moment is fatherhood, the experience of fatherhood affections. I have had experience with children; I have brought them up, the father is saying, I can say, still, “His life is in him”. I have such experience as to be able to say his life is in him; he is still living, that is the idea — to nurture the youth.
God bore with their manners forty years in the wilderness and what manners they were! What manners Paul bore with at Corinth. What manners were there. What manners are here in this city. Think of Eutychus getting careless while the most wonderful ministry was being given. He was sitting in the window and fell from the third floor, and it says that “he was taken up dead”. But Paul says, Not so. Not where you have love in the brethren. Paul embracing him, says, “His life is in him”. Do not let the boy go. His life is in him. Give him to his mother, the motherly care of the brethren.
Think of that Shunammite. The prophet says, ‘Call her’. He says, ‘There is the boy, take your son away, a living boy’. That is what is needed. When Elisha met the Shunammite (she had come herself, and he could see there was something very wrong), he says to Gehazi, ‘Take my staff and lay it upon the child’. The mother of the child says, ‘That will not do this time, you cannot deal with this matter from a distance, you must see the boy, and have to say to the boy; you must come with me’, says the woman, ‘I will not leave you’. Elisha was too great a servant of the Lord not to heed this cry. So Gehazi returned, saying the lad is not awake. You must go. You must go to that boy, talk to that boy; have to do with that boy, if you are to have him. He went with the mother of the child.
When he comes to the door he goes in alone, shuts himself in with the boy, puts his mouth on his mouth, his eyes on his eyes, and his hands upon his hands, and the boy began to be warm. Began to be warm, that was all. This matter requires great exercise. The prophet walks through the house. What have you in this house? something perhaps in the way of reading, poisonous literature, which has brought about this death. Then he went back and bent over the boy; the boy sneezed seven times; it is a long matter, but it is a living matter. We get the thought in Adam, he became a living soul through the breath of God. So the boy sneezed seven times. Elisha calls the mother, saying, “Take up thy son”.
It is the same today if we are to do anything in these cases, to present to the mother a living boy. She takes him; there has been a complete victory over death, through personal contact.
May God bless these words that there may be fatherhood with us in a true sense.