How can I be a better father?

The footnote with the alternate reading in the New International Version says “Or from whom all fatherhood.” Both senses are true. We all get our name in baptism from Jesus Christ; also, all fatherhood anywhere gets its name and primary example from God himself.

What practical benefit does this have for us? First, some people have trouble praying to “our Father in heaven” (Matthew 6.9) because they’ve never known a human father’s love. Perhaps their father died early or their parents divorced or they never knew who their father was or their father was simply unloving and uncaring or a severe disciplinarian or a sexual abuser. In any case like this, identifying God with father might take much imagination, so try this: look at the Ephesians Scripture above, see that the supreme example and first reference point—the model—is not your earthly dad, but is God himself, then turn the ordinary earthly concept in your mind upside down, like turning an hourglass over, and let the sand flow the opposite direction, where you now see that not only your dad, but all fatherhood, has God at the hub instead of your previous earthly experience. Everything else flows from
Jesus Christ.

Knowing that liberates you a lot, and helps in your own acts of parenting. If you didn’t have a good example set by your earthly father, so what? Don’t let that stop you. Use God’s example. Think you can’t do that? Sure you can—you got his power when you first received his Spirit (Acts 1.8) Don’t have the patience? Sure you do—you have his love in your heart by his Spirit he gave you (Romans 5.5), and his love is patient and kind (1 Corinthians 13.4). “God’s own divine nature,” Peter, a husband, and probably a father, called it (2 Peter
1.4).

Don’t know what to do next? Jesus said when his Spirit enters, he’ll guide you (John 16.13). So you really can do this—and very well, too. You really can, by God’s Spirit in you, be perfect as your Father in Heaven is perfect (Matthew 5.48), simply because you can do all things through Christ, who strengthens you (Philippians 4.13). Nothing is impossible for you because God can do immeasurably beyond all we ask or even imagine, according to his power, love and wisdom working in us (Ephesians 3.20; 2 Timothy 1.7).

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