We do not have the natural right to call God “Father.” That right is bestowed upon us only through God’s gracious work of adoption. This is an extraordinary privilege, that those who are in Christ now have the right to address God in such a personal, intimate, filial term as “Father.”

The next time you attend a prayer meeting, pay close attention to the manner in which individuals address God. Invariably, the form of address will be something like this, “Our dear heavenly Father,” “Father,” “Father God,” or some other form of reference to God as Father. Not everyone customarily addresses God in the first instance in prayer by using the title “Father.” However, the use of the term Father in addressing God in prayer is overwhelmingly found as the preference among people who pray. What is the significance of this? It would seem that the instructions of our Lord in giving the model prayer, “The Lord’s Prayer,” is emulated by our propensity for addressing God as Father. Since Jesus said, “When you pray, say, ‘Our Father,’” that form of address has become the virtual standard form of Christian prayer. Because this form of prayer is used so frequently, we often take for granted its astonishing significance.

The German scholar Joachim Jeremias has argued that in almost every prayer that Jesus utters in the New Testament, He addresses God as Father. Jeremias notes that this represents a radical departure from Jewish custom and tradition. Though Jewish people were given a lengthy number of appropriate titles for God in personal prayer, significantly absent from the approved list was the title “Father.” To be sure, the Jews would use the term “Father” indirectly by addressing God as the Father of people, but never by way of a direct address, in which the person praying addressed God in personal terms as “Father.” Jeremias also notes that the serious reaction against Jesus by His contemporaries indicated that they heard in His addressing God as Father a blasphemous utterance by which Jesus was presuming, by this term of address, a certain equality that He enjoyed with the Father. Jeremias goes on to argue that there is no record of any Jew addressing God directly as Father until the tenth century a.d. in Italy, with the notable exception of Jesus. Though Jeremias’ findings have been challenged in some quarters, it remains a matter of record that Jesus’ use of the term “Father” in personal prayer is an extraordinary use.

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