| The Golden Gate of Prayer |
Chapter 3 |
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“Our Father which art.” This is one of the great present tenses of the Bible. God is. He is not a being who merely was in the remote past, and is now only a memory. Nor is he a God who is to manifest himself sometime is the future as our judge. He is. He is the living God. He is our Father and he is evermore our Father. There is never a moment when he is not near us, when his ear will not hear our faintest cry, when his hand is not ready to help.
This truth of the living God who is our Father is wondrously rich in its meaning. In these learned days some men like to talk of the God of the universe as a great mysterious force, at the center of things, which in some way keeps all words and all the things in being. But they deny to this great power the elements of personality. They scoff the Christian teaching that this God loves us as his children, that he gives personal thought to any individuals of the race, that he knows our needs or concerns himself with any of the perplexities of our life.
But this naming of our God as “Our Father which art” reveals to us a God who is the same yesterday and to-day,—yea, and forever. All these nineteen centuries his children have been calling him in the same precious way. Moreover, the name Father sweeps away all vague thoughts of God as mere force or power. Father means love, not love merely for a race, but love for his children, a distinct love for each one of them. It means thought and care and providence. Our Father knows us by name and carries each one of us in his heart. This is our Father’s world, and wherever we go we are beneath his eye, near to his hand, and within the circle of his love.
It is the part of faith to realize this truth of the living God, “Our Father which art,” — a Father not far off, but close about us always. We never can get away from his presence. He is a very present help in time of trouble. The Scriptures seem to labor to make this truth plain to us. Underneath us are the everlasting arms — again the present tense gives added preciousness to the teaching. The words are spoken directly to every one who reads or hears them.
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