A year after my salvation, I had breakfast once a week with three or four Christian men. We fellowshiped, prayed for each other, and usually one gave a short teaching.
The only teaching that I can remember from those breakfasts was given by a young man who stated, “Our heavenly Father is a good God.”
As he said the words, a revelation exploded within me: “Of course, that has to be true because my own earthly father is a great dad. So, my heavenly Father has to be a good God.”
This simple revelation has remained with me for more than thirty-three years. It has comforted me in my worst times, just knowing that God is a good God and that He absolutely loves me.
Over the years, I have been with many different groups and befriended many Christians. All have mouthed the words, “God is a good God,” but sadly, I have met very few believers who really, really believe that God is a good God.
It’s not that the believers did not love God because they did. It’s just that the believers did not have the child-like abandon of knowing that the Father loved them and was cheering for them on their good days, as well as their bad days.
Most believed that they had to perform at a certain, but undefined, high holy level so that the Father would love them. They did not see themselves as little children and God as a loving Father who absolutely loved and doted upon them, even when they made mistakes.
Some of these believers had less than perfect earthly fathers, and a few were even abused by their dads. And to be honest, this may hinder a person’s revelation of God being a good God, but at the same time, God is able to give anyone a revelation of His love and goodness. We just need to ask and keep asking until we receive this revelation.
But most (98%) of these believers, who had difficulty believing God was a good God, had Christian leaders over them who did not reflect the Father-Heart of God to them.
For if you were to have countless tutors in Christ, yet you would not have many fathers, for in Christ Jesus I became your father through the gospel. (1 Corinthians 4: 15)
Here for this third time I am ready to come to you, and I will not be a burden to you; for I do not seek what is yours, but you; for children are not responsible to save up for their parents, but parents for their children. (2 Corinthians 12: 14)
Because the traditional church system is set up with a definite separation between the clergy and the laity, most church leaders look at church members as a means for advancing their own personal visions. After all, their personal visions came from God, right? And the laity has been the traditional money-source for hundreds of years, so why change?
The end-time apostles are willing to spend themselves for other believers.
(Continued in Part 4…but if you want to read all of the parts to date, you can go here.)
Larry Who 