What Does The Bible Have To Say About Fathers?

Jun 4

During the month of May, we examined what God’s Word has to say about mothers. We examined joy and pain in motherhood, the God of the woman of Proverbs 31, Eve as the earliest example of a mother, and how Godly women help shape communities.

Throughout June we will be examining what God’s Word has to say about fathers. To get started with this month’s topic of fatherhood we will give a brief overview of what the Bible has to say about fathers. What does the Bible have to say about fathers? What are the hallmarks of a good father according to the Bible?

Word for Father in the Bible

Old Testament

There are a few different words that are used for “father” in ancient Hebrew (the original language of the Old Testament).

There is a word that means to “father” someone in the sense of a verb - to become one’s father. Old English sometimes renders this word “begat” or “bring forth”. This is one of the most common occurrences of fathers throughout the Old Testament showing up throughout various lists of family genealogies (See Genesis 10, Ruth 4, 1 Chronicles, Nehemiah 12). This verb shows up almost 500 times throughout the Old Testament. Lots of “fathering” going on!

There is also a noun form for “father” that is used most commonly in speech, dialog, poetry, and descriptions of parental fathers, or ancestors. This word occurs almost 1200 times throughout the Old Testament (more than 200 times in Genesis and 100 times in 1 Chronicles).

New Testament

In the New Testament (originally written in Greek) there are also a few words for father.

The Greek word for parental father or ancestor occurs more than 400 times throughout the New Testament. John’s gospel is where this word most occurs (more than 130 times), most frequently being used in connection with Jesus as God the Son and His Father as God the Father. Other books where the word for parental father occurs frequently are the gospels of Matthew (60+ times) and Luke (50+ times).

The Greek New Testament from time to time will directly quote or allude to what’s known as the Septuagint. The Septuagint is a Greek translation of the Old Testament and intertestamental books written between the time of the Old and New Testament periods (a time of about 400 years). So our English Bibles not only do good work in translating Hebrew and Greek, they also do good work when they translate into English passages that were originally written in Greek, that were quoted or translated from Hebrew. Another language to consider in this study is Aramaic, a common language in Judea during the 1st century. The word “Abba” (Aramaic for father) is used three times in the New Testament. Jesus first speaks this word in Mark 14:36 during the prayer of Christ in the garden of Gethsemane. The word “Abba” again is used in Romans 8:15 and Galatians 4:6 both referring to addressing God personally as our father.

Godly Expectations for Father’s Conduct

Clearly, fatherhood is something that is frequently referenced throughout the scriptures. Our attention ought to be heightened further in this discussion when we realize that one of the Holy Trinity has made Himself known as “father”. As fathers, there is an example for us as human fathers to be found in the very person and work of God the Father. If we miss out on what it means to be good fathers, we miss out on the reality of who God has revealed Himself to be.

Rather than list all of the passages that reference fathers, we will look at a few passages that detail prescriptions for fathers. These passages contain godly expectations for how fathers ought to conduct themselves. Consider these passages as a foundational beginning point to our month of study on fathers:

The first human father was the first human man, Adam. In Genesis 3 we’re told the tragic story of Adam and Eve’s sin against God. We’re told about the curse that comes specifically to Adam details and reveals much of what it means to be a man and father in a world marred by sin:

To Adam, he said, “Because you listened to your wife and ate fruit from the tree about which I commanded you, ‘You must not eat from it,’
“Cursed is the ground because of you; through painful toil, you will eat food from it all the days of your life. It will produce thorns and thistles for you, and you will eat the plants of the field. By the sweat of your brow, you will eat your food until you return to the ground since from it you were taken; for dust you are and to dust you will return.” (Genesis 3:17-19)

In this curse comes details about the work and world of Adam, the first human father. While Eve, the first human mother, would have specifics about her relation to her husband, with the promise of children and accompanying pain (Genesis 3:16), for Adam the specifics would be about his work, provision, and future. We learn, very early on in the Biblical account, that the expectation after sin entered the world is for fathers to work, provide, and die. Work is hard in this sin-marred world, and that includes the work fathers are called to in providing and eventually in dying. Some of the hard work fathers are called to is raising children. For a father to be a father he must have a child. The book of Proverbs is structured early on as a series of lessons from parents, including a father to his son:

Listen, my son, to your father’s instruction, and do not forsake your mother’s teaching. (Proverbs 1:8)

It is implied therefore from Proverbs that If you want to be a good father, you’ll teach your offspring the lessons contained within the book. One of those lessons includes discipline for children. To be a loving father who cares for the future of their child, fathers ought to correct their children, impressing upon them the folly of evil:

My son, do not despise the LORD’s discipline and do not resent his rebuke, because the LORD disciplines those he loves, as a father the son he delights in. (Proverbs 3:11-12)
Whoever heeds discipline shows the way to life, but whoever ignores correction leads others astray. (Proverbs 10:17)
Whoever loves discipline loves knowledge, but whoever hates correction is stupid. (Proverbs 12:1)
Whoever spares the rod hates their children, but the one who loves their children is careful to discipline them. (Proverbs 13:24)

Discipline is an action, when done well, that is a byproduct of love, that reaps a future reward for the child. In their discipline of their children, fathers are not to be harsh, overreaching, or vindictive. Fathers are to be compassionate, even in their discipline.

As a father has compassion on his children, so the LORD has compassion on those who fear him; (Psalm 103:13)

Compassion comes through in discipline rightly exercised. It is compassionate to show what is right, and warn, guard against, and steer away from what is foolish, wicked, and evil. To discipline with compassion is more than simply responding well when children do wrong. To be a father who compassionately disciplines children means to teach them and show them the glory of what is good, righteous, and godly:

These commandments that I give you today are to be on your hearts. Impress them on your children. Talk about them when you sit at home and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up. Tie them as symbols on your hands and bind them on your foreheads. Write them on the doorframes of your houses and on your gates (Deuteronomy 6:5-9)

Parents (including fathers) are integrally involved in raising their children. In raising children there is content that parents are to deliver and characteristics they are to instill and exemplify before their young ones. Deuteronomy gives explicit instructions to parents (including fathers) to instruct children in the commandments of the Lord. Instead of backing down from the parent’s role and example, Deuteronomy doubles down on this expectation for parents:

Fix these words of mine in your hearts and minds; tie them as symbols on your hands and bind them on your foreheads. Teach them to your children, talking about them when you sit at home and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up. Write them on the doorframes of your houses and on your gates, so that your days and the days of your children may be many in the land the LORD swore to give your ancestors, as many as the days that the heavens are above the earth. (Deuteronomy 11:18-21)

A multigenerational hope of blessing is the payoff of all this work as the last verse details. Long and good days in a good land are the hope of the father who instructs their children and lives as an example in the ways of the Lord.

These foundations of provision and instruction are further built upon and succinctly presented throughout the New Testament. We see that God’s expectations and role for fathers have maintained consistency across cultures, languages, and time. God expects and teaches fathers to work, learn God’s word, instruct, protect, discipline, and love their families:

Fathers, do not exasperate your children; instead, bring them up in the training and instruction of the Lord. (Ephesians 6:4)
Fathers, do not embitter your children, or they will become discouraged. (Colossians 3:21)
Endure hardship as discipline; God is treating you as his children. For what children are not disciplined by their father? If you are not disciplined—and everyone undergoes discipline—then you are not legitimate, not true sons and daughters at all. Moreover, we have all had human fathers who disciplined us and we respected them for it. How much more should we submit to the Father of spirits and live! They disciplined us for a little while as they thought best; but God disciplines us for our good, in order that we may share in his holiness. No discipline seems pleasant at the time, but painful. Later on, however, it produces a harvest of righteousness and peace for those who have been trained by it. (Hebrews 12:7-11)
I am writing to you, fathers, because you know him who is from the beginning. (1 John 2:13)
For you know that we dealt with each of you as a father deals with his own children, encouraging, comforting and urging you to live lives worthy of God, who calls you into his kingdom and glory. (1 Thessalonians 2:11-12)
“Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives; the one who seeks finds; and to the one who knocks, the door will be opened. “Which of you, if your son asks for bread, will give him a stone? Or if he asks for a fish, will give him a snake? If you, then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give good gifts to those who ask him! So in everything, do to others what you would have them do to you, for this sums up the Law and the Prophets. (Matthew 7:7-12)

We see in this brief intro that the Bible has much to say about fathers and much to say to fathers. God has not left fathers without expectations, examples, or instruction. God has revealed His expectations for fathers by His Word, God has revealed His example as a good father in His Word, and God instructs fathers through His Word. What an awesome heavenly father we have!

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