The Church of God Declaration of Faith states, “We believe in one God eternally existing in three persons; namely, the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost.” God’s fatherhood is foundational, doctrinal, and unmistakably Christian. But do we actually know what it means? What seems easy is sometimes difficult.
Intellectually, of course, we know God is Father, and we know this from Scripture. But do we know what it means for God to be a Father? And more than that, what does it mean for Him to be our Father? These are harder questions.
Maybe we don’t really know, at least not deep in our bones. And the consequences are not small. If we misunderstand what father means, then we are not just misreading a metaphor; we are misunderstanding God himself. The way we imagine fatherhood will shape the way we approach God in prayer, how deeply we trust His love, and how we portray Him to the world.
The trouble is that father is one of those words that has become so familiar that it has nearly lost its meaning. Worse, we think we understand it already, so we don’t stop to consider it carefully or even notice that we’ve overlooked it. We don’t ask what God means when He calls Himself our Father. We assume we already know.
And that assumption may be leading us badly astray.
Two Common and Incomplete Ideas
Ask someone what a father is, and you will likely get one of two answers, or a combination of both.
First, he’s an authority figure. He leads. He disciplines. He sets rules and enforces them. Second, he’s a provider. He works to meet physical needs such as food, clothing, and housing.
These are Biblical roles. But they are not the whole picture. In fact, they are the starting point, not the finish line.
If authority and provision are all we think a father is, then we’ve missed something crucial. Worse, we’ve accepted a counterfeit image of fatherhood stripped of its heart. Proverbs 4:23 tells us to protect our hearts above all else. To understand fatherhood, we have to understand the heart of a father.
What Is a Father, Really?
A father does more than provide a home. He creates belonging. He does more than set rules. He subtly shadows his children, protecting and guiding them even when they cannot see it. He does more than discipline. He teaches, nurtures, and restores.
The heart of fatherhood is not control. It is love. Deep, self-sacrificing, relentless, intimate love.
A true father does not simply ask, Have I fed them? He also asks, Do they know I love them? Do they know who they are because of who I am to them?
A child does not only need food. A child needs nurture, attention, affection, safety, instruction, identity, and love. To raise children without affection is to starve them emotionally. To provide shelter but never proper safety is to leave them exposed in their hearts. We tend to separate physical and non-physical needs. I’m not sure Scripture does this in the same way we do. God designed us as whole persons, and He provides for us that way: body, soul, and spirit.
Those of us who are fathers can feel the wrongness of ignoring the non-physical needs of our children. When I’m outside doing yardwork, and I hear my newborn son wake and start crying, I do not say: “Oh, his physical needs are met, so I can leave him be.” No, hearing his cries causes me pain. My heart is inextricably knit up with his. I wash up as quickly as possible to go to him.
Jesus tells us our instincts as fathers are the instincts of fallen humans. He tells us that the good we do, while it is good, is so much less than the good God, as our Father, does and wants to do for us (Matthew 7:9-11). How do you imagine God responds when you cry?
When God says He is our Father, He is not just saying, “I rule over you,” or “I’ll keep you alive.” He is saying so much more.
This is where we need to recover a childish word: Dadda.
The Abba of the Bible
Romans 8:15 says, “You have received a spirit of adoption as sons and daughters by which we cry out, ‘Abba! Father!’” (NASB). That word “Abba” is also used in Galatians 4:6 and Mark 14:36. It’s not a formal title—it’s an intimate one. In the Aramaic-speaking world of Jesus, Abba was a family word; the sort of word a young child would use, like “Papa” or “Dadda” in today’s vernacular.
Some have tried to argue that “Abba” isn’t childish, but that it’s reverent and respectful. That’s true. But reverence and intimacy are not opposites. Reverence does not require giving up on deep intimacy. A child can run into her father’s arms and revere him at the same time. Jesus Himself used “Abba” when praying in the Garden of Gethsemane. It was not casual, but it was intimate. It was the cry of a Son who knew the Father’s heart.
Here’s what we need to see: God does not merely tolerate our closeness. He demands it. He insists on it. He says, in effect, that we cannot know Him unless we come to Him as “Dadda.”
He is not a distant landlord. He is not a cosmic boss. He is not merely “the Man upstairs.” He is Dadda: Father in the deepest, warmest, most essential sense.
Why We Resist
Why do we resist this idea?
For some of us, the word Dadda feels childish. Too sentimental. Too vulnerable. For others, the word is painful. It brings up memories of fathers who were absent, angry, passive, or abusive. The idea of God as “Dadda” feels foreign and maybe even threatening.
So, we retreat into safer roles. We are happy to accept God as the authority figure. That’s clear-cut, impersonal. Or we thank Him for being our provider, another safe distance. But we hesitate to say “Dadda” because that makes us feel like children. And we don’t like feeling like children.
But maybe that’s the point.
Jesus said in Matthew 18:3, “Truly I say to you, unless you change and become like children, you will not enter the kingdom of heaven.” And in Luke 18:16-17, He said, “Allow the children to come to Me, and do not forbid them, for the kingdom of God belongs to such as these. Truly I say to you, whoever does not receive the kingdom of God like a child will not enter it at all.”
We are not just permitted to be childlike before God. We are commanded to be.
The sheep hear the Shepherd’s voice. But what is that voice like? Is it thunder from Sinai? Sometimes. But it is also the quiet assurance of a Dadda who stoops down, lifts up His child, and whispers, “I’m here. I’ve got you.”
Watch the Playground
Still unsure? Visit a playground and watch the dads.
Some stand back and supervise. Some only scroll through their phones. Some bark commands from a distance. While they may be fathers biologically or legally, they are not demonstrating what God intends by “father.”
But then there are the dads on the ground. The ones who kneel to kiss “booboos.” The ones racing with their kids across the mulch. The ones who wipe tears. The ones changing diapers. The ones who cheer, who lift their children high, who laugh and hug and listen. Those are daddas.
And God says: That’s who I am to you.
A Call to Relearn the Word
In the church, we often spend time studying Greek and Hebrew words to better understand Scripture. But perhaps study the words we think we already know. Like “Father.” Like “Abba.” Like “Dadda.”
We need to let Scripture reteach us what those words mean by watching Jesus, by hearing the Spirit’s whisper, by remembering that we are children, not employees, in the household of God. If we take ourselves so seriously that we forget we are children, then we have made a mistake. Who we need to take seriously is Dadda.
And once we remember, really remember, what it means to have God as Father, it changes everything. It changes how we pray, how we suffer, how we trust, how we hope. How we love.
Because there is no safer or better place than being with our Dadda.
Kevin Nordby, Ph.D., is an assistant professor of religion, culture, and philosophy at Lee University.