I may be called to preach the Fathers' Day sermon in church this year which is a big deal for me since it will be only my second time preaching. I want to do my homework properly. I would like to say that in the Old Testament there are no prayers addressed to "Father." How could I search the OT to convince myself that this is a true statement (if it is)?
-john
And he will turn the hearts of fathers to their children and the hearts of children to their fathers
(Mal 4:6)
And he will turn the hearts of fathers to their children and the hearts of children to their fathers (Mal 4:6a)
If you trust FL coding - since determining the criteria fo identify prayers is complex - I'd use
{Label Prayer WHERE Addressee ~ <Person God>}
Note FL has separate entries for God the Son and God the Holy Spirit but not for God the Father.
Orthodox Bishop Hilarion Alfeyev: "To be a theologian means to have experience of a personal encounter with God through prayer and worship."
Thanks MJ. I want to make the point that in the OT nobody prayed to the "Father." Jesus taught us to pray to the "Father" and only then did Christians pray to the "Father." Clearly in the OT people prayed to God but did they pray to him as "Father?"
MJ, I saved the results of your search as a passage list and searched that for "Father" with zero results. Thank you. I think you solved my problem.
I did an OT search for father INTERSECTS <Person God>
You might want to look at Jeremiah 3:4 to see if this is relevant to your quest
John Connell: Thanks MJ. I want to make the point that in the OT nobody prayed to the "Father." Jesus taught us to pray to the "Father" and only then did Christians pray to the "Father." Clearly in the OT people prayed to God but did they pray to him as "Father?"
Not criticizing, but you'd need to be careful exactly what you're saying. During the 2nd Temple period, God as the Father is not particularly unusual, and so, Jesus addressing God as the Father would be pretty normal, at the time.
And if memory serves (not in front of my PC), the Psalms introduced the jewish tradition.
Thanks Graham and DMB for keeping me straight.
Here’s an interesting article on The Fatherhood of God in the Old Testament: https://hrcak.srce.hr/file/250901
DAL
Great find DAL.
DAL: Here’s an interesting article on The Fatherhood of God in the Old Testament: https://hrcak.srce.hr/file/250901 DAL
DAL:
what do you think of Jesus calling God Father, when it seems that His Father was actually the Holy Spirit? strange.
tried several times to format the above so each version was on a different line, but did not seem to work. Nowhere seems to say through the H.S., most if not all say of the Holy Spirit.
Hamilton Ramos:what do you think of
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The thread originator wants to know about father, so maybe it should have been:
DAL: do you know about any resources that deal with the apparent fatherhood of the Holy Spirit in Matthew 1:20, when Jesus elsewhere refers to God as Father and not the Holy Spirit.
{note this was implied because I know DAL, almost always cites good info, but voila}
Are you sure you are using "father" in the same sense as the OP?
The answer of knowledgeable posters is that there is father references in OT to God.
In NT there are key instructions by Jesus to refer to God as Father.
I am calling attention to what seems to be an exception, Mt 1:20 seems to imply that the H. S. is the father of Jesus, maybe the translation is not quite rendered like the original, DAL knows a lot about such things, that is why I asked him.
If the original poster wants to study all about the Father, he should also check the difficult data.
Every time I ask other believers, they keep saying that is Father through the Holy Spirit, but that does not seem to be what is written in Mt. 1:20, so I wanted to know DAL's findings because I know he studies such kind of things.
Another baffling example is Isaiah 9:6
Isa 9:6 For a child has been born for us; a son has been given to us. And the dominion will be on his shoulder, and his name is called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.
Some people think that the above refers to Christ, yet it says that Christ name will be "Everlasting Father", but maybe is not rendered very accurately from the original.
DAL knows more about such things that is why I am interested on what he has to say.
DAL, am I correct in thinking you are an author and teacher?
How did I get so deep in this discussion, when all I did was recommend an article on what the OP asked for 😂😂😂
John Connell: MJ, I saved the results of your search as a passage list and searched that for "Father" with zero results. Thank you. I think you solved my problem. -john
A little more conclusive is father INTERSECTS {Label Prayer WHERE Addressee ~ <Person God>} as it has 14 results!
In particular, 1 Chron 29.10 and Jer 3.4
father INTERSECTS <Person God> INTERSECTS {Label Prayer WHERE Addressee ~ <Person God>} narrows it even further (combines both MJ's and Graham's search).
But it is strange that "father = Abraham" is equated as God (Gen 32.9). I feel a bug report coming on!
Dave===
Windows 11 & Android 8
Thanks Dave. I appreciate the effort.
john