Jesus Scares Me

I recently came across a sermon my father preached when I was two years old. Examining the relationship between parents, children and faith, Dad asked, "Parents, where do you supposed your child first begins to pick up an idea of what God is like? From you, of course. From the way you cuddle and nurse and talk to the child. And as the child grows, his or her concept of God is further colored by contacts with other significant adults. We call God 'father' because we think of God as being like a good father. Children have no other way to visualize God except in terms of adults.

Bill with Phil

The other day, my young son Philip looked at a picture of the bearded Jesus and asked me who it was. I said, 'Jesus.' Philip answered, 'Jesus scares me.' And that set me to thinking about how Philip or any child will come to know God. Not by first seeing pictures or hearing stories, but by experiencing God's love channeled through me."

It turns out that I did come to learn many valuable things about God's nature from the love that was channeled through my father. 

Dad was always concerned for my well-being, was always looking out for me ... and so is God.

Dad was both playful and serious ... and so is God.

Dad was called to serve many others beyond his family. There were the members of his congregations who looked to him for guidance, the grieving who needed comfort, the sick who needed to be visited, the needy who came looking for aid. So it was for Jesus.

And with the many demands that others made on my Dad's time and attention when I was a kid, there was plenty of opportunity for me to be resentful of his ministry ... to wish that he was just my dad and not everyone else's pastor. But I understood -- no doubt because Dad made such a point of it -- that his ministry was our family's ministry. We all were part of it. He wasn't appointed to a church; our whole family was. His work was our work, too. God is like that -- choosing to work with us and through us for the good of others, for the good of all.

Dad ended his sermon by saying, "I thank God, as I look back across my life, for the people who disciplined me, the people who taught me, the people who spoke the words and who gave the gentle shoves that challenged me. I have forgotten the people who didn't care, those who were afraid to advise, the ones who were too busy to teach. I remember only, and I thank God for the men and women who saw to it that I came to love and serve God in Jesus Christ through the church."

Thank you, Dad, for seeing to it that I know and love God. I'm happy to report that Jesus doesn't scare me any more. (Well, at least his beard doesn't.) Happy Father's Day!

From "Lent to the Lord"

Scripture: 1 Samuel 1:19c-28

January 21, 1968

Adams Shore Community Church

Quincy, MA