Step 1: “Our Father” - Establishing the Relationship
The Parent-Child Relationship
In the first step of the Lord’s Prayer, Jesus establishes a fundamental parent-child relationship between God and humanity. By using the phrase “Our Father,” Jesus was making a revolutionary statement about God’s nature, especially given the religious context of his time.
Before Jesus, God had mostly been described as a kind of oriental despot that was sometimes cruel and angry punishing God, a God to be afraid of, a God that people felt they needed to appease. Through the image of a father, Jesus transformed this conception into one of loving care and intimate connection.
The Meaning of “Father”
Jesus chose this metaphor deliberately. Living in a patriarchal society, he used the relationship between father and son as his audience would understand it - as a relationship of:
- Inheritance and provision (“All that the father had belonged to the older son”) - Luke 15:31
- Progression and development (“the son moving upward and in time becoming more and more like the father”) - Matthew 11:27
- Love and acceptance, best illustrated in the parable of the Prodigal Son
As stated in the parable of the Prodigal Son: The father came out to meet him and turned to the servants, and said, quick, put a robe around his shoulders. My son is weary from this long travel. Put shoes on his feet as he has walked a long distance over sharp stones. A ring on his finger symbolizing a new consciousness, a new awareness, and go and kill the fatted calf and let us be merry…
The Prodigal Son may be Jesus’ most famous parable since it is virtually impossible to take this parable just literally, it must be read in the abstract with a higher meaning in mind. I choose to interpret it as meaning God’s feminine presence comes to meet us when we move in His direction. The story is about joy, peace and oneness.
The Collective “Our”
Importantly, Jesus didn’t say “My Father” but “Our Father,” establishing a universal relationship where all humans are connected through the same divine source. This creates a spiritual family where all people are siblings.
We are therefore all equally participants in all that the father has. This understanding of our shared spiritual heritage eliminates barriers of separation between people.
The Implication for Our Lives
Understanding that God is “Our Father” means realizing:
- We are loved unconditionally, not because we’ve earned it - Ephesians 2:4-5
- We are loved because the nature of God is love and love has only one desire, Jesus said, and that is to fulfill itself in us - John 4:7-8
- We have a direct, personal connection to the Creator - John 15:5
- We belong to a spiritual family that includes all of humanity - - Galatians 3:28
- God’s nature is nurturing, not punishing - - Ephesians 6:4
God cannot possibly forgive us because God has never blamed us… God, our father is not a male being, but a spirit of life, a responsive expression of our Creator. Always with us. Before we have asked, the answer is there.
This first step in the Lord’s Prayer fundamentally reorients our understanding of God from a distant, judgmental deity to an intimate, loving presence. It forms the foundation for all the steps that follow.