The first words of the New Testament initialize the Gospel by sourcing Jesus to His generations: “Abraham was the father of Isaac.” Jesus became the God-man who could say, “Father is My father, and Abraham is My father, and David is My father.” At the same time, He could say, “Before Abraham was, I AM.”
Jesus accepted responsibility to create what-Father-wants, redeem what-Father-wants, and restore what-Father-wants. He put purpose into Abraham through covenant so He could inherit that purpose and make it eternal secure and perfectly fulfilled. He put something into history so He could inherit it and make it eternal.
Fathering and Your Personal Destiny
Fathering prepares you to inherit something of God’s purpose that unlocks the highest priorities of your destiny: you were created to participate in something eternal! What God starts, He finishes. Not that you cannot personally fall short, miss it completely, or partially fulfill because you can, but He will preserve purpose for millennia is needed and release purpose in a faithful generation.
Your personal destiny is not at its highest because you grab hold of potential. Your personal destiny cannot see its highest until you grab hold of purpose. In other words, there is not success like the success that comes when whatever measure of potential you have realized is a sacrifice to His purpose for your life.
You can be world-class at potential and dud and dead on purpose: gain the whole world and lose? No profit is having it all? Yes, and Christians who use their lives to realize personal potential can also stand on near empty in the end if personal success isn’t poured into eternal purpose. “Lord, Lord, have we not done wonderful works in Your Name? So, how is it that you do not recognize us?”
Since God’s strategy for purpose involves fathers, a fatherless generation is as far from purpose when they are pouring passion and provision into personal potential as Cain. He brought his best to God, but his best wasn’t what God asked for; his personal highest wasn’t even in the ballpark of God’s purpose.
So, how does fathering, which perpetuates purpose, prepare you to inherit purpose?
Fathering Preparation
We have more examples of failure in this question than successes. The failures are often glaring, painful, tragic, and disheartening. The best seem capable of producing the worst! We see that God’s strategies include humans, and we are one generation from pushing the purpose of God into preservation mode.
Fathering works. But the battle against functional fathering is really strong! Fathering works. But the temptation to avoid it is strong. Fathering works. But relationships are messy, imperfect, and complex. Father works. But it only works from the heart, not as a business relationship, a corporate relationship, a friendship relationship. Father works as a fathering relationship.
So, if fathering is so challenging and hell is working so hard to stop it, why did God make this strategy so vital and necessary to fulfilling eternal purpose? God doesn’t have a fathering relationship with angels. He wants a fathering relationship with humans, so the relationship is inherent: God made man in His image and likeness, so we function best when we mirror the relationships of heaven. This is why Jesus prayed that Father would make His kingdom people one as God is one, and this is the meaning of oneness in heaven.
Fathering preparation occurs best in strong relationships because the preparation is so strong. Preparation for inheritance tests the relationship of fathers and children as nothing else. Preparation for personal potential is not so challenging because it involves the use of provision and relationship to get you what you want, what seems most compatible with our self-image. However, purpose runs deeper than self-image and potential, so fathering will demand that we sacrifice ourselves to something higher than potential.
Destiny ties to purpose, not potential. Destiny has a destination chosen by God. Potential is a choice made by us, choosing from the vast ocean of personal potential what we desire to pursue.
To start the “Abraham was the father of Isaac” that led to Jesus Christ, God told Abraham to go when Abraham didn’t know where he was going. Someone said this was God’s way of stopping His children from asking, “Are we there yet?” Actually, it was God’s way of resetting fathering and inheritance, through Abraham, to an eternal purpose.
