Your Real Father Is Waiting | A Spiritual Truth

What comes to mind when you think about God as Father?

For some, it's love, protection, and guidance.

For others, it's a much more complicated question.

In this special 100th episode of The Valiant Forge, Mark Osborne explores the Father's heart, the meaning of "Abba," and the relationship that Jesus spent His entire ministry pointing us toward.

Along the way, Mark shares the powerful story of his own father—a man who struggled with alcoholism for years before a life-changing encounter with Jesus Christ transformed him overnight.

Through Scripture, personal testimony, and the story of the Prodigal Son, this episode offers encouragement to anyone seeking a deeper relationship with God and a better understanding of what it means to be part of His family.

Whether your relationship with your earthly father has been strong, broken, or somewhere in between, your story is not the final word.

Your Heavenly Father is waiting.

Scriptures Referenced:

• Psalm 103:13

• Matthew 7:11

• Mark 14:36

• Romans 8:15

• Luke 15

Thank you for being part of the first 100 episodes of The Valiant Forge.

Stay Strong.
Stay Valiant.
Keep Forging Your Path.

Want to be a guest on The Valiant Forge Podcast? Send Mark Osborne a message on PodMatch, here: https://www.podmatch.com/hostdetailpreview/17432638464878159623a121d
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Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

When I was 14, my father gave his life to the Lord, and the man that I knew for 14 years became a different man. Overnight, literally overnight, I woke up that Saturday morning, and he was sitting at the table with the Bible in front of him with a big smile on his face, and he called me over and gave me a hug and told me he loved me. That right there, I knew this Jesus man. God had to be real because I saw it before my very eyes. Welcome to the Valiant Forge Podcast, where Christian men come to forge strength and purpose in Christ. I'm Mark Osborne. I'm the host of the podcast. Before we get into today's lesson, I want to acknowledge that this is the 100th episode of The Valiant Forge. And to everyone who has listened, shared an episode, encouraged me, prayed for this ministry, prayed for this podcast. I just I just want to thank you from the bottom of my heart. I'm truly grateful that God is allowing me to share the words that he gives me on this platform. I was just telling my wife, two and a half years ago, I was like, I need to do something more for God. I need to do something more for God. And here I am today getting ready to go record episode 100 on a Tuesday night after work, after a long day of work, after doing housely duties and spending time with my grandkids, here I am recording episode 100, and it's an important episode because I want to talk to you about how to develop your relationship with your heavenly father and your earthly father. With that being said, again, thank you, but now let's get into today's message. Jesus used fatherhood to teach us about God. In Psalms one hundred three thirteen it says, As a father has compassion on his children, so the Lord has compassion on those who fear him. That's a powerful message, compassion, peace, care, protection, all the things that earthly fathers want to provide for their children. God gives that to us. In Matthew seven hundred eleven it says If you then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give good gifts to those who ask him? Notice what Jesus is doing. He's talking about something we understand, a loving Father, and he's using it to reveal to us how God the Father sees us, how much he loves us. And Jesus was always pointing us to the Father. He was always talking about the Father. Jesus was God in the flesh, but he kept talking about the Father because he was trying to develop that, trying to help us develop that relationship with the Father. I only did the will of my Father. And with our earthly fathers, whether our experiences were good or bad, they left an impression on us. They shape how we think about authority, they shape how we think about love, how we think about trust. And that's why this message is so important. One of my favorite words in the scripture is Abba. I hear worship songs all the time with the word Abba, and I don't know, it just does something to my spirit. When I pray, once in a while I say the word Abba, because Abba is such a deep word. Now a lot of us we call our fathers daddy, and Abba is kind of a way of saying daddy, but in the Hebrew it has such a deeper meaning. In the Jewish culture when you say the word Abba, it's deeply personal, it's relational, it's intimate, and it's a word of trust. In Mark fourteen, Jesus is in the Garden of Gethsemane, and he prays. We know that he prayed for hours, he prayed until drops of blood were falling down. But in that prayer, he prayed to Abba, the Father. He says Abba, Father, everything is possible for you. Take this cup from me. Yet not my will, but your will. He was begging the Father to try to find another way, but he was still being submissive and obedient to what the Father was asking him to do because he knew how important it was. He was connected to the Father. The Father loves us, Jesus loved us, so he knew what he was about to endure. But in that moment of despair he cried Abba. He didn't just say Father. He said Abba, that deep, intimate relational, personal connection. And what's amazing is Jesus invites us into that same relationship. In Romans eight fifteen it says The Spirit you receive does not make you slaves so that you live in fear again. Rather the spirit you received brought about your adoption to sonship, and by him we cry Abba Father. Think about that for a moment. Jesus paid it all so that we can have that same relationship, that deep, personal, close connection to God and Jesus, Abba Father, so that we could understand and know his love for us. And when you understand that love, you understand that you are part of the family of God. Now I'm talking a little bit about the Heavenly Father and our earthly fathers, and then I mentioned family. And when I think about family, it's hard for me not to think about my own father. Some of you have heard my father's story, but if you haven't, I'm gonna briefly describe it. For the first 14 years of my life that I can remember, my father struggled with alcohol. He was a hard worker, and alcohol was one of the ways that he used to decompress and it made him not as present as he could have been. My father was not a bad guy. My father was a good guy. He just wasn't the best father. And honestly, most of us, earthly fathers, we all have our faults. None of us are perfect. But when it comes to my father, what I saw for 14 years was not a real present guy. But then, 14 when I was 14, my father gave his life to the Lord. And the man that I knew for 14 years became a different man. Overnight, literally overnight. He became a different man. And my father didn't do it on his own. Jesus changed him. There was no way my father could have just made that change overnight. It had to be divine intervention from the Holy One, the Father, Abba Father, that changed my dad. What I saw in my father, the drinking stopped. His priorities changed. The man who wasn't always present became present. Like literally the night after my father got saved, I woke up that Saturday morning and he was sitting at the table with the Bible in front of him with a big smile on his face, and he called me over and gave me a hug and told me he loved me. That right there, I knew this Jesus man. God had to be real because I saw it before my very eyes. And then over time the man who needed saving started saving people. Within a year he was preaching the gospel. I remember going out on the streets with him playing my guitar while he was preaching the word to people on the streets. I saw a transformation right before my very eyes, in my father, and one of the greatest gifts my father ever gave me, it wasn't advice, it wasn't the sermons he preached. It was him showing me what surrender to Jesus Christ looked like. Because when my father gave his life to the Lord, he surrendered everything. He surrendered the life he had before. Everything that he knew for that time, he just gave it all up for Jesus Christ. And that stayed with me because you know I became a man, I made my own choices, I wandered, I strayed. If you know my story a little bit, you know I wasn't always as close to God as I should have been, as I wish I had been, but I never completely forgot what I had witnessed. My father's life, his testimony kept me grounded. It kept me from turning and going too far down that prodigal path. Now maybe that hasn't happened in your life, maybe you haven't seen your father turn around. And God has a plan for everybody. Sometimes we have our own free will and we don't make it. But what I'm trying to tell you here is that no matter what you've been through, how you see your earthly father, while it can help you see the heavenly father, Jesus was trying to show us what a true father, what a true relationship with the Father should be by the relationship he had with his father. And that's the relationship we are supposed to develop with God. I'm just gonna mention one more Bible story about fathers and the heart of the father, and Jesus gave us this example to show how much our heavenly father loves us. It's the prodigal son. You already know the story. The son leaves home, rejects his father, takes his inheritance, goes out and blows it. And when he was down on his luck, he decided he was going to go back home. When he was going back home, he was expecting some consequences. He wasn't expecting he's probably any of us, if we've ever been in that moment, we probably have this expectation of, oh see, I told you so. But that wasn't what happened to the prodigal. When the father saw him coming, he ran to him, he embraced him, he told his servants, go kill the fat a calf. He celebrated the return of the Son. He celebrated the return of the Son who went astray. He didn't scold him, he didn't correct him, and that's exactly how God the Father sees us. And that's exactly how I want you to see God the Father so you can learn to develop your relationship with him. No matter what you've done, no matter how far you've gone, no matter how many failures you've made, God loves you. He loves you so much that he came down on earth, wrapped himself in flesh, and had himself sacrificed to cover the sins. He put the wrath, all the wrath that you hear talking about in the Old Testament, that wrath, Jesus took on the cross for us because God loves us so much. And maybe you're out there today and you need to hear this. Father's Day is coming up and you're you're not sure how to deal with it. Sometimes Father's Day is a happy time, a celebration. Sometimes it can be depressing, depending on where you are with your relationship with your earthly father, depending on your circumstances. Everybody has certain different circumstances that happen to them in their life. Maybe you feel distant from God. Maybe you feel like you've failed. Maybe you feel like you've wandered too far, like the prodigal. But God loves you and he is calling you home right now. And all you have to do is go to him and say, Father, forgive me, and he will embrace you with open arms. Learn to know that God loves you, and that will actually help you. If you are a father out there and you're trying to figure out how to lead your sons and daughters well, you learn to develop your relationship with your Heavenly Father, and that will relay over to how you deal with your sons and daughters. If your father out there listening today, let me encourage you. You don't have to be perfect. None of us are. But my kids love me because they saw my authenticity, the fact that I was humble and said I messed up, I did it wrong. Because what I really did right was I love them. I loved them through it all. And I was only able to mirror what I knew God did for me, what God does for me. God loves me that much, and it helped me to pour that love out onto my children. My father wasn't perfect, but his transformation turned me to Christ. And that's a legacy worth living. Maybe your father was amazing. Maybe your father hurt you. Maybe your relationship is complicated. But your earthly father story is not the final word. Through Jesus, we have access to a perfect father, one who never abandons his children, a father who never changes, a father who loved us enough to send his son for us. The greatest privilege of this Christian life isn't forgiveness, it's adoption. It's being welcomed into the family of God. It's been a being able to call God Abba Father. So I just want to end with this. You have a place in the family of God, and all you have to do is call on Abba, and he will be there for you. Now before I go, I want to thank you again. A hundred episodes, it's it's an incredible blessing, and we're just gonna keep moving forward until God says, You've done enough. But for now, I will see you next time. Stay strong, stay valiant, keep forging your path, and be blessed.