While I have several other posts I am working on, I thought about this quick one today. I handed my daughter something and she replied with a simple "thank you Daddy!" And you know what? It honestly warmed my heart. Not the way she said it (cute as it was) but because of what the term "Daddy" represents. It is a closeness and intimacy which only one other title (mommy) can match. It is one of those terms which can be understood through knowing and yet means so much more when genuinely experienced (no it doesn't count when a girl you met at the bar calls you daddy.) If i have ever had that "warm, fuzzy feeling" this was it. I looked down at my daughter and was filled with love for her. And I know she was too because at the moment, calling me daddy was a genuine emotionally based title for me: not just something she calls me because it is what she has always called me.
How incredible is it then that God desires us to call him Father? Mother, Father, mama, papa - is there any term out there which can even approach the intimacy and closeness in relationship in using such a term? Not really. Husband and wife come close, but not quite the same. The major difference there is that it is a choice, and choices sometimes change. There are ex-wives and ex-husbands but ex-daddy's? Nope. And what is even more amazing about God? It not that he gives us permission to call him Father, he desires us to call him Father. He wants that intimacy with us, wants to be so much more than a creator. We were created in God's image and as such, our desire to be closer to our children is a reflection of what he desires to have with us. All of us.
