The Father's House

When my children were small, or even as teens, occasionally the door would open and my kids would come in with one or two friends, some of whom I had never met.  They never questioned whether their friends would be welcome; they just assumed that anyone who was a friend of theirs could come into their house.  And they were right.

Because of Jesus, there is an open door into the Father's house.  He Himself is the door, and He opens it to all His friends.  When He invites us into His Father's house, it is without any formality; He invites us in as playmates, or even better, as His own flesh, His brothers and sisters:*

Father, I desire that they also, whom thou has given me, may be with me where I am....(Jn. 17:24).

I no longer call you servants, but friends....(Jn. 14).

If we consider the apostles, that very first group of Jesus' "playmates," they were not a haloed, saintly group.  We need to actually picture them in all their rough ways, arguing amongst themselves, confused, even sinful and jealous.....much like the friends our children bring into our house.  The interesting thing is that some "friends" did not stay long or ever come back; some "fit into the family" and some didn't.  Those who did not had no desire to come back, not because they were not invited, but because they just didn't "fit." 

When my brother once brought a new girlfriend to a family re-union, she spent the whole week in her room.  Somehow, she just didn't feel comfortable in the family group----and shortly afterwards, she and my brother broke up.  Years later, he married a lovely woman because as he said, "I finally found someone I could bring to a family re-union."

The door to God's house stands open; everything He is and owns is available to us in His Son.  I John says, "and this is the confidence we have in him, that if we ask anything according to his will, he hears us.  And if we know that he hears us in whatever we ask, we know that we have received the requests we make of him" (I Jn. 5:14).

Confidence (parrhesia in the Greek) is that intimacy in love which puts the other person's goods at our disposal.*  My children's friends did not wonder if they had access to whatever toys or food my children had; they correctly assumed that if they came into the house, whatever was there for the children was there also for them.  If they had no respect / reverence for the household and the possessions, they were no longer welcome, but as long as they could "play nice," they could come in anytime.

Christ has made divine truth open and accessible to the human heart which cries out to know the truth.  In His face, we finally see the the image and glory of the Father in heaven, now made manifest to the world.  Nothing is withheld from His friends; everything that is His, is theirs.

The door is open; the only question is whether we will come into the Father's house as the friend and playmate of Jesus, the Son --- and whether we ourselves will feel that we fit into the family, despite our inherent failings and faults.

*  Most of these ideas and some direct quotations have been taken from Hans Urs von Balthasar's book called Prayer.  I don't want to take credit for his insights; I just want to make them available to a wider audience.