God, the Father, and the Good Parents

Ruy Miranda (He is not a religious person)
Bible Quotes Science Info

Nowadays, there is a great deal of controversy surrounding the issue of how to raise children. The article that follows, as well as others found in the archive index of this site, arise from the biblical concept of God as Father. As God can only be thought of as being a good Father, His behavior toward His children should serve as a model for those who wish to be good parents. It will show how God acted and then extrapolate this conduct for human parents, without making value judgments. It should be noted that this series of articles is confined to Old Testament passages so as to reach both Jewish and Christian readers.

God Fulfills the Promises Made to His Children

God, the Father, carried out two remarkable actions were done to fulfill a promise to His children, the descendents of Israel. God had promised the Israelites a land where milk and honey flowed. According to the biblical accounts of this people, the divine presence and action occurred at various times and in sundry places, but two of them were absolutely identical and only possible as miraculous acts. The first was the crossing of the Red Sea, and the second was the crossing of River Jordan.

The crossing of the Red Sea took place when the people, led by Moses, left Egypt but were then pursued by the Pharaoh’s army. Frightened by the pursuit, they cried out in desperation.

And the LORD said to Moses, "Why do you cry to Me? Tell the children of Israel to go forward."

"But lift up your rod, and stretch out your hand over the sea and divide it. And the children of Israel shall go on dry ground through the midst of the sea."

And this is how it happened.

Then Moses stretched out his hand over the sea; and the LORD caused the sea to go back by a strong east wind all the night, and made the sea into dry land, and the waters were divided.

So the children of Israel went to the midst of the sea on the dry ground, and the waters were a wall to them on their right hand and on their left.

Free from their captivity in Egypt, the Israelites spent forty years wandering in the desert. At the end of this time, Moses died, and, with his death, something very interested happened with regard to God’s interaction with his people: He no longer spoke face to face. History records God speaking through a series of prophets, Moses’ successors, for approximately seven hundred years, but never again face to face, as He had done with Moses. This is how it was with Joshua, whom God had chosen to succeed Moses in leading the people to the Promised Land.

To fight for and take possession of the land, it was necessary to cross the River Jordan. Here, God worked the second miracle, similar to the one before.

"And it shall come to pass, as soon as the soles of the feet of the priests who bear the ark of the LORD, the Lord of all the earth, shall rest in the waters of the Jordan shall be cut off, that the waters that come down from upstream, and they shall stand as a heap."

And this is how it happened.

And as those who bore the ark came to the Jordan, and the feet of the priests who bore the ark dipped oin the edge of the water (for the Jordan overflows all its banks during the whole time of harvest),

That the waters which came down from upstream stood still, and rose in a heap very far away at Adam, the city that it beside Zaretan. So the waters that went down into the Sea of the Arabah, the Salt Sea, failed, and were cut off; and the people crossed over opposite Jericho.

Thus, it can be seen that God promoted two supernatural phenomena—although they were not the only ones—so that the Israelites could reach the Promised Land.

Good Parents

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