“Behold what manner of love the Father has given to us, that we should be called children of God; and so we are”- 1 John 3:1

If you want to judge how well a person understands Christianity, find out how much he makes of the thought of being God’s child, and having God as his Father. If this is not the thought that prompts and controls his worship and prayers and his whole outlook on life, it means that he does not understand Christianity very well at all. For everything that Christ taught, everything that makes the New Testament new, and better than the Old, everything that is distinctively Christian as opposed to merely Jewish, is summed up in the knowledge of the Fatherhood of God. ‘Father’ is the Christian name for God.[1]

 

[1] J. I. Packer, Knowing God (InterVarsity Press, 1973), 182.