Gospel-Powered Parenting: How the Gospel Shapes and Transforms Parenting

by William P. Farley

God is distinct and unique from everything with which we are familiar. He is not what we expect. We would never invent the God of the Bible. Invented gods are like the people that invent them. They are not separate. They are common. That is because we make them in our own image.

Human wrath is usually sinful. Human wrath is anger out of control. It is unrighteous. But God’s wrath is never out of control. Rather, it is measured. It is deliberate. Most importantly, God is “slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness” (Ex. 34:6). This means that God’s anger is tightly controlled. It is more like the anger of the Ents in J. R. R. Tolkien’s fantasy The Lord of the Rings. In Tolkien’s story, the Ents are powerful living trees that grow in Middle-earth. For generations they sleep. They finally awake to a Middle-earth dominated by evil. Their anger grows, but very slowly. They do nothing hastily. But when it finally erupts, their collective wrath wreaks devastation on the evil city nearby.

Grace is fundamental to God’s family. It is the air his children breathe. It is crucial to parenting.

Those who see what their adoption cost God, in light of what they deserve, are stunned and amazed by God’s grace. It is holy grace. It is not common.