One cannot have God as Father unless one is willing to be as a child. How are we to be ‘sons and daughters, children of our heavenly Father’ except by becoming like the Son whom God has chosen saying “this is my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased?” Thus the Apostle sings, “It is no longer I who live but the Son of God in me.”

Jesus’ relationship to God is expressed in Jesus’ message, “The time is fulfilled, the reign of God has come, repent and believe in the Gospel.” Thus we live in God’s kingdom as we pray, “Thy kingdom come thy will be done on earth as it is in the heaven.” (The Eastern Orthodox Church prays “Thy kingdom come thy will be done in earth (in me) as it is in the heavens.”) As above so below.

When we live in God’s reign, or rather when God’s reign lives in us, we rely upon God’s love as Father as reflected in the wilderness imagery, “Give us this day our daily bread.” Thus is our relationship to the Father a daily experience of that which sustains us (Jesus is the bread of life) in the present moment. Our lives are lived in the now; now is the time, now is the hour to awake from death to life: “here and now dear friends we are God’s children.”

Another facet of the diamond of relationship with the Father is impossible without also being related to God’s other sons and daughters. Just as God calls each of us into relationship with him by forgiveness of sins (John 3:16) as God’s children we in turn forgive one another: “Forgive us our sins as we forgive those indebted to us.” We are really praying that if we don’t forgive, then neither do we want the Father’s forgiveness. Thus, Jesus tells the story of the unjust steward who was forgiven everything and refused to forgive his fellow worker a small debt.