God was always referred to as “Father God” in the churches I grew up going to. Learning to see God as “Father” and especially as the Father shown by Jesus has been extremely powerful in my life. But what about those for whom the idea of “Father God” brings to mind only abuse, oppression, etc? Can we approach God as “Mother God” as well?
This is totally just my opinion- since humans are a reflections of God “made in his image”. The creation account talks about “man made in Gods image” “male and female He made them”. I believe male and female characteristics are both stemming from Gods own characteristics. I don’t believe He thinks exclusively male or female. I believe it’s a division of two sets of His characteristics. I believe He is neither male nor female but in a sense He is both. I tell my daughters (who had a very physically and verbally abusive father), when they are having trouble with their image of God because of this, to try focusing on His nurturing, motherly attributes more and His “fatherly” attributes a little less.
Although it may be a case of anthropomorphism, I feel that YHWH revealed Himself as having spiritual maleness for a reason. As CS Lewis writes, paraphrasing, “Gender is more than biological sex. It is a pervasive and ultimate binary in the universe, of which biological sex is just the anatomical incarnation of either the masculine or feminine gender.” (Perelandra). If this is true, and I believe a case could be made that it is, then God has what we may call the “masculine” Spirit. It is no small wonder that Christ came as a man and not a woman, and that in all of Scripture He has revealed Himself as masculine.
I grew up with a biological dad who beat and raped my mom, was absent most of my childhood due to drug and alcohol abuse, occasionally had violent outbursts due to bipolar, etc. so I can relate to it being hard to see God as our Abba, our Daddy. But what I have learned and experienced is that as you throw yourself into the role of His Child, and you try to seek out a Parental relationship from Him, He radically changes your perception of Fatherhood into something so much more perfect and beautiful and consoling than what our imperfect, human, fallible dads here on earth could show us. At best they are shadowy reflections in a mirror of His Parenthood; at worst they’re perversions of it. I hope this has helped you friend; shalom and agape to you
