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There is a connection between the word for "Father," and that for "family" in the Greek which we cannot reproduce in translation, but which may be illustrated by the analogous connection which exists in English between "Creator" and "creature." Every family (πατριά) derives its name from the Father (πατήρ).

I. I find here a remarkable and most interesting statement of the Fatherhood of God. It is this: that THE PROTOTYPE OF ALL HUMAN FATHERHOOD IS FOUND IN THE DIVINE. God is the true and perfect Father, of whom all other fathers are but faint likenesses. As one of the old divines has it, "Not from us did this name and the relation it expresses ascend to heaven, but from heaven it came down to us." Let me illustrate. Far off beyond the Rocky Mountains, in the valley of the Humboldt River, the traveller sometimes sees, in certain conditions of the atmosphere, some earthly object — even an entire landscape — painted as if by an angel's hand upon the clouds. Not thus is this word "Father" applied to God — an earthly image upon a heavenly ground. Ah, then, dear as it is to the ear of man, it were no better than a cruel mirage mocking poor travellers through this desert of time I But no: it is a heavenly image reflected in earthly relations; the application of the word "father" to man is borrowed from its Divine and heavenly meaning. It is a dewdrop fallen from the skies, which mirrors in its tiny surface the whole "scope of heaven."

II. The next thought suggested by the text, relates to THE FATHERHOOD OF MAN. Behold the dignity and glory of the family! It is heavenly and Divine in its origin. Great reason is there, then, that men should take heed how they exercise their relationship — how they fulfil the holy office of "father." Let us stint neither prayer nor care, that our families here on earth may be, at least in some faint degree, a reflex of the family in heaven. There is a little sheet of water at the eastern end of the Yosemite valley, in which one may see, if we visit it before the sun has touched it, a most wonderful and entrancing sight. In the surface of that tiny lake, polished to an almost preternatural smoothness by the hand of God Himself, is mirrored the whole grand amphitheatre of gigantic walls and towering cliffs, varying from two thousand to five thousand feet in height; the entire valley of the Yosemite, some eight miles in length, and with it the over-arching sky, reflected with absolute exactness, and with such vividness that every tint of the forest, and every crevice and stain in the cliffs, and every hue of the floating clouds, is distinctly reproduced. We may not hope even to see an earthly family which shall be such a mirror as that, which shall reflect the family in heaven with any such perfectness as that. But surely our earthly families may reflect something of heaven — something of the peace and joy and love which reign there. Surely we may at least by God's blessing, so order our homes that they need not always be like a turbid lake, so tossed and so unquiet as never to show any reflection of heaven.

III. THE PERPETUITY OF THE FAMILY. Follow for a little distance the fortunes of a family. They gather, we will suppose, in a bright country home — father and mother, sons and daughters, all bright and hopeful and happy; the young full of enthusiasm for the untried voyage before them, the old full of joy in the happiness and hope of the young. A few years pass, and again we see them gathered, it may be, in the same scene; but how changed already! Lines — the well known lines of care — traced on the brow, and gray hairs here and there, tell the story of battle and bereavement in the experience of life. There is a vacant chair or more, and the tears on more than one cheek bear silent witness to the sad associations that the family reunion recalls. Years roll on; and one after the other is missed, till the number up there is greater than the number here, and the home centre must be sought beyond the river. At length only one is left, a lonely pilgrim, tottering under the weight of years, and steadily approaching the brink of the cold, dark stream. To such a one, how sweet the gospel message about the family in heaven I to know that, fast as the Christian family breaks up here, it is reforming in a better home there; and to be assured that the life there shall not be an utterly new and strange one — that this at least will remain, the family.

(B. H. McKim, D. D.)

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KJV: Of whom the whole family in heaven and earth is named,

WEB: from whom every family in heaven and on earth is named,