As we understand who is truly fathering all children, and parents, too, we recognize the tender, loving nature of our heavenly Father's care. We see that the only real Father there is does not neglect His children, and they can in no way be separate from Him and all His goodness. We learn that because Spirit, God, is the origin and creator of all, we are actually His offspring, reflecting Him. True fatherhood is ever present and is expressed through such God-derived qualities as strength, honesty, reliability, and integrity. Christian Science helps us to comprehend these spiritual facts and apply them in a practical way.

The example of Christ Jesus in the Bible helps direct our path in this adventure of learning the true nature of fatherhood. Jesus states, "... no man cometh unto the Father, but by me" (John 14:6). In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus encourages us to turn to God in prayer for our needs (see Matt. 7:7–11). He tells us that if mortals know how to take care of and give gifts to their children, "how much more shall your Father which is in heaven give good things to them that ask him?" It is truly always God who is supporting and caring for us and our children, even though we are deeply grateful for our human parents and all the love they share with us. In fact, tender parenting love, wherever it occurs, reflects God's love.

As a single mother, I had to get a deeper sense of God's fatherhood. I had expected to remarry to bring what I felt would be a greater balance to the children's and my life. But I remained unmarried until the children were grown, and they rarely saw their dad. I pored over the Bible and Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures by Mary Baker Eddy to gain a better understanding of this passage from Isaiah: "Thy Maker is thine husband" (54:5). I could see this also meant God was the Father my children needed.

The fruitage from this study and from my fuller sense of genuine fatherhood evidenced itself in many different ways. Sometimes the children would be invited by trusted adult male friends to go camping, hiking, or boating. One dear friend even took my son along to help him with a newspaper delivery for a major paper. I found I was growing in my own ability to reflect God's fathering through a deeper concept of spiritual strength and dominion. I was able to be firmer in decisions about both the children and the household.

In another family, a friend of mine also learned to see who was really the Father of all children and supplying all needs. This friend had been very frustrated over the fact that her former husband had sometimes not paid his child support; she didn't feel he was living up to his obligation. Then something happened that threatened to disturb her whole financial situation. She had applied for a small loan and it was rejected. This happened not because her credit was bad but because her former husband had something on his record that affected her credit rating. She called a Christian Science practitioner, almost in tears. She was upset because she needed this loan and felt that everything was working against her—especially her former husband!

The practitioner helped quiet her thought by encouraging her to realize what God was providing for her and her family. Drawing on the Bible's teachings, Mrs. Eddy explains that God is constantly providing us with spiritual ideas, which give us our daily supply (see Miscellaneous Writings, p. 307). The beautiful and abundant ideas God imparts to us give us tangible good, and nothing can interfere with His good for us or our children.

After their conversation was over, it suddenly dawned on the practitioner that recognizing God's abundance was not the only demand. She realized that it was important to acknowledge wholly and completely that, in truth, there are no deadbeat dads! Man, as the reflection of God, divine Principle, expresses integrity, obedience, and love.

The practitioner called back to share this new line of thought, and my friend was very grateful for the demand to hold to only a pure image of her former husband. She laughed when she realized how much the false view of man had been a part of her thinking. The practitioner urged her to accept that this false sense of him was untrue and that understanding this would clear the way to see all the good available to her from God.

The purpose of this prayer was to purify my friend's thought so that she held no view of man but the one God reveals. The practitioner found support in this statement from Mrs. Eddy's writings: "Wholly apart from this mortal dream, this illusion and delusion of sense, Christian Science comes to reveal man as God's image, His idea, coexistent with Him—God giving all and man having all that God gives" (The First Church of Christ, Scientist, and Miscellany, p. 5). That certainly is the best kind of husbanding and fathering to have!

About a month later my friend's former husband called to say that he was making plans to pay off the bad debt that was being recorded on her credit rating. A month before, when she had spoken to him about this, he was absolutely certain that there was no way he could meet this obligation. And yet everything had since changed. She rejoiced a week later in the fact that the debt had been completely paid and her credit was restored.

Each one of us must at some point recognize God as the Father of all and as the true source of all the good that is available for us. In reality there can be no deadbeat dads; all of us reflect and include the unchanging fathering qualities of God.