JABBA
THE BUTT

Topics: Fear of God; God as Father; God’s Holiness; God’s Love

References: Luke 12:32; 2 Corinthians 5:11; Galatians 4:4–7

When my children got old enough to wrestle with me, we played a game we called “Jabba the Butt.” The name came from a disgusting, evil character in the Star Wars trilogy called Jabba the Hutt.

I would play Jabba and roar around the room as the kids would shoot their laser guns at me and try to wrestle me to the floor. Sometimes I would get too much into the role. The kids would feel my great strength and hear my booming voice, and Daddy would become Jabba. Then I had to stop the game and hold them tenderly, reminding them I was Daddy.

The juxtaposition of overwhelming strength and tender love is as hard for a child to grasp as it is for an adult. But addressing God as Father can be electrifying if we can think of him as infinite love and tenderness combined with infinite holiness and power.

—Ben Patterson, Deepening Your Conversation with God (Bethany, 1999)