The Father in the Parables

At the Last Supper, Philip said to the Savior, “Lord, shew us the Father, and it sufficeth us.”  To this the Savior responded, “Have I been so long time with you, and yet hast thou not known me, Philip? he that hath seen me hath seen the Father; and how sayest thou then, Shew us the Father?” (John 14:8-9)  Certainly one of the ways that the Lord showed them the Father was in the way that He lived each day, for He had said, “The Son can do nothing of himself, but what he seeth the Father do: for what things soever he doeth, these also doeth the Son likewise” (John 5:19).  The way that He healed the sick, taught the truth, cared for the children, invited the people to repent, and loved all those He met surely showed us the kind of person the Father is.  He also said, “He that sent me is with me: the Father hath not left me alone; for I do always those things that please him” (John 8:29).  We can know that anything the Savior did is what the Father would do—He told the Nephites, “I am in the Father, and the Father in me, and the Father and I are one” (3 Nephi 11:27).  We cannot know the Son without knowing the Father. 

                It seems that the Savior also sought to “show them the Father” while in mortality through the teachings of parables.  A few of the parables give great insight into who the Father is, such as the parable of the prodigal son.  In this parable the great love and compassion and tenderness of the father of the two sons is surely a representation of that same love of our Father in Heaven.  When the son finally returned after having wasted away his living, “when he was yet a great way off, his father saw him, and had compassion, and ran, and fell on his neck, and kissed him” (Luke 15:20).  This instinctively teaches us how our Father in Heaven will welcome us when we return to Him.  Another parable which shows us the character of the Father is that of the laborers in the vineyard.  The man in charge of the vineyard showed great concern for the workers and was willing to employ any who wanted to work, even if that was only for an hour.  When He gave all workers the same wage, no matter how long they had worked, some complained.  But the man said, “Is it not lawful for me to do what I will with mine own? Is thine eye evil, because I am good?”  Surely this “householder,” who showed both justice in giving a fair wage to all the men and mercy to those who started late, was meant by the Savior to teach us of the Father.  He said elsewhere that “my Father is the husbandman” of the vineyard and also that “there is none good but one, that is, God,” both indications that the “good” man in charge if the vineyard in the parable of the laborers of the vineyard was indeed meant to represent the Father (John 15:1, Matt. 19:17).  The Father is full of goodness and compassion and does not compare our efforts to others. 

                Another parable that Jesus taught to teach about his Father was that of the unjust judge.  The unjust judge in the story gave the widow what she was asking because she was so persistent, and Jesus suggested that His Father would be all the more willing to answer the petitions of the righteous.  He said, “And shall not God avenge his own elect, which cry day and night unto him, though he bear long with them?” (Luke 18:7)  In the Sermon on the Mount He put a similar principle of comparison between man and the Father this way: “If ye then, being evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children, how much more shall your Father which is in heaven give good things to them that ask him?” (Matt. 7:11)  The Savior indeed sought to show us the love and compassion and goodness of His Father that we can trust in, and His parables were an important way that He did that.