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Why is it so important to stick to the concept of God the father instead of God the mother? Why is gender so important?

JesusIsLord, I suspect this post has been waiting approval a while because the answer comes with much potential to be taken beyond what is meant.

There are two issues I see in your question. The "Fatherhood" of God and the idea of "gender" as it relates to God.

1. Why Father?
Jesus spoke of God as his Father and taught us to pray in those terms in the Lord's Prayer ... "Our Father in heaven" (Matthew 6:9; Luke 11:2) and the bible a a whole presents a revelation of God in fatherly terms. Hence our referring to God as "Father."

I think we can understand those who wish to refer to God as heavenly Parent or Heavenly Mother ... sadly, our fathers here on earth have sometimes made the idea of fatherhood a bad one. Personally, I see no harm in explaining what we mean, by seeing God as the perfect parent, father and mother ... but in scripture we see revealed the model we are to use, the picture we are explaining if you like. God has revealed himself as our perfect, heavenly Father.

2. Is God, then, Male?
God is spirit, and is not male or female. If I can be blunt, God "the Father" does not have a body with sex organs in order to procreate - the title "Father" refers to how he relates to the Son, and to us as his adopted children. God is beyond gender, so much greater, not limited in any way by our human ideas of gender. So, the fatherhood of God does not mean that God is male.

Nonetheless, when God stepped into human history at the incarnation, he came as the human man Jesus - who clearly was and is "male" both in his humanity, and relationally as "Son" of God. Jesus, without doubt, is male. The NT says Jesus "lowered himself" to become a man, i.e. human (Philippians 2:2-11). I see this, in regard to this question, as part of God taking on humanity - it involved the taking on of gender, as that is part and parcel of who we are in our physical bodies.

The Holy Spirit is without gender being a spirit, and is often described as showing characteristics we usually think of as more feminine - even the name of "Comforter" could be seen that way (John 14:16,26; 15:26; 16:7). In one of my favourite sections of scripture, Jesus says God has wept with longing over Jerusalem "as a hen over her chicks," (Matthew 23:37; Luke 13:34) which is such a feminine image. There are a number of pictures scattered throughout scripture likening God to something feminine. But that does not make God female. But the scripture does not give us leeway to see the Spirit as female in some sort of attempt to equalise gender within the Godhead - the Spirit is above and beyond the limitations of human gender.

So, JesusIsLord, I would say it is important to refer to God as "Father" because that is what Jesus taught us to do! As His disciples, we follow His lead and guidance. But the big leap in thinking that then concludes that God is male, is not warranted, beyond that fact that Jesus was/ is fully man and fully God. The Triune God of the bible is beyond gender.

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Avid Reader

“Lord, in my zeal for love of truth, let me not forget the truth about love.” - Thomas Aquinas
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The main reason that I picuture God as father is that He is described in this fashion in the original languages both Hebrew and Greek. In addition, the terms in Hebrew and Greek for father are in the masculine gender. Now I realize the objections such as God is a spirit (John 4), and there is neither male or female in Christ (Galatians), and it is difficult to make points on gender in the original languages since inanimate objects may have masculine or feminine genders.

However, even if the term father is more of an anthropomorphism I still think of God as father.