That does seem (anecdotally to me too) to be such a key for so many - especially when so many of us have been immersed in patriachal theologies for so many centuries. One does not just delete that influence from their lives, even if they’re fully conscious of it and make a concerted effort not to think of God that way.
Speaking of how we see God, though, … I’m not sure I’ve fully followed where GM went in the following excerpt. I’m needing to ponder it a few more times.
This time many more followed, and her eyes were fast becoming fountains, when all at once a verse she had heard the Sunday before at church seemed to come of itself into her head: “Call upon me in the time of trouble and I will answer thee.” It must mean that she was to ask God to help her: was that the same as saying prayers? But she wasn’t good, and he wouldn’t hear anybody that wasn’t good. Then, if he was only the God of the good people, what was to become of the rest when they were lost on mountains? She had better try; it could not do much harm. Even if he would not hear her, he would not surely be angry with her for calling upon him when she was in such trouble. So thinking, she began to pray to what dim distorted reflection of God there was in her mind. They alone pray to the real God, the maker of the heart that prays, who know his son Jesus. If our prayers were heard only in accordance with the idea of God to which we seem to ourselves to pray, how miserably would our infinite wants be met! But every honest cry, even if sent into the deaf ear of an idol, passes on to the ears of the unknown God, the heart of the unknown Father.
As found in MacDonald’s “Sir Gibbie”