Fathers Give Good Gifts Simile

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Would you give a hungry child a poisonous arachnid to eat? Probably not, because even sinful human beings are not totally depraved. Would God give you something dangerous and destructive when you ask him for help? Certainly not, because he is the source and foundation of all goodness. In the Fathers Give Good Gifts simile, Jesus concludes his reassuring arguments that God can be trusted to provide for his full-time disciples when they pray the Lord's Prayer.

Matt. 7:9-11; Luke 11:11-13

(Huck 38, 148; Aland 70, 187; Crook 53, 212)[1]

Revised: 6 February 2023

וּמִי בָּכֶם אָדָם שֶׁיִּשְׁאַל בְּנוֹ לֶחֶם וְאֶבֶן יִתֵּן לוֹ אוֹ שֶׁיִּשְׁאַל דָּג וְנָחָשׁ יִתֵּן לוֹ אוֹ שֶׁיִּשְׁאַל בֵּיצָה וְעַקְרָב יִתֵּן לוֹ לְפִיכָךְ אִם אַתֶּם שֶׁרָעִים יְדַעְתֶּם לִיתֵּן מַתָּנוֹת טוֹבוֹת לְיַלְדֵיכֶם עַל אַחַת כַּמָּה וְכַמָּה אֲבִיכֶם שֶׁבַּשָּׁמַיִם שֶׁיִּתֵּן [מַתָּנוֹת] טוֹבוֹת לַשּׁוֹאֲלִים מִמֶּנּוּ

“Now what father is there among you who, when his son asks for bread, would give him a rock instead? Or if he asks for a fish, would give him a snake instead? Or if he asks for an egg, would give him a scorpion? Not a single one of you! So if even you, with your inclination to do evil, still instinctually give good gifts to your children, how much more do you think your heavenly Father will give good gifts to his children when they ask him?”[2]


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Reconstruction

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  • David N. Bivin

    David N. Bivin
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    David N. Bivin is founder and editor of Jerusalem Perspective. A native of Cleveland, Oklahoma, U.S.A., Bivin has lived in Israel since 1963, when he came to Jerusalem on a Rotary Foundation Fellowship to do postgraduate work at the Hebrew University. He studied at the Hebrew…
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    Joshua N. Tilton

    Joshua N. Tilton

    Joshua N. Tilton studied at Gordon College in Wenham, Massachusetts, where he earned a B.A. in Biblical and Theological Studies (2002). Joshua continued his studies at Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary in South Hamilton, Massachusetts, where he obtained a Master of Divinity degree in 2005. After seminary…
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