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Luke 11:11–13
“If you then, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will the heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him!” (v. 13).
Christ exhorts us to come to God in prayer boldly and persistently, knowing that He hears His children (Luke 11:5–10). We should conclude from this that the Father has a deep love for us, for why would our Almighty Creator want to hear from us unless He loved us? After all, He certainly does not have to hear from us, and He has no need of our prayers. Amazingly, however, He loves us so much that He actually wants us to talk to Him.
Lest we miss this point, Jesus in today’s passage stresses the goodness and love of our Father, especially as revealed in His willingness to hear us and give us good gifts. Appealing to the relationship of an earthly father to his son, Jesus asks what father would give his son a serpent when he asks for a fish or will give his son a scorpion when he asks for an egg (Luke 11:11–12). The answer, of course, is that no good father would do such a thing. Good fathers are kind to their children. They do not seek to harm them but provide for their needs.
Jesus then draws a comparison to God the Father, noting that if earthly fathers, who are evil, do such good to their sons, how much more the perfect heavenly Father will do good to His children (Luke 11:13). Our Lord’s point is not to disparage good earthly fathers. He is just noting that even in their sin, good earthly fathers know what is right to do for their children because they love them. If this is true, then we should never doubt the love of God the Father for us and His eagerness to do good to us, because unlike even the best earthly fathers, our Father in heaven has no sin to ever get in the way of His affection for us.
All this is to say that our heavenly Father really does love us if we are in Christ. Yes, He will discipline us when we go astray, because that is what fathers do (Heb. 12:7). God is not “out to get us,” however, if we are His children through faith in Jesus. He is not just waiting to punish us for the least transgression, and He is not withholding anything good that we need. Jesus has paid the price for our transgressions, and the Father loves us so much that He is for us, not against us (Rom. 8:31–39).
Our Father’s love for us is particularly manifested in His giving the Holy Spirit to those who ask (Luke 11:13). Here the reference is not so much to our receiving the Spirit at our conversion as to the Father’s ongoing work of providing guidance through the Spirit. God will not leave His children bereft of anything they need to know and do His will (see 2 Peter 1:3).
Coram Deo Living before the face of God
Our Father in heaven really does love us and really does seek to give us good gifts. We should be confident that He will do what is best for us. No earthly father is perfect, and some of us have had poor earthly fathers. But God our Father is perfectly good and perfectly loving. Let us never forget that, and let us never think that He wants anything but the best for us if we are in Christ Jesus by faith.
for further study
- Psalm 136
- Matthew 7:9–11
- Romans 5:6–8
- 1 John 3:1
the bible in a year
- 2 Chronicles 19–22
- John 15:18–16:15