Commentary on the Gospels and Acts, Commentary 1 · Chapter 7 · Verse 9,10
Verse 9, 10. Or, what man is there of you, whom if his sonne ask …. 1. 6.…, &c.]
By an argument from the lesse to the greater. Ourforeign. …: sententijs …. Saviour … what he had said; that we may ask in faith, nothing wavering, or being at an uncertainty, or at variance with himself, doubting whether he should believe or not.Budaeus in Cō. This is no lesse unpleasing to God, then vnprofitable to us. God is the Father of all mercies, and loveth his, farre more then any naturall father doth his own childe; then Abraham did Isaack, or David Absolom. And according to his affections, such are his expressions: for as he knoweth their needs, so he gives them all things richly to enjoy. He giveth them not, as he doth the1 Tim. 6. 18. wicked, panem …, a stone for bread: he feeds them notAlterâ mann fert lapidem, altera panem …. …. Gen. 47. 12. foreign. Say the …: whereunto our Saviour seems to allude. (as we say) with a bit and a knock. He puts not into their hands. foreign, (as the Greek proverb hath it, whereunto … Saviour here alludeth) for a fish a scorpion: No, he feedeth them with the finest wheat, Psal. 81. 16. and filleth them with fat things … of marrow, Isa. 25. 6. He nourisheth them with the best, as Joseph did his fathers houshold in Egypt, according to the mouth of the little ones, or as so many little ones (saith the Originall) tenderly and lovingly without their care or labour. And whereas some naturall parents have (monstrously) provedLuk. 12. 42. unnaturall; as Saul to Ionathan, and those foreign, Rom. 1. 31. Not so God: as himself is an everlasting father, Isa. 9. 6. So is his …, Isa. 49. 14. Ioh. 13. 1. Men may hate their children whom they loved: but he rests in his love, Zeph. 3. 17. they may cast outPsal. 27. … babes, but he gathers them. Father Abraham may forget us, and Israel disown us, Isa. 63. 16. But thou O Lord art our never-failing Father, our Redeemer, &c. The fathers and governours of the Church, may (out of an over-flow of their misguided zeal,) cast us …, and for a pretence, say, Let the Lord be glorified. But then shall he appear to your joy, and they shall be ashamed, Isa. 66. 5. The fathers of our flesh … their children after their own …: but he for our profit, that we might be partakers of his holinesse. Heb. 12. 20.He feeds his people sometimes with the bread of adversity, and the Ier. 30. 20,water of affliction: or gives them (as it were) a thump on the backPsal. …. 9. with a stone, to drive them downwards, and makes them eatEzek. 12. 18. ashes for bread, as David; their bread with quaking, as … did: holds them to hard meat (some of the Martyrs were fed with bread made, most part, of saw-dust, and … with bread… 4. 15. prepared with cow-…) He chasteneth them also, other-whiles, not only with the rods of men, but with the severe discipline of scorpions: and this seemeth not, for the present, to be joyous but grievous: Neverthelesse, afterward it yeeldeth the peaceable fruits of righteousnesse, to them that are thereby exercised. They shallHeb. 12. 11. sit down with Abrahram, yea in Abrahams bosome (as they used to lean at feasts) in the Kingdom of heaven: and shall have (not a Benjamins … only, but) a royall diet as Ieconiah had, everyMatth. 8. 11. day a portion. Then shall the Lord stand forth, and say to those…. …. 34. men of his hand, who had their portion here, and whose bellies he filled with his hid treasure. (The Inne-keeper gives the best bits to his guests, but reserves the patrimony for his children) Behold my servants shall eat, but ye shall be hungry, &c. Isa. 65. 13.