Every Good Gift

The God of the Bible is the most generous being we could ever imagine. No author or filmmaker could invent a more generous character.

The picture in this verse is of a generous father, and immediately we recall Jesus’ invitation to ask, seek, and knock, for we have a Father in heaven who gives good things to those who ask him! We also remember the father in the prodigal son story, who gave an inheritance to a selfish and undeserving son. Then, he famously threw a lavish party to celebrate the return of the one who wasted his wealth.

As marvelous as those depictions are, the Father of lights stretches even beyond the idea of a generous father who answers his children’s requests. Here we find that God is the source of every good gift in our lives, whether we’ve asked for it or not. Every breath. Every friend. Every meal. Every sunrise. These are personal favors from our Father in heaven, not autopilot actions of a distant deity.

The point is this: God is fundamentally a giver, the giver. And you are fundamentally a receiver. God gives. You receive. That’s how his world is setup.

There are no self-made men. Down with our prideful independence. Be gone, self-reliance. For what is a branch without the vine? What is clay without a potter? And what is an orphan without a father?

But we have a father because of what Jesus did on the cross. He bore our sin in his body and took our place in death. He rose again victorious and then said to his disciples, “Go to my brothers and say to them, ‘I am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God.’ ” By grace, God adopts us as his own and invites us to call him Father.

Martyn Lloyd-Jones once wrote, “If you should ask me to state in one phrase what I regard as the greatest defect in most Christian lives I would say that it is our failure to know God as our Father as we should know Him.”

Through Jesus we have the privilege to come to God as our Father. Jesus himself said, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.” Our worries and striving melt away when we believe we’re children, not orphans, for as Proverbs says, “the glory of children is their fathers.”

To know and believe you are in the hands of a perfect Father completely transforms your outlook on life. He’s interested in you. He watches over you. He takes care of you. You have a Father who values you. He is with you in trials and will never leave nor forsake you. He knows your future and is leading you into it. And he delights to give you good things day after day.

Father in heaven, we ask for eyes to see every good thing as it really is, a gift from you. We ask for hearts to believe you are who you say you are, our generous Father, and we are who you say we are, your beloved kids.

© John Rinehart 2025