The Monday after the Second Sunday after Trinity Sunday
Posted on June 30, 2025 by under
Scripture: St. Matthew 7:7-11 (NKJV)
7:1 “Ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you. 8 For everyone who asks receives, and he who seeks finds, and to him who knocks it will be opened. 9 Or what man is there among you who, if his son asks for bread, will give him a stone? 10 Or if he asks for a fish, will he give him a serpent? 11 If you then, being evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father who is in heaven give good things to those who ask Him!”
Devotion
The fact that our knee-jerk reaction to this text is to think of all the times we asked and did not receive demonstrates that we are, as the Lord says we are in verse 11, “evil”. It is evil to make our selfish and ignorant desires the standard of whether or not God is good. That is why our Lord emphasizes “good gifts.” If God Himself is truly good, He knows the difference between a good gift and a bad gift, and knows the right time to give it. By faith, the Christian trusts God’s judgment over his own. The Large Catechism explains that to “have no other gods” means to “look to Him and expect from Him naught but good” (1st Commandment). Therefore, take all your desires to God in prayer, trusting that He will do what is good, even if you do not know what that is.
What guarantee do we have that God is good? Our Lord Jesus Christ is Himself the guarantee. The proof of God’s goodness is that, in the person of the Christ, God became man to die for our sins. Compared with the gift of the Christ, all other things are insignificant. Christ is the proof that God does give what is good: “He who did not spare His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all, how shall He not with Him also freely give us all things?” (Rom. 8:32).
Collect: O Lord, Who never failest to help and govern those whom Thou dost bring up in Thy steadfast fear and love: Make us to have a perpetual fear and love of Thy holy Name; through Jesus Christ, Thy Son, our Lord, Who liveth and reigneth with Thee and the Holy Ghost, ever One God, world without end. Amen.
Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
