And I say unto you, Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and you shall find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you.
All Commentaries on Luke 11:9 Go To Luke 11
Cyril of Alexandria
AD 444
The words, I say to you, have the force of an oath. For God does not lie, but whenever He makes known any thing to His hearers with an oath, he manifests the inexcusable littleness of our faith.
In these words our Savior gives us a very necessary piece of instruction. For oftentimes we rashly, from the impulse of pleasure, give way to hurtful desires. When we ask any such thing from God, we shall not obtain it. To show this, Hebrings an obvious example from those things which are before our eyes, in our daily experience. For when your son asks of you bread, you give it him gladly, because he seeks awholesome food. But when from want of understanding he asks for a stone to eat, you give it him not, but rather hinders him from satisfying his hurtful desire. So that the sense may be, But which of you asking his father for bread, (which the father gives,) will he give him astone? (that is, if he asked it.) There is the same argument also in the serpent and the fish; of which he adds, Or if he asks a fish, will he for a fish give him a serpent? And in like manner in the egg and scorpion, of which he adds, Or if he ask an egg, will he offer him a scorpion?.
Now from the example just given he concludes, If then you being evil, (i.e. having amind capable of wickedness, and not uniform and settled in good, as God,) know how to give good gifts; how much more shall your heavenly Father?
