Biblical descriptions of God’s Paternal Care for the Just

December 24, 2021 • 2 min

From The Sinner’s Guide, page 134
By Venerable Louis of Granada

Numerous are the titles which the Holy Scriptures use to express God’s providence.

The one most frequently recurring is the sweet name of Father, which we find not only in the Gospel but also throughout the Old Testament.

Thus the Psalmist says: “As a father hath compassion on his children, so hath the Lord compassion on them that fear Him; for He knoweth our frame, He remembereth that we are dust.” [Ps. cii. 13, 14.]

But because the love of a mother is deeper and more tender than that of a father, God makes use of it to express His care and solicitude for the just.

“Can a woman,” He says by the mouth of His prophet, “forget her infant, so as not to have pity on the son of her womb? And if she should forget, yet will not I forget thee. Behold, I have graven thee in My hands; thy walls are always before My eyes.” [Isaias xlix. 15, 16.]

What sweeter or more tender assurances of love could God express? And shall we continue blind to so many proofs of His tenderness?

And not content with illustrating His love for us by that of a mother, He compares His watchfulness to that of the eagle, a creature noted for its devotion to its young, saying by Moses: “As the eagle enticing her young to fly, and hovering over them, He spread His wings, and hath taken him and carried him on His shoulders.” [Deut. xxxii. 11.]

Even more forcibly did Moses express the paternal goodness of God when he told the Israelites: “The Lord thy God hath carried thee, as a man is wont to carry his little son, all the way that you have come, until you came to this place.” [Deut. i. 31.]

As our Father, God does not disdain to call us His children, His cherished children, as the prophet Jeremias attests when, speaking in the name of God, he says: “Surely Ephraim is an honorable son to Me, surely he is a tender child; for since I spoke of him I will still remember him. Therefore are my bowels troubled for him; pitying I will pity him.” [Jer. xxxi. 20.]

Let us ponder these words, which are uttered by God Himself, that they may inflame our hearts and move us to make some return for His affectionate tenderness to us.