‘They answered and said to him, “Our father is Abraham”.'

His listeners were quick to pick up the fact that He was distinguishing His Father from theirs. This immediately set them on their mettle. ‘Abraham is our father', they declared proudly and firmly. Surely being connected with Abraham could only be good?

Like many they thought that they could be judged by their connections. They were inordinately proud of their connection with Abraham for it was to him that God's great promises were given. But Jesus would now point out that if they were Abraham's children it only counted if they behaved like Abraham. And this was something that they should indeed have recognised, for their history and their Scriptures were full of God's rejection of those who did not obey Him. We can compare Matthew 3:9 where to the same claim to be sons of Abraham, John the Baptiser says wryly that God is able to raise up ‘these stones' to be sons of Abraham. There is nothing to a name. Evidence of true sonship lies in behaviour.

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