100 Bible Verses about Absent Fathers

1 Timothy 5:8 ESV / 203 helpful votes

But if anyone does not provide for his relatives, and especially for members of his household, he has denied the faith and is worse than an unbeliever.

Psalm 68:5 ESV / 133 helpful votes

Father of the fatherless and protector of widows is God in his holy habitation.

Ephesians 6:4 ESV / 84 helpful votes

Fathers, do not provoke your children to anger, but bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord.

Proverbs 27:8 ESV / 80 helpful votes

Like a bird that strays from its nest is a man who strays from his home.

Psalm 27:10 ESV / 73 helpful votes

For my father and my mother have forsaken me, but the Lord will take me in.

Luke 9:60 ESV / 48 helpful votes

And Jesus said to him, “Leave the dead to bury their own dead. But as for you, go and proclaim the kingdom of God.”

Luke 14:26 ESV / 46 helpful votes

“If anyone comes to me and does not hate his own father and mother and wife and children and brothers and sisters, yes, and even his own life, he cannot be my disciple.

Malachi 4:6 ESV / 38 helpful votes

And he will turn the hearts of fathers to their children and the hearts of children to their fathers, lest I come and strike the land with a decree of utter destruction.”

Psalm 146:9 ESV / 37 helpful votes

The Lord watches over the sojourners; he upholds the widow and the fatherless, but the way of the wicked he brings to ruin.

Proverbs 22:6 ESV / 34 helpful votes

Train up a child in the way he should go; even when he is old he will not depart from it.

James 1:27 ESV / 32 helpful votes

Religion that is pure and undefiled before God the Father is this: to visit orphans and widows in their affliction, and to keep oneself unstained from the world.

Proverbs 13:22 ESV / 31 helpful votes

A good man leaves an inheritance to his children's children, but the sinner's wealth is laid up for the righteous.

Matthew 11:28 ESV / 29 helpful votes

Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.

Zechariah 11:17 ESV / 24 helpful votes

“Woe to my worthless shepherd, who deserts the flock! May the sword strike his arm and his right eye! Let his arm be wholly withered, his right eye utterly blinded!”

Proverbs 23:24 ESV / 23 helpful votes

The father of the righteous will greatly rejoice; he who fathers a wise son will be glad in him.

Exodus 22:22-24 ESV / 23 helpful votes

You shall not mistreat any widow or fatherless child. If you do mistreat them, and they cry out to me, I will surely hear their cry, and my wrath will burn, and I will kill you with the sword, and your wives shall become widows and your children fatherless.

Colossians 3:21 ESV / 20 helpful votes

Fathers, do not provoke your children, lest they become discouraged.

Psalm 103:13 ESV / 20 helpful votes

As a father shows compassion to his children, so the Lord shows compassion to those who fear him.

James 2:19 ESV / 19 helpful votes

You believe that God is one; you do well. Even the demons believe—and shudder!

Hosea 14:3 ESV / 19 helpful votes

Assyria shall not save us; we will not ride on horses; and we will say no more, ‘Our God,’ to the work of our hands. In you the orphan finds mercy.”

Deuteronomy 24:16 ESV / 19 helpful votes

“Fathers shall not be put to death because of their children, nor shall children be put to death because of their fathers. Each one shall be put to death for his own sin.

Luke 14:28-30 ESV / 17 helpful votes

For which of you, desiring to build a tower, does not first sit down and count the cost, whether he has enough to complete it? Otherwise, when he has laid a foundation and is not able to finish, all who see it begin to mock him, saying, ‘This man began to build and was not able to finish.’

Psalm 127:3-5 ESV / 17 helpful votes

Behold, children are a heritage from the Lord, the fruit of the womb a reward. Like arrows in the hand of a warrior are the children of one's youth. Blessed is the man who fills his quiver with them! He shall not be put to shame when he speaks with his enemies in the gate.

Genesis 18:19 ESV / 16 helpful votes

For I have chosen him, that he may command his children and his household after him to keep the way of the Lord by doing righteousness and justice, so that the Lord may bring to Abraham what he has promised him.”

Isaiah 30:21 ESV / 15 helpful votes

And your ears shall hear a word behind you, saying, “This is the way, walk in it,” when you turn to the right or when you turn to the left.

Isaiah 41:10 ESV / 14 helpful votes

Fear not, for I am with you; be not dismayed, for I am your God; I will strengthen you, I will help you, I will uphold you with my righteous right hand.

Proverbs 23:22 ESV / 14 helpful votes

Listen to your father who gave you life, and do not despise your mother when she is old.

Proverbs 20:7 ESV / 14 helpful votes

The righteous who walks in his integrity— blessed are his children after him!

Proverbs 3:11-12 ESV / 13 helpful votes

My son, do not despise the Lord's discipline or be weary of his reproof, for the Lord reproves him whom he loves, as a father the son in whom he delights.

Psalm 10:14 ESV / 12 helpful votes

But you do see, for you note mischief and vexation, that you may take it into your hands; to you the helpless commits himself; you have been the helper of the fatherless.

Deuteronomy 10:18 ESV / 12 helpful votes

He executes justice for the fatherless and the widow, and loves the sojourner, giving him food and clothing.

Exodus 20:12 ESV / 11 helpful votes

“Honor your father and your mother, that your days may be long in the land that the Lord your God is giving you.

Philippians 4:13 ESV / 10 helpful votes

I can do all things through him who strengthens me.

John 3:16 ESV / 10 helpful votes

“For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.

2 Corinthians 12:14 ESV / 9 helpful votes

Here for the third time I am ready to come to you. And I will not be a burden, for I seek not what is yours but you. For children are not obligated to save up for their parents, but parents for their children.

2 Corinthians 6:18 ESV / 9 helpful votes

And I will be a father to you, and you shall be sons and daughters to me, says the Lord Almighty.”

Proverbs 27:10 ESV / 9 helpful votes

Do not forsake your friend and your father's friend, and do not go to your brother's house in the day of your calamity. Better is a neighbor who is near than a brother who is far away.

Proverbs 17:6 ESV / 9 helpful votes

Grandchildren are the crown of the aged, and the glory of children is their fathers.

Genesis 2:24 ESV / 9 helpful votes

Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and they shall become one flesh.

Romans 8:28 ESV / 8 helpful votes

And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose.

John 3:16-17 ESV / 8 helpful votes

“For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him.

Psalm 27:11 ESV / 8 helpful votes

Teach me your way, O Lord, and lead me on a level path because of my enemies.

1 Chronicles 16:11 ESV / 8 helpful votes

Seek the Lord and his strength; seek his presence continually!

Deuteronomy 6:6-9 ESV / 8 helpful votes

And these words that I command you today shall be on your heart. You shall teach them diligently to your children, and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, and when you walk by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise. You shall bind them as a sign on your hand, and they shall be as frontlets between your eyes. You shall write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates.

Genesis 31:49 ESV / 8 helpful votes

And Mizpah, for he said, “The Lord watch between you and me, when we are out of one another's sight.

2 Timothy 3:16-17 ESV / 7 helpful votes

All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work.

Ephesians 5:22-24 ESV / 7 helpful votes

Wives, submit to your own husbands, as to the Lord. For the husband is the head of the wife even as Christ is the head of the church, his body, and is himself its Savior. Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit in everything to their husbands.

John 14:18 ESV / 7 helpful votes

“I will not leave you as orphans; I will come to you.

Matthew 6:9 ESV / 7 helpful votes

Pray then like this: “Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name.

Joshua 24:15 ESV / 7 helpful votes

And if it is evil in your eyes to serve the Lord, choose this day whom you will serve, whether the gods your fathers served in the region beyond the River, or the gods of the Amorites in whose land you dwell. But as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord.”

Exodus 34:6-7 ESV / 7 helpful votes

The Lord passed before him and proclaimed, “The Lord, the Lord, a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness, keeping steadfast love for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, but who will by no means clear the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children and the children's children, to the third and the fourth generation.”

Titus 2:2 ESV / 6 helpful votes

Older men are to be sober-minded, dignified, self-controlled, sound in faith, in love, and in steadfastness.

Ephesians 6:1 ESV / 6 helpful votes

Children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right.

Romans 8:15 ESV / 6 helpful votes

For you did not receive the spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you have received the Spirit of adoption as sons, by whom we cry, “Abba! Father!”

Psalm 23:1-6 ESV / 6 helpful votes

A Psalm of David. The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want. He makes me lie down in green pastures. He leads me beside still waters. He restores my soul. He leads me in paths of righteousness for his name's sake. Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for you are with me; your rod and your staff, they comfort me. You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies; you anoint my head with oil; my cup overflows. ...

Deuteronomy 27:19 ESV / 6 helpful votes

“‘Cursed be anyone who perverts the justice due to the sojourner, the fatherless, and the widow.’ And all the people shall say, ‘Amen.’

Deuteronomy 4:9 ESV / 6 helpful votes

“Only take care, and keep your soul diligently, lest you forget the things that your eyes have seen, and lest they depart from your heart all the days of your life. Make them known to your children and your children's children—

Deuteronomy 1:29-31 ESV / 6 helpful votes

Then I said to you, ‘Do not be in dread or afraid of them. The Lord your God who goes before you will himself fight for you, just as he did for you in Egypt before your eyes, and in the wilderness, where you have seen how the Lord your God carried you, as a man carries his son, all the way that you went until you came to this place.’

1 Timothy 3:15 ESV / 5 helpful votes

If I delay, you may know how one ought to behave in the household of God, which is the church of the living God, a pillar and buttress of the truth.

2 Corinthians 5:8 ESV / 5 helpful votes

Yes, we are of good courage, and we would rather be away from the body and at home with the Lord.

Ecclesiastes 7:1 ESV / 5 helpful votes

A good name is better than precious ointment, and the day of death than the day of birth.

Proverbs 14:26 ESV / 5 helpful votes

In the fear of the Lord one has strong confidence, and his children will have a refuge.

Psalm 10:17 ESV / 5 helpful votes

O Lord, you hear the desire of the afflicted; you will strengthen their heart; you will incline your ear

Deuteronomy 24:20-21 ESV / 5 helpful votes

When you beat your olive trees, you shall not go over them again. It shall be for the sojourner, the fatherless, and the widow. When you gather the grapes of your vineyard, you shall not strip it afterward. It shall be for the sojourner, the fatherless, and the widow.

Titus 2:4 ESV / 4 helpful votes

And so train the young women to love their husbands and children,

Ephesians 5:1 ESV / 4 helpful votes

Therefore be imitators of God, as beloved children.

Matthew 7:21 ESV / 4 helpful votes

“Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but the one who does the will of my Father who is in heaven.

Jeremiah 49:11 ESV / 4 helpful votes

Leave your fatherless children; I will keep them alive; and let your widows trust in me.”

Isaiah 1:17 ESV / 4 helpful votes

Learn to do good; seek justice, correct oppression; bring justice to the fatherless, plead the widow's cause.

Proverbs 4:1-4 ESV / 4 helpful votes

Hear, O sons, a father's instruction, and be attentive, that you may gain insight, for I give you good precepts; do not forsake my teaching. When I was a son with my father, tender, the only one in the sight of my mother, he taught me and said to me, “Let your heart hold fast my words; keep my commandments, and live.

Psalm 48:14 ESV / 4 helpful votes

That this is God, our God forever and ever. He will guide us forever.

Psalm 34:18 ESV / 4 helpful votes

The Lord is near to the brokenhearted and saves the crushed in spirit.

2 Chronicles 7:14 ESV / 4 helpful votes

If my people who are called by my name humble themselves, and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven and will forgive their sin and heal their land.

Deuteronomy 24:17-21 ESV / 4 helpful votes

“You shall not pervert the justice due to the sojourner or to the fatherless, or take a widow's garment in pledge, but you shall remember that you were a slave in Egypt and the Lord your God redeemed you from there; therefore I command you to do this. “When you reap your harvest in your field and forget a sheaf in the field, you shall not go back to get it. It shall be for the sojourner, the fatherless, and the widow, that the Lord your God may bless you in all the work of your hands. When you beat your olive trees, you shall not go over them again. It shall be for the sojourner, the fatherless, and the widow. When you gather the grapes of your vineyard, you shall not strip it afterward. It shall be for the sojourner, the fatherless, and the widow.

Deuteronomy 6:6-7 ESV / 4 helpful votes

And these words that I command you today shall be on your heart. You shall teach them diligently to your children, and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, and when you walk by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise.

Exodus 22:22 ESV / 4 helpful votes

You shall not mistreat any widow or fatherless child.

Exodus 12:14-51 ESV / 4 helpful votes

“This day shall be for you a memorial day, and you shall keep it as a feast to the Lord; throughout your generations, as a statute forever, you shall keep it as a feast. Seven days you shall eat unleavened bread. On the first day you shall remove leaven out of your houses, for if anyone eats what is leavened, from the first day until the seventh day, that person shall be cut off from Israel. On the first day you shall hold a holy assembly, and on the seventh day a holy assembly. No work shall be done on those days. But what everyone needs to eat, that alone may be prepared by you. And you shall observe the Feast of Unleavened Bread, for on this very day I brought your hosts out of the land of Egypt. Therefore you shall observe this day, throughout your generations, as a statute forever. In the first month, from the fourteenth day of the month at evening, you shall eat unleavened bread until the twenty-first day of the month at evening. ...

Revelation 1:1 ESV / 3 helpful votes

The revelation of Jesus Christ, which God gave him to show to his servants the things that must soon take place. He made it known by sending his angel to his servant John,

Revelation 1:1-20 ESV / 3 helpful votes

The revelation of Jesus Christ, which God gave him to show to his servants the things that must soon take place. He made it known by sending his angel to his servant John, who bore witness to the word of God and to the testimony of Jesus Christ, even to all that he saw. Blessed is the one who reads aloud the words of this prophecy, and blessed are those who hear, and who keep what is written in it, for the time is near. John to the seven churches that are in Asia: Grace to you and peace from him who is and who was and who is to come, and from the seven spirits who are before his throne, and from Jesus Christ the faithful witness, the firstborn of the dead, and the ruler of kings on earth. To him who loves us and has freed us from our sins by his blood ...

1 Peter 3:7 ESV / 3 helpful votes

Likewise, husbands, live with your wives in an understanding way, showing honor to the woman as the weaker vessel, since they are heirs with you of the grace of life, so that your prayers may not be hindered.

1 Timothy 5:3 ESV / 3 helpful votes

Honor widows who are truly widows.

Philippians 4:19 ESV / 3 helpful votes

And my God will supply every need of yours according to his riches in glory in Christ Jesus.

Ephesians 6:1-3 ESV / 3 helpful votes

Children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right. “Honor your father and mother” (this is the first commandment with a promise), “that it may go well with you and that you may live long in the land.”

Ephesians 4:17-32 ESV / 3 helpful votes

Now this I say and testify in the Lord, that you must no longer walk as the Gentiles do, in the futility of their minds. They are darkened in their understanding, alienated from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in them, due to their hardness of heart. They have become callous and have given themselves up to sensuality, greedy to practice every kind of impurity. But that is not the way you learned Christ!— assuming that you have heard about him and were taught in him, as the truth is in Jesus, ...

1 Corinthians 7:25-40 ESV / 3 helpful votes

Now concerning the betrothed, I have no command from the Lord, but I give my judgment as one who by the Lord's mercy is trustworthy. I think that in view of the present distress it is good for a person to remain as he is. Are you bound to a wife? Do not seek to be free. Are you free from a wife? Do not seek a wife. But if you do marry, you have not sinned, and if a betrothed woman marries, she has not sinned. Yet those who marry will have worldly troubles, and I would spare you that. This is what I mean, brothers: the appointed time has grown very short. From now on, let those who have wives live as though they had none, ...

Proverbs 19:18 ESV / 3 helpful votes

Discipline your son, for there is hope; do not set your heart on putting him to death.

Proverbs 13:24 ESV / 3 helpful votes

Whoever spares the rod hates his son, but he who loves him is diligent to discipline him.

Proverbs 1:8 ESV / 3 helpful votes

Hear, my son, your father's instruction, and forsake not your mother's teaching,

Psalm 82:3-4 ESV / 3 helpful votes

Give justice to the weak and the fatherless; maintain the right of the afflicted and the destitute. Rescue the weak and the needy; deliver them from the hand of the wicked.”

Deuteronomy 21:18-21 ESV / 3 helpful votes

“If a man has a stubborn and rebellious son who will not obey the voice of his father or the voice of his mother, and, though they discipline him, will not listen to them, then his father and his mother shall take hold of him and bring him out to the elders of his city at the gate of the place where he lives, and they shall say to the elders of his city, ‘This our son is stubborn and rebellious; he will not obey our voice; he is a glutton and a drunkard.’ Then all the men of the city shall stone him to death with stones. So you shall purge the evil from your midst, and all Israel shall hear, and fear.

Exodus 22:24 ESV / 3 helpful votes

And my wrath will burn, and I will kill you with the sword, and your wives shall become widows and your children fatherless.

Revelation 3:10 ESV / 2 helpful votes

Because you have kept my word about patient endurance, I will keep you from the hour of trial that is coming on the whole world, to try those who dwell on the earth.

1 John 3:1-24 ESV / 2 helpful votes

See what kind of love the Father has given to us, that we should be called children of God; and so we are. The reason why the world does not know us is that it did not know him. Beloved, we are God's children now, and what we will be has not yet appeared; but we know that when he appears we shall be like him, because we shall see him as he is. And everyone who thus hopes in him purifies himself as he is pure. Everyone who makes a practice of sinning also practices lawlessness; sin is lawlessness. You know that he appeared in order to take away sins, and in him there is no sin. ...

1 Peter 5:7 ESV / 2 helpful votes

Casting all your anxieties on him, because he cares for you.

1 Peter 2:1-25 ESV / 2 helpful votes

So put away all malice and all deceit and hypocrisy and envy and all slander. Like newborn infants, long for the pure spiritual milk, that by it you may grow up into salvation— if indeed you have tasted that the Lord is good. As you come to him, a living stone rejected by men but in the sight of God chosen and precious, you yourselves like living stones are being built up as a spiritual house, to be a holy priesthood, to offer spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ. ...

James 1:3 ESV / 2 helpful votes

For you know that the testing of your faith produces steadfastness.

Hebrews 13:5 ESV / 2 helpful votes

Keep your life free from love of money, and be content with what you have, for he has said, “I will never leave you nor forsake you.”

Hebrews 13:1-25 ESV / 2 helpful votes

Let brotherly love continue. Do not neglect to show hospitality to strangers, for thereby some have entertained angels unawares. Remember those who are in prison, as though in prison with them, and those who are mistreated, since you also are in the body. Let marriage be held in honor among all, and let the marriage bed be undefiled, for God will judge the sexually immoral and adulterous. Keep your life free from love of money, and be content with what you have, for he has said, “I will never leave you nor forsake you.” ...

Hebrews 12:5-11 ESV / 2 helpful votes

And have you forgotten the exhortation that addresses you as sons? “My son, do not regard lightly the discipline of the Lord, nor be weary when reproved by him. For the Lord disciplines the one he loves, and chastises every son whom he receives.” It is for discipline that you have to endure. God is treating you as sons. For what son is there whom his father does not discipline? If you are left without discipline, in which all have participated, then you are illegitimate children and not sons. Besides this, we have had earthly fathers who disciplined us and we respected them. Shall we not much more be subject to the Father of spirits and live? ...

Hebrews 12:3 ESV / 2 helpful votes

Consider him who endured from sinners such hostility against himself, so that you may not grow weary or fainthearted.

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