Daily Bread
"Give us today our daily bread" (Mat. 6:11).
Ho hum, swing open pantry door, pluck out a can of food.
Cruising through crowded grocery store aisles, charting the course through the grocery list, navigating through the numerous selections of brands.
Granted. We have food. Or, that is, I have food.
Granted.
"Give US today OUR daily bread" was what Jesus prayed. It is not my bread, but our bread. It is not give me, but give us.
Perhaps it is plural because--though we may have abundant--we are called to intercede on behalf of those who do not have food. For the families who stand in line in the food pantry I walk by each Thursday. For the Gypsy mothers in Romania who I saw begging for food to give to their children; not all were doing it for manipulation. For the 6- and 1- year-old brothers on the street in Honduras who had been selling themselves for sex so they could eat. For the 16,000 children who die every day due to hunger-related causes, or 1 every 5 seconds (1).
Perhaps it is our daily bread because God does want to reach out to the hungry, and he desires to do so through his body, the church. In this he gets glory--hearts and people transformed to be generous beyond the natural, sinful flesh capacity.
Perhaps we ask him to give it to us because God gives to us so graciously and abundantly and he promises to meet our needs as our Father, we can be radically generous. Because God so graciously gave his Son to us, we have no doubt he will "generously give us all things" and "meet all our needs according to his glorious riches in Christ Jesus" (Rom. 8:31-32; Phil. 4:19). Because we personally "know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though he was rich, yet for [our] sakes he became poor, so that [we] through his poverty might become rich" (2 Cor. 8:9). When we see Christ, we grow in deeper confidence that we are given all things, that our Father will provide for us for our good--although perhaps in different ways than we think is best. But we are free to be radically generous, to give of our daily bread to others, and to pray for our daily bread for those who do not have.
Food is granted--not taken for granted, but granted as a gift by our Father. Do we take that seriously? Do we pray this in all earnestness for ourselves? Do we pray it in earnest love for the poor for whom Christ loves? Do we have his heart of trust in his Father and his heart of love for others? May we see Christ more and more--in us as we become like him and in our neighbor as we minister like him!
NOTES
(1) Bread for the World. "Global Hunger."
Ho hum, swing open pantry door, pluck out a can of food.
Cruising through crowded grocery store aisles, charting the course through the grocery list, navigating through the numerous selections of brands.
Granted. We have food. Or, that is, I have food.
Granted.
"Give US today OUR daily bread" was what Jesus prayed. It is not my bread, but our bread. It is not give me, but give us.
Perhaps it is plural because--though we may have abundant--we are called to intercede on behalf of those who do not have food. For the families who stand in line in the food pantry I walk by each Thursday. For the Gypsy mothers in Romania who I saw begging for food to give to their children; not all were doing it for manipulation. For the 6- and 1- year-old brothers on the street in Honduras who had been selling themselves for sex so they could eat. For the 16,000 children who die every day due to hunger-related causes, or 1 every 5 seconds (1).
Perhaps it is our daily bread because God does want to reach out to the hungry, and he desires to do so through his body, the church. In this he gets glory--hearts and people transformed to be generous beyond the natural, sinful flesh capacity.
Perhaps we ask him to give it to us because God gives to us so graciously and abundantly and he promises to meet our needs as our Father, we can be radically generous. Because God so graciously gave his Son to us, we have no doubt he will "generously give us all things" and "meet all our needs according to his glorious riches in Christ Jesus" (Rom. 8:31-32; Phil. 4:19). Because we personally "know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though he was rich, yet for [our] sakes he became poor, so that [we] through his poverty might become rich" (2 Cor. 8:9). When we see Christ, we grow in deeper confidence that we are given all things, that our Father will provide for us for our good--although perhaps in different ways than we think is best. But we are free to be radically generous, to give of our daily bread to others, and to pray for our daily bread for those who do not have.
Food is granted--not taken for granted, but granted as a gift by our Father. Do we take that seriously? Do we pray this in all earnestness for ourselves? Do we pray it in earnest love for the poor for whom Christ loves? Do we have his heart of trust in his Father and his heart of love for others? May we see Christ more and more--in us as we become like him and in our neighbor as we minister like him!
NOTES
(1) Bread for the World. "Global Hunger."
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