daily bread

Luke 11:² So He said to them, "When you pray, say:

      Our Father in heaven,
      Hallowed be Your name.
      Your kingdom come.
      Your will be done
      On earth as it is in heaven.
       ³ Give us day by day our daily bread.

 

I remember when I was growing up that hippies called money "bread".  I like this because I think the Lord wants us to look at the money we need and all the other physical needs we have in the same way we look at bread.  Bread is best when it's fresh and spoils after a few days, if unrefrigerated.  We need bread and we need to eat pretty much on a daily basis and the Lord wants us to look to Him for our physical needs to be met on a daily basis.  Of course it is good and it is necessary to plan ahead...and to save for future needs.  But I suspect that we miss out on a blessing sometimes when we forget that a big part of the wonder of our personal walk with God is the way He meets our needs and sustains our lives each day.  In fact, I think you can even go to a narrower slice of time to appreciate this.  Consider the protection He provides when we sleep, and are unconscious beyond our dreams.  He is watching us...He is sustaining our bodies with the automatic functions of breathing, heart beat and other internal body processes...despite our lack of conscious participation.  I suppose our hearts beat about once per second...that means that we need Him to sustain us at least every second, as the brain and the nervous system trigger the next heart beat and the heart muscle properly responds with its rhythmic pump action to propel our lifeblood through our body.  When we pray the familiar prayer: "Give us his day our daily bread", we are bringing our appreciation for the Lord into our immediate living...our experience of life, real-time...we acknowledge that we need Him right Now and all the Now's that will make up this day, as we walk through it.  And so we are reminded that God is not distant...He is intimately involved in our lives...down to the finest slice of time and the smallest increment of living.

 

blessings to all those with heartbeats and appetites for bread,

Rob Smith