Daily Bread

“Give us day by day our daily bread.” Luke 11:3 NKJV

On your horizon will be challenges beyond your experience.

My thoughts and comments today are about “daily bread.”

Life comes to you one day at a time; your necessary provision for life comes from your Father one day at a time as well. I think most people recognize their lack in some measure. Working harder, thinking longer, or getting richer won’t solve every problem. Everyone needs help sometimes.

Our great-granddaughter, Kaylee, is now one month old. She is helpless, fully dependent on the grace, love, and assistance of those who love her, for any and everything she needs for her health and growth. She will grow, and learn to do those basic things for herself, but she will always need some help from God and others – just as you and I do.

You were not born self-sufficient; you will not become self-sufficient entirely. You will have needs beyond your ability to satisfy. On your horizon will be challenges beyond your experience. You won’t know everything you will need to understand; you won’t have all the perseverance life will require; you will face situations and people for which you lack wisdom.

Life will confront you with things unexpected, things for which you are unprepared – injustice, false accusation, financial disaster, medical emergency, health crises, terribly accidents, social abandonment, emotional trauma, and too many other unwarranted tragedies to list. It is foolish to think that you can be equal to everything that could occur in a lifetime. Life doesn’t afford you ample storage of reserve and resource for whatever may come your way in a lifetime. You meet life in smaller, daily doses.

Finally, the good news. There is nothing that touches your life that is bigger than God. You will not face anything without God, unless you choose to. You won’t have to confront all of those frightening things at the same time. You will experience very few of those in your lifetime, but you will not be exempt from all things that frighten and hurt. That’s why you will want help.

Jesus’ disciples asked Him to teach them how to pray; He gave them a model prayer. Read Luke 11:1-4 NKJV. This prayer provides a grand view of the intimacy of your relationship with God and the dimensions of God’s faithfulness to you. The prayer Jesus taught them teaches how life works, beginning with “our Father!”

Everything you need begins there – in His heart, from His hand, out of His love. You can have a unique, personal relationship with God who is your Father. In every circumstance, God’s will for your life can be preeminent, “on earth as it is in Heaven,” that grace flows when we “forgive everyone who is indebted to us,” and your cry, “deliver us,” leaves every evil intent impotent of harm.

I purposefully left this simple statement for last; “Give us day by day our daily bread.” Bread symbolizes basic needs that are common to us and necessary daily. As I stated above, you meet life in smaller, daily doses. Sufficient help is available every day from the one unfailing Source; you only need to come to your Heavenly Father and ask , “Give us day by day our daily bread.”

As surely as God fed Israel each day in the wilderness with manna He gave and they gathered, He will give you your “daily bread.” “Some gathered much, some little . . he who gathered much did not have too much, and he who gathered little did not have too little. Each one gathered as much as he needed. No one is to keep any of it till morning.” See Numbers 11:7-8/Exodus 16:16-19 NIV. God’s provision was day by day only.

My prayer for you today is that you live confidently in the ample supply of God’s love.