OUR DAILY BREAD

In Christ's model prayer, He teaches us that we are to rely upon God to supply our needs, especially food (Matt. 6:11). He told us not to worry about our food because God loves us more than the fowls of the air (Matt. 6:26). Here, He was referring to our sustenance, but could He also have been hinting at other things? For instance, Jesus called Himself the "Bread of Life" (John 6:48-58). Our daily relationship with Jesus is also a provision of God, in that the Father drew us (John 6:44); the Son died for us (John 3:16); and the Spirit convicted us and provided us with the faith to believe in the living Christ (John 16:7-11; Eph. 2:8-9).

Partaking of our daily bread may also have another meaning. He told His disciples that His food was to do the will of the Father (John 4:34). I doubt that any Christian would question the fact that the Lord wants us to do the will of the Father every day. A little over a year ago, I was hospitalized with blood-clots in my lungs. The doctor was very clear that I might not make it. A pastor came and asked if he could pray for me. I told him he could on one condition; if God was going to let me live, I wanted to have a way to serve Him daily. Obviously I lived, and the blog you are now reading is the ministry He gave me through my pastor. I still don't know what a blog is, but I praise God for the opportunity to send my thoughts around the world.

Today, God has supplied us with another form of daily bread. The daily devotional, Our Daily Bread, published by RBC Ministries (Radio Bible Class) is available to anyone who asks for it, and it is free (www.radiobibleclass.org). However, I suggest you support the ministry financially and in prayer. I read it the first thing every morning, and start my day out "eating His bread." God has literally spoken to me on one occasion to turn back and look at the message on a specific day. As soon as I read the title, my mind immediately returned to something that had occurred on that day, which I had not yet understood. It was my first day in seminary, and during chapel, I had an emotional "melt-down." There I was, a forty-four year old sobbing uncontrollably. The date was September 2, 1986, and the title was "God's Love Softens Hearts." At the time, I did not know what had happened, but now, God was showing me that the experience was the result of His changing my heart from being rock-hard, to being teachable. He had broken me. Again, I found myself weeping. My God had worked on me, and here He was describing "the operation" so that I would realize that He was with me every day. Getting saved, or being born again, is great, but knowing that the Creator of the universe is orchestrating my metamorphosis into Christ-likeness boggles my mind! Oh, what a great God we serve!