Word of Salvation – Vol. 36 No. 45 – December 1992

 

Praying For Daily Bread

 

Sermon by Rev. M. P. Geluk on Lord’s Day 50

Reading: Deuteronomy 8:10-20; Matthew 6:25-34

 

Beloved Congregation,

With the fourth request of the Lord’s Prayer we come to that part that focuses on the needs of God’s people.

First it was the honour and glory of God.  ‘Hallowed be your name.  Your kingdom come.  Your will be done.’

But now it is our living and working that are brought before God, and that makes sense for it is God alone who is able to provide our needs.  ‘Give us this day our daily bread.  Forgive us our sins.  Do not lead us into temptation.  Deliver us from evil.’

As we give our attention to these prayer requests about our needs – the need for bread, for forgiveness, for overcoming temptation and for deliverance from evil – it is very important for us to discover that our whole life is bound up in them.  That is really the amazing and wonderful aspect of Jesus’ prayer.  With just a few lines the Lord has indicated that He has understood our whole struggle in this imperfect world.

What He has taught us to pray for covers our bodily, mental and spiritual needs.

Someone may ask, and what about my sexual needs, or my emotional needs?  They are needs too, aren’t they?  Yes, they are, but these needs have been pushed to the front more so in our generation than in any other.  These needs have been made fashionable by our western society and they are felt needs only at certain times of our lives and in certain circumstances.  The Lord Jesus, however, is referring to essential needs that are there from the cradle to the grave.  The very young and the very old have no sexual needs but the needs Jesus mentions are needed by everyone at all times.

And when we receive food, forgiveness, victory over temptation and deliverance from evil, then the Lord has met all our emotional needs too, for then we are at peace with God and with ourselves.

With this simple but profound prayer, the Lord Jesus shows Himself to be a wonderful and mighty God who understands the needs of people.  And why shouldn’t He?  He is our Maker isn’t He?  And He so understood our greatest and deepest need – estrangement from God through sin – that He also became our Redeemer!

It is tragic, therefore, that in the lives of so many people there is little or no recognition and awareness of man’s dependence on God.

Peoples and nations everywhere are so very, very busy looking after their basic needs and most of these are considered to be material.

They organize, they plan, they legislate and they will even go to war, in order to maintain a comfortable standard of living.

Progress or recession is measured in terms of economic up- turns or down-turns but little or no attention is given to man’s spiritual well-being.

But if God’s people agree that ‘Man does not live on bread alone but on every word that comes from the mouth of God.’ (Matt.4:4), then is it not somewhat surprising that Jesus in His prayer taught us to pray for daily bread first and then for forgiveness and so on?

Why does the Lord now place the material and physical before the spiritual?  Why start with the body when it is the state of the soul that determines our eternal destiny?

It is important for us to know the answer for it has implications for evangelism and the diaconate of the church.

Do we come first with the Bible and then provide the material needs, or do we first see to the provision of food, shelter and clothing and then come with the message?  We would probably be correct if we say that we must come with both, but if the Lord’s Prayer is our guide, as it must be, then we may certainly not ignore the physical and material or make these a late second.

In His prayer Jesus teaches us that in order to be forgiven of sin, we need to continue to exist.

Indeed, if we are to glorify God’s name, seek the coming of His kingdom, and obey His will, then we need food to be able to go on.

It is refreshing for us to know that God, who is so concerned about our soul, is also very practical in that He knows we can’t serve Him as the angels who have no bodies.

Our obedience has to be as willing and faithful as the angels in heaven but until we get there we have to do our obeying with our bodies and minds.  But these need food, hence we first pray for daily bread.

Let us now look at the words of this fourth request separately.  Here are just a few simple words from the Lord on the whole question of food and other material needs.

Many books have been written on the subject, economists devote their lives to it; governments can fall from power because of it, and nations will even go to war over it.

As men deal with this question of food and material needs, then they need no reminder that the earth no longer enjoys paradise conditions.

After the fall into the sin the ground was cursed because of man’s disobedience.

We can still eat from it but it will be through painful toil.  With the food there will be thorns and thistles and the process of overcoming the one and harvesting the other will involve hard work and sweat.

And after a life time of toil and effort in order to make a living from the earth, it will in the end conquer us and we will return to the ground, for we are dust and to dust we will return.  And to add to our struggle there are the droughts, floods and fires.

Man has been given the task to subdue the earth and live from its resources but it is far from easy.

Romans 8 reminds us that the very creation that is to sustain us is also subject to decay.

Yes, there will be a glorious liberation and this tired, old earth will make way for a beautiful new earth where there will be no shortage of anything.  But that is still future.  In the meantime we have to make do with an imperfect situation.

We are told that the earth is capable of growing enough food to feed everyone living, yet there are many poor and hungry people.  This is due to greed, lust and pride.

People can be terribly selfish and wasteful.

The presence of sin deeply complicates the whole problem of feeding everybody in the world.

But it’s not all bad.  In our generation we have seen the rise of humanitarian organizations, which have made public the hungry and needy areas of the globe.  These organizations seek to help the poor and call upon the affluent to assist them.

These poor areas are huge and growing.  In an age of plenty these is still an incredible want.

In an age of technology there are still farming methods that do more harm than good to the earth.  In an age of high living standard there is still mass-starvation.  In an age of luxury there are still millions of refugees.

But now in that complex and contradictory world of sinful imperfections, we may pray this prayer: ‘Our Father in heaven… give us this day our daily bread.’

‘Give us’ we pray.  We do not demand but we humbly ask.  It is when people forget that God is holy and they themselves are sinners, that they begin to demand.  When God is pushed into the background and men and women begin to assert themselves, it is then that we start hearing these cries of demand.

But the cries of demand are often legitimate, for the poor and downtrodden have been exploited and ripped off.  It’s the age-old story of those in power manipulating the weak and powerless and the latter rising up in revolt.  But when the strong are made powerless and the weak become strong then the new masters fall into the same sins, or worse, of the ones they’ve replaced, and so we have the rise and fall of people.

But the Bible has always taught what the Lord Jesus so eloquently taught us to pray, that all men are dependent on God and that they must acknowledge this.  All humankind, whether they be poor or rich, weak or strong, ought to humbly pray and say ‘Father, give us…!’

Only God is Almighty and He alone rules over all the earth and its inhabitants.  No one but God has the power to give or withhold, to bring rain or drought, good harvests or poverty.  Man’s mandate is to work and subdue the earth but he should humbly look to God and ask Him to bless the work of his hands.  Man is to obey and serve His Maker and Redeemer.  And, therefore, we people of the earth are to say, Father you know our needs, please give us…!

Before God all men are equal but the Word of God does not teach that people are to be equal among themselves.  But instead of struggling and fighting amongst each other in order to get on top, all people are to obey God in their different roles and situations and serve Him and one another.  We all have to learn to live out of God’s hand; to live with the various gifts of God which we did not earn; how to live by God’s grace which we do not deserve.

Therefore, the employer, the wage-earner, the self- employed, the poor people, the millionaire, they all have to learn to look humbly to heaven and pray earnestly, ‘Father, give us this day our daily bread.’

Then we also pray, ‘Give us…!’  We do not pray: ‘Give me this day my daily bread,’ but ‘Give us this day our daily bread.’

With regard to our material needs, the Lord rules out individualism.  The Lord does not want us to be selfish.  He wants us to love our neighbour and involve him or her in our prayer.  What we are really praying is: ‘Give us, Father, so that we all may have our needs supplied.’  Yes, may all come to God and ask for daily bread and then our loving Father will graciously give and provide our necessities.

When people in the same house, neighbours in the same street, people in the same society and nations in the one world, all pray, ‘Father, give us…!’ then jealously and theft will disappear overnight.  For all will look to God and not eye off each other.  It means that the members of the same household have to start praying for each other; so also the boss for his workers, and the workers for the boss.  The government starts praying for its citizens and the citizens for their government; the rich for the poor, and the poor for the rich.

That little word ‘us’ is very important therefore.  When we are in it just for ourselves, yes, then we are sowing the seeds of crime, chaos, and anarchy.

The ‘Give us…’ aspect in this request for daily bread also means that those of us who can work and have work, ought to provide for those who can’t work.  Meaning that the unemployed, the elderly, the sick and the handicapped are not to be left out in the cold.

In this prayer the Lord Jesus points to what we call the social welfare system.  In our country we have that and let’s be thankful for it.  It means that there is a positive side to paying our taxes and we should, therefore, not complain about taxes.

Of course, there can still be room for tax reform.  And those in society who selfishly try to live off others when they themselves are able to work and the opportunity is there, should be called to account, for they are abusing the ‘Give us…’ aspect in this prayer.  Yet, for all the abuse, let us not forget that we are not in it just for ourselves alone.  It’s not just me, but it’s our neighbour and us.

We also pray, ‘Give us this day…’ or ‘Give us today…!’  We’re not asking God for a year’s supply but just for today.  We don’t pray for the end of the year whilst we are still in the middle of the year.

Of course, we must plan for the future.  It’s not that we are careless about tomorrow but we want to listen to Jesus and not be anxious about tomorrow.  Each day has enough of its own cares and concerns.

‘Give us this day…!’ for it is today that we need it.  So we do make plans for the future but we do not panic about the possibility that our plans for the future may not see fulfilment.

Let’s face it, everything in this life, except the work of Christ, is perishable.  The future may turn out to be completely different than we anticipate today.  It’s all in the Lord’s hands.

If today, and each day after today, we have somewhere to live, something to eat and something to wear, then our heavenly Father has answered our prayer.

We may wonder sometimes why we pray, ‘Give us today our daily bread,’ when the food is on the table already and plenty more in the cupboard and the freezer.  But with this request about food and other material needs, we should realise that in order to have food in the house and clothes in the wardrobe a complex process is involved.  There’s a sowing stage, a growth or a producing stage, a harvesting or manufacturing stage, a marketing stage, and buying and selling stage.

Indeed, when we finally put food into our mouth or wear the clothes, a lot has gone on before it.  And in that whole process one day flows into the next.  Asking for today’s needs, implies that God continues to bless that whole chain.

We further say, ‘Give us today our daily bread.’ Jesus did not say God’s bread but our bread.  It would even make sense to speak of it as God’s bread for isn’t God the Maker and Provider of it all?  The earth is the Lord’s and the fullness thereof, says the psalmist.  And yet the Lord Jesus wants us to say ‘our’ bread, for we do not come to the Father in heaven as beggars or slaves but as His dear children in Christ.

Our own children do not have to ask us for our meat and our cheese.  It’s good that they ask and not just take but we say to them ‘here is your food.’  And by teaching us to pray for our food, the Lord Jesus acknowledges the fact that we are subduing the earth in order to eat from it.  This involves work, planning and organization.  We just don’t sit back with our mouths open waiting for food.  It’s pray and work.  We have a hand in it, even though the effort is supplied by God too.  But the Lord acknowledges our contribution and we pray: ‘Our daily bread.’

The second-last word in the fourth request is ‘daily’.  Jesus did not actually say ‘daily’.  He used a word that according to the language experts is only used in the Lord’s Prayer.  The meaning of this rarely used word would seem to be stressing the current day’s needs.  We’re praying for the things needed to exist, needed for this particular day or needed for the next day.  The Lord will provide us on a day-to-day basis.

We have already referred to this ‘daily’ provision when dealing with the earlier word ‘this day’ or ‘today’.  So we don’t have to repeat what was said already.  But we should note that whilst ‘daily’ is the second-last word in our English translation, it really occurs at the beginning.  Literally, Jesus said, ‘Our daily bread give us this day.’ The whole idea of moderation and the provision of just the basic needs is therefore right up front.

The last word we look at is ‘bread’.  And by now you will have realised that much more than actual bread is implied.  We may understand that ‘bread’ includes all our basic material needs.

With this fourth petition, then, the Lord Jesus has taught us a number of important things that we need to remember when we pray for our needs.  To say, ‘Father, give…!’ means to be humble in our prayer, for we are but creatures.  To say, ‘Father, give us…!’ causes us to be generous to others, for it’s not just my needs but their needs as well.

The words ‘this day’ and ‘daily’ remind us to be moderate in our asking.  We don’t have to have everything, just the provision of our needs.  Whatever we receive beyond that is luxury.

To pray for ‘our’ daily bread suggests that we don’t come to God as beggars but as dignified people who have been remade in the image of Christ, and placed on the earth to subdue it and live from it.

And ‘bread’ refers to all our physical and material need including the whole economic cycle, thus pointing to God’s providence and our need to trust Him.

To pray, therefore, ‘Give us this day our daily bread’, means that we need to be humble, generous, modest, dignified, and trusting.

But if there is one word that sums up this prayer for daily bread, then surely it is dependence.  We are totally dependent on our Father in heaven.

Surely, the supreme folly of this twentieth century is the thinking and attitude that there is no God and man has to look after himself.  Modern science and technology have been in many respects wonderful tools to subdue the earth for man’s benefit and well-being.

But it is terribly sad that many people do not realise that science and technology are given to us by God in order to understand the intricate workings of the human body, the interacting laws of nature, and the complex components of things physical and chemical.  People who can’t see God’s hand in these things, tend to turn man into a god.  Man then becomes a rule unto himself and responsible only to himself.

Indeed, there are people who say, ‘Look, I might have to work for a boss, but I am not responsible for him, or for you, or anybody else; I am responsible only to myself, and cut out this nonsense about God.’

There is nothing new about that attitude.  It first appeared in Cain who said, ‘Am I my brother’s keeper?’  Cain’s offering was still to the Lord but his heart was not in it like his brother Abel.  Cain’s defiant attitude came out even stronger in his offspring.  They rejected God altogether and became a violent and destructive people using the primitive science and technology of their day.

Since then there have been countless numbers who walk in the footsteps of Cain, proud and arrogant.  But they all end up destroying themselves.  No one can live without God.  How important, then, for us to look up to our Father in heaven, confess His great and holy name, humbly confess our dependence on Him, and pray as Jesus taught us, ‘Give us this day our daily bread.’

AMEN