OUR DAILY BREAD


A. "GIVE US THIS DAY OUR DAILY BREAD"
  1. Luke renders this fourth petition in these words, "Give us day by day our daily bread": Luke 11:3
  2. It is significant that:
    1. Three petitions pertain to God's glory.
    2. Three for man's spiritual necessity.
    3. And this fourth petition pertains to man's bodily needs.
B. "GIVE US THIS DAY OUR DAILY BREAD"
  1. This petition is full of special signification:
    1. In it we express our complete dependence upon our heavenly Father.
    2. "My God shall supply all your needs" - Phil. 4:19
    3. "These wait all upon thee; that thou mayest give them their meat in due season." - Ps. 104:27
    4. "For your heavenly Father knoweth that ye have need of all these things." - Matt. 6:32
  2. Those who offer this petition:
    1. Put their confidence in the paternal care of their heavenly Father.
    2. "The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want." - Ps. 23:1
    3. "I have been young, and now I am old; yet have I not seen the righteous forsaken, nor his seed begging for bread." - Ps. 37:25
  3. The petition seems to indicate that this is a family prayer:
    1. Was offered at the family altar -- "Give us this day our daily bread."
    2. This petition is one of the strongest evidences for the importance of family worship.
    3. "Pour out thy fury . . . upon the families that call not upon thy name" - Jer. 10:25
  4. How few in this fair land of ours never turn to the Giver of all good gifts, recognizing that what they think they have comes from him:
    1. Ingratitude is one of the sins of the last days.
    2. That was the sin that sent Sodom and Gomorrah to Hell - Ezek. 16:49, 50
C. "GIVE US THIS DAY OUR DAILY BREAD"
  1. Has a double application:
    1. It has reference, no doubt, to the bread or food to sustain our physical life.
    2. God created man by placing the necessity of food to sustain his life - Gen. 1:26-28
  2. But man, so the Bible says, consists of body, soul, and spirit: 2 Thess. 4:23
    1. This points to a dual nature of man, physical and moral or spiritual.
    2. If the physical nature of man needs nourishment, then it is equally true of the spiritual need.
    3. "Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God." - Matt. 4:4
  3. When we gather our loved ones around the family altar:
    1. We do, rightly so, place our temporal needs before our heavenly Father.
    2. But, as God's spiritual children, we include the bread of life in our petition.
      1. Christ is that bread which came down from Heaven - John 6:33, 35
      2. The written word of God is, too, the bread of life - Jer. 15:16; Heb. 4:12, 13
      3. Paul calls it "meat" - Heb. 5:12
      4. Our Saviour speaks of the word of God, using the same expressions - Matt. 24:45
  4. Thus we gather from the fourth petition in the Lord's prayer:
    1. That we look to our heavenly Father for all those needs that sustain our physical and our spiritual nature.
    2. That the nature of the petition places the request at the family altar.
    3. That being true, the family altar becomes the storehouse or center for our temporal and our spiritual needs.
    4. Dear reader, is this true of your experience at your family altar?
    5. Have you ever given thought to the life-giving importance of the family altar?


Design © John Bryant 2011