The Lord's PrayerChikamu

Provision

Give us today our daily bread

In one way, there is a shift in the Lord’s Prayer at this point. We go from, as it were, ‘looking upwards’ to God towards more ‘looking around’ towards ourselves and those around us. This shift of gaze mirrors both the Ten Commandments and Jesus’ summary of right religion: to love God and to love our neighbour (Matthew 22:36–40). Yet it is unwise to think that we are here shifting from the spiritual to the practical; the fact of the matter is that God is involved in every part of life.

We need to think carefully about what this phrase means. It has always been assumed that ‘bread’ here refers to all the necessities of life. It includes physical needs: not just food but also water, shelter, clothing, health, money, etc. Yet it is more: it can include psychological needs such as peace of mind, hope and courage, and spiritual needs such as grace, awareness of God and faith itself. ‘Bread’ is everything we need to keep us going. Note that to pray for bread is to admit our dependence on God. It’s all too easy for us to adopt the arrogant position of being someone who takes stock of all that they are and have and says ‘this is what I personally have made’. In the book of Daniel chapter 5, the prophet pronounces a judgement on the wicked King Belshazzar which includes the words, ‘But you did not honour the God who holds in his hand your life and all your ways’ (Daniel 5:23). In the same way St Paul, in attacking pride in the Corinthian church writes, ‘What do you have that you did not receive?’ (1 Corinthians 4:7).

Yet if there is a breadth in this phrase there is also a limit. Bread is the most basic food of life and that’s all Jesus tells us to pray for; not the luxuries of life but the essentials. As we pray this let’s never forget that there are many in this world for whom access to even the most basic necessities of life would be a luxury. In praying this part of the Lord’s Prayer let’s remind ourselves that we pray for our needs, not for our greeds. We need to remember all we have been given.

There are no redundant words in the Lord’s Prayer and the word daily should make us pause. It’s very tempting to ask God not just for what we need now, but for what we imagine we will need in the future. Yet to do this is one of many ways of distorting the purpose of prayer. God wants our prayers to focus on our relationship with him, and for us to come to him on a daily basis with our requests helps build that. That we should pray day by day for our needs builds a relationship for eternity. 

Finally, let me point out something that is present all the way through the Lord’s Prayer: that little word our. And it is very important. It’s all too easy for our praying to be focused on ourselves but that is not the focus of the New Testament. We must make a decision to follow Christ and join God’s people as individuals; but as Christians we must always see ourselves as part of a community. When we pray, we should always be praying for those whom we are linked with: our own physical families and also our spiritual family. And actually, it’s a good thing to pray for our friends, colleagues and neighbours as well. 

Finally, when God does give us our daily ‘bread’ – and frequently far, far more than that – let’s be grateful.