Give us this day our daily bread – part of the prayer Jesus gave us. What a treasure! He taught us how to pray. The Lord’s prayer includes it all – adoration, contrition, thanksgiving and supplication. I once heard a priest explain it to children this way: it’s like a bacon sandwich with 5 slices of bacon – praise, hope, trust, forgiveness and goodness.
The Bacon
Praise – Our Father who art in heaven, hallowed be Thy name
Hope – Thy Kingdom come, Thy will be done, on Earth as it is in Heaven
Trust – Give us this day our daily bread
Forgiveness – and forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us and
Goodness – lead us not into temptation but deliver us from evil. Amen
What a concept
I thought that was an ingenious idea to have children remember what we are professing when we recite each part of the Our Father. I think of that story everyday as I pray the Lord’s prayer several times throughout the day.
Give us this day our daily bread stayed with me for some reason last weekend. I thought about my upcoming week and all the stresses that come with dealing with work and family obligations, along with illness and tough decision making. I prayed God would give me the strength I needed to deal with difficult moments and that He would give me the wisdom and understanding I need to show compassion to those who need it.
God provides
In that moment of prayer, I realized that that one line in the Lord’s prayer is so much more than asking He provide for our material needs. It’s also a request that He provide what we need spiritually. It could be the comfort of a hug, a kind word, something we see or read, even encouragement or sharing from someone to let us know we are not alone.
Thinking of those words in this way made me realize that God hears me and answers my prayer everyday. I say this because often I recognize a “theme” between my thoughts and my experiences each day. I often write about how amazed I am that everything I read and experience in one day guides me to one particular thought or theme. Wow!
The more I thought about the spiritual needs aspect of the prayer, the word bread came to mind. Jesus is the Bread of Life, nourishment for our souls. So we are, in effect, asking Him to give us daily nourishment for our souls in whatever way He sees fit and boy does He provide!
Our daily bread
Just the other day, I was chatting with my dad over the phone. He’s been, actually, we’ve both been a little stressed over his recent diagnosis of liver cancer. I often try to encourage him and tell him all will be well, but it’s quite difficult to stay focused when you know you have cancer and treatment has not begun.
The past three months since his diagnosis has been filled with appointments, recommendations, referrals and tons of testing with no definitive answer until a few days ago. In the midst of all of this, just last week another diagnosis.
Anyone who knows our family knows my dad has a great sense of humor and most of his children, including myself, have inherited that trait. Because dad loves to bust chops, his children thrive on busting his chops the most. We often get a kick out of making fun of his “isms.” As a matter of fact, one of my brothers is the dictionary keeper. Whenever my dad blurts out an “ism” we call this brother and say, “add that one to Papi’s “dictionary.”
God provides
As dad and I discussed his latest diagnosis, I could sense his stress level was through the roof. He almost sounded like he wanted to give up, like he just couldn’t take anymore and then……………. During our very serious conversation, I blurted out the wrong word – I misused a word and realized it a minute later. Well, we both laughed so hard we cried and before we said our good-byes, my dad said: Thanks for the laugh, it’s just what I needed today. I think we both laughed into the next day.
As I brushed my teeth the following day, I laughed thinking about my little “ism” episode and then it hit me………that was our daily bread. In that moment, God was giving us our daily bread! I went from laughing to crying as I became aware of how good God is to us and how much He cares for us.
What was your daily bread today? How did God provide for you today? Take notice of the smallest ways and you’ll be amazed at how much He cares! God bless you!
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