May 3, 2009

Mt. 6:11; John 6:25-35; Deut. 8:1-10

We are continuing our sermon series on the theme “Teach us to pray”.  Most of us already know how to pray but we can always go deeper in our prayer life.  For this sermon series we are using the prayer Jesus taught his disciples as a guide in developing our own prayer life.

As I said before, the Lord’s Prayer has seven petitions. The first three are all focused on God. We begin prayer by focusing on God’s agenda – hallowed be Your name, Your kingdom come, and Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven.

In this part of the prayer we learn to yield our will to God’s will – just as Jesus did. We begin prayer by praising God and listening for God to speak to us.

And, then, after we yield our will to God’s will we are prepared for God to address our needs.

Notice how the last four petitions in the prayer change. The movement is from Your name and Your kingdom and Your will to “our bread, our debts, our temptation, and our deliverance from evil”.

The last four petitions of this prayer are focused on our needs and our concerns. God wants us to ask for things.

Now, when I read books on prayer I sometimes get the impression that “asking God for things” is more like a beginner’s prayer. It is sort of a childish or immature form of prayer.

The more enlightened and advanced prayers are supposed to go beyond these little requests – to adoration and contemplation of God’s goodness and holiness. It’s like when you become mature – you won’t need to ask God for anything.

I think this understanding is a false view of prayer. I don’t think we ever get beyond asking God for things because we are dependent upon God our whole lives.

Petitionary prayer – asking God for things – is not a lower form of prayer – it is our staple diet. Jesus taught his disciples in the Lord’s Prayer to ask for the very basic necessities of life – like bread. Nothing is too trivial for God.

Jesus even provided wine for those celebrating a marriage. He provided food for the hungry crowds, rest for the weary, and he healed the sick.

Adoration and contemplation of God is certainly an important part of prayer, but so is asking God for things that matter most to us.

I know there are a lot of important and weighty matters in the world to pray about, but God also cares about us.

Nothing is more important to God than the anxiety we might feel about an upcoming surgery.

Nothing is more important to God than the exasperation we feel over our child’s irresponsible behavior.

Nothing is more important to God than the desperation we feel over the plight of our aging parents.

These things all matter to God because they matter to us.

As a parent, when our children were young (and even when they got older), I always wanted to hear the details about their day at school. I enjoyed hearing how their day went and what they did.

I think in the same way, God delights in hearing from us about what is happening in our lives – even those seemingly insignificant things.

When Jesus teaches his disciples to ask for “daily bread” he gives us permission to talk with God about the things that matter to us.

So, these requests related to bread, debts, temptations, and deliverance are not trivial or childish – they are an important part of our prayer life. How we pray about things may change, but we will always be dependent on God for the basic things of life.

Well, this morning then I want to focus on the petition “Give us this day our daily bread”. (Give out bread)

I looked up bread this week and noticed that there are over 300 references to bread in the bible. You can actually tell the whole biblical story through the lens of bread. I want to mention a few references this morning.

1. From the very first story in the bible bread is mentioned.

When Adam and Eve were expelled from the garden God said to them – “by the sweat of your face you will eat _________. (bread) (Genesis 3:19)

1. Later, we have the story of Esau who sells his birthright to his twin brother Jacob for a bowl of porridge and a loaf of __________.  (Gen. 25:34)
2. The Israelites were in the land of Canaan and there was a terrible famine. So they go to Egypt in search of ___________.  They finally end up there and becomes slaves for 400 years because they were searching for _________.
3. After 400 years, God uses Moses to deliver them from Pharaoh. On the night they were to be delivered – Moses tells them to hurry up because they have to leave.

There was no time for the yeast to work on their _______. So they ate unleavened _________.

1. In the wilderness they got tired of what they were eating so they cried out to God for something different.

God then gave them Manna so they could make ______.

1. Well there are many other references to bread in the OT but let’s jump over to Jesus.

Jesus, as he begins his public ministry is baptized and sent into the wilderness to be tempted for 40 days. He is fasting and the devil comes to him with a stone and says – if you really are the Son of God you can satisfy your hunger by turning this stone into ___________.

1. Jesus doesn’t do that but in his public ministry he irritates the Pharisees and Sadducees because he spends so much of his time with sinners, tax collectors, and prostitutes. And what does he do with them? He breaks ________ with them.

1. Then there are the multitudes who come out to hear Jesus. Thousands come to hear him and they get hungry.

So, Jesus asks his disciples to bring him what they can find. They bring to Jesus some fish and _______.

Jesus takes it and after blessing it he feeds the multitudes.

1. Then there is the last night of his life where he sits down with his disciples for a meal.

Jesus takes __________ , and after he blesses it, he says this __________ is my body given for you. As often as you eat this ____________ – remember me.

1. In the book of Acts the early church took Jesus seriously and whenever they met together they devoted themselves to the apostles teaching and fellowship and to the breaking of ________ and the prayers. (Acts 2:42)

So, for the early church communion wasn’t just a special meal at church once in a while but every time Christians ate together – they paused to remember that Jesus is the bread of life.

From these few references you can see very quickly that the whole biblical story can be told through the lens of bread and that bread has different meanings in the scripture.

Sometimes bread refers to the bread we eat. Other times bread refers to the basic necessities of life. And other times bread refers to spiritual things like Jesus being the bread of life.

So, what does it mean then to pray “give us this day our daily bread”?

1. I think it is interesting that the first petition of Jesus in relating to us is about ordinary bread. It isn’t about forgiveness or temptations, or deliverance from evil. It is about bread.

Now, many commentators dealing with this petition want to spiritualize the bread. They want to say the “bread is God’s word or the bread is the mystery of Christ’s body broken for us.”

Bread can mean those things, but here Jesus wants us to pray for the bread we eat everyday.

I find it interesting that the first office established in the early church was the office of deacon. In Acts 6 deacons were called to give oversight to the distribution of bread to those in need.

So, giving out bread is not marginal, but central to the church’s activity and prayers.

All human beings have the need to eat – we get hungry. No matter how spiritual one is – we still need bread. We are body, as well as soul. We have material needs.

We do not need to be ashamed of our dependence on material goods. We should not keep quiet about hunger concerns in our communities.

To pray – give us this day our daily bread – is a prayer to have our material needs met. God doesn’t want anyone to go hungry.

Now, of course there is always a tendency to either “overvalue material things” or to “undervalue material things”.

There will always be some who “undervalue material things” by emphasizing an austere and ascetic lifestyle. Yet, Jesus seems to oppose an ascetic lifestyle. Jesus enjoyed table fellowship with people. He was even accused of gluttony.

So material things are important and they are given to us to enjoy.

However, the more common problem for most of us is not undervaluing material things but “overvaluing material things.”

Most of us struggle with too much bread, rather than too little. We fill our emptiness through endless consumption

There is a perverted hunger in our society that is oriented towards accumulation and growth that knows no bounds. Our material interests can take over our hearts and become an idol in our lives.

The important thing about this petition is that it sets limits on our temptation to accumulate. Notice the words “this day” and “daily bread”.

Jesus knows that we need bread to thrive in life, but this petition also counsels restraint. We are not to ask for bread for tomorrow or next month or next year, but only for today.

This is really a prayer for contentment. It is a prayer to trust God to meet all of our needs.

The Greek word for “daily” is Epiousion. The interesting thing about this word is that it only appears in the Lord’s Prayer. It is not used anywhere else in the bible.

Jesus seems to be teaching his disciples to be satisfied or content with what they need for the day. They are not to heap up goods, but to ask only for what is necessary and sufficient for the day.

Give us “this day” the bread we need.

When Jesus gave this petition he may have had in mind a prayer from Proverbs 30: 8-9.  The writer of Proverbs prays – “give me neither poverty nor riches; feed me with the food that I need, or I shall be full, and deny you, and say – Who is the Lord? Or I shall be poor, and steal, and profane the name of my God.”

In Proverbs we see the danger of having too little – we might steal to get food and profane God’s name. Or the danger of having too much is that we think we don’t need God anymore. We think we can make it on our own and that what we have, we got with our hard work and we deserve to keep it for ourselves.

In our culture of consumption it is important for us to pray this petition because it sets limits on us. This petition helps us to pray – “Give us the grace to know when enough is enough.” Or it “Helps us to say, no, when the world entices us with too much.”

So, this petition authenticates our need for bread and material things, but it also sets limits on what we need. It teaches us contentment and it teaches us to trust God for all of our needs.

1. Secondly, this petition teaches us to pray for bread, not only for ourselves, but for others too.

We do not pray – give “me” this day, “my” daily bread. Instead, we pray – give “us” this day, “our” daily bread.

When we pray this prayer we pray collectively for us and for others. The bread that we pray for is bread that must be shared.

Often in the OT bread is often linked with the command to share. In Isaiah 58:7 we are commanded to “share our bread with the hungry.”

In Psalms 146:7 the Psalmist praises God as the one “who executes justice for the oppressed, who gives food to the hungry.”

When we pray “give us this day our daily bread” we are called to act on behalf of others, to consume less, and to live more simply. We are invited to share, to feed the hungry, and to work for justice in our world.

You might ask – how does God give us bread? Some times God multiplies what we have so that it goes further. But most times God gives us bread through other people.

Often times, when we share our bread, we become the answer to someone else’s prayer.

If someone has a flat tire and they pray for help – you become the answer to their prayers when you stop to help them.

If someone needs food and you take them a bag of groceries – you become an answer to their prayers.

There really is enough food in the world to feed every person but many people are starving because we have not learned to share our food with others.

Extravagant consumption, not only of food, but of other basic raw materials is a sin against our needy sisters and brothers and it is a sin against God.

To pray for God to give us our daily bread is really a prayer for justice. It is a reminder that bread is God’s gift to us and it is not meant to be hoarded but to be shared.

A Latin American prayer puts it this way – “O God, to those who have hunger give bread; and to those who have bread give the hunger for justice.”

So, to pray – God, give us this day our daily bread – is not only to pray for our basic needs, but to also pray for our commitment to justice and fairness so that all God’s children have their basic needs met.

1. And then lastly this morning – to pray for our daily bread – is to pray for our soul and spirit to be nourished, as well as our body.

When Jesus was tempted in the wilderness to turn stones into bread he said – “one does not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God.”

Jesus said “I am the bread of life. Whoever comes to me will never be hungry, and whoever believes in me will never be thirsty.”

It is possible for us to be physically well-fed and to still be malnourished.

If we expect one hour a week on Sunday morning to nourish our spirits we will die. If we put junk food into our spirits all week long we can’t expect to deepen our faith in God.

Without feeding our souls daily on God’s word we will be weak. Without regular times of prayer and fellowship with other Christians our spirits will shrivel.

We will be malnourished. We won’t be able to thrive on our Christian journey.

So, when we pray “give us this day our daily bread” we are also praying for God to provide us spiritual bread – bread that will last forever.

The bread we need is also the bread of heaven that will nourish our inner beings.

Jesus truly is the bread of life who satisfies our hunger for God.

In the end, this petition –give us this day our daily bread – really teaching us to eat bread thankfully. Bread is really a gift from God.

And bread is always meant to be shared with our sisters and brothers around the world.

One of the reasons we pray before meals is to remember that bread is a gift from God and it is meant to be shared.

I want to suggest that our daily meals can also be times of remembering Jesus as the bread of life. Our meals can be a reminder that bread alone will not satisfy us – we also need the bread of heaven.

So, as we pray – give us this day our daily bread – may we learn to value bread as a gift from God and learn to share it with others. And may we also give thanks daily to God for giving us Jesus – the bread of life. Amen.