In this manner, therefore, pray: …Give us this day our daily bread (Matthew 6:9-11)
Here in the Lord’s prayer, Jesus taught us to ask God for our daily bread (Matthew 6:11). Jesus again emphasized this truth when He said “Ask, and it shall be given you” (Matthew 7:7). Later on, James in His epistle noted that the failure to pray what Jesus taught is the reason for lack among believers: “You do not have because you do not ask” (James 4:2). In this way, the Scriptures affirm the need we have to pray “give us this day our daily bread” in the new covenant.
To ask God for our daily bread is to ask for our provision. God is not oblivious of our needs. Even so, after Jesus mentioned that God knows our needs before we ask Him, He went on in the same discourse to teach that we ask Him for the very things we need (Matthew 6:8, 11). This is because our Father desires to communicate and build a relationship with His children. He is not an absentee Father who only provides for His children and stays out of their lives but One who has opened His arms for us to come to Him with our desires.
In Matthew 15:21-28, we learn that healing is the Children’s bread. Thus, asking God for our daily bread should always remind us of the covenant of healing we have with God in Christ (Matthew 8:17, 1 Peter 2:24). Because we have access to our daily bread in Christ, we should be confident of God’s willingness to grant us healing when we ask Him, should sickness attempt to attack.
In Exodus 16:4, God told Moses that the reason for providing them manna or bread (Psalm 105:40) and requiring them to gather enough for each day was to test them to see if they will follow His instructions. We are also told that the things that existed in the Old Covenant were only a shadow of the real things that were to come in Christ (Hebrews 10:1, Colossians 2:17). Many years later, when Jesus Christ, the Word, came to the earth, He affirmed that He was the bread that came down from heaven (John 6:41). Even so, as we pray and ask God for our daily bread, this should be a reminder for us to always seek the Bread (the Word) He has given us from heaven daily. This is a way God tests us to see if we will follow His instructions or not.
To be continued.
Kwadwo Omari, PhD
February 26, 2019.