When Jesus taught His first followers to pray, He gave them a framework of fewer than five dozen words.<\/p>\n
He started with three requests that draw the person praying into the mission and priorities of Jesus Himself: \u201cMay Your name be kept holy, may Your kingdom come and may Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven.\u201d<\/p>\n
Or, put another way, \u201cGlorify Your name, spread Your kingdom, accomplish Your will.\u201d<\/p>\n
But His next words took a surprising turn. From the sublime to the mundane, you might say. He said to pray \u201cgive us today our daily bread.\u201d<\/p>\n
Really, Jesus? Bread? After instructing us to pray about the holiness of God\u2019s name, the coming of His reign and the accomplishment of His sovereign will\u2026\u201dgive us today our daily bread\u201d?<\/p>\n
\u201cYes,\u201d He would say. In a word, \u201cbread.\u201d<\/p>\n
Those few words make it clear that praying for the most basic, practical, ordinary needs of daily life is perfectly consistent with praying also for such high and lofty things as God\u2019s reputation, kingdom and will. In other words, when you pray, Jesus says, pray for your mundane, daily needs.<\/p>\n
We pray most fervently about desperate needs. A diagnosis. A layoff. A crisis. And our loving Lord wants us to pray at such times. But He also tells us to pray for daily needs. He urged on His followers a day-by-day dependence on God for the most basic, elemental human needs. It wasn\u2019t figurative. It wasn\u2019t symbolic of \u201cwhat we\u2019re going to need today\u201d as we generally understand it when we pray. It was literally a prayer for bread. And literally a prayer for today.<\/p>\n
I think it still is.<\/p>\n
I think we pray best when we exhibit a day-by-day dependence on God for the most basic, elemental human needs. Jesus didn\u2019t say to pray \u201cgive us this day our daily bread\u201d only when we are in need. He said, \u201cWhen you pray, say\u2026give us this day our daily bread.\u201d<\/p>\n
It is a prayer for all seasons, and a prayer even for people who have three different kinds of bread in their cupboard. It is a daily prayer because it is a prayer of dependence.<\/p>\n
Do you pray for the mundane? Do you ask for the most basic, elemental things? If not, why not?<\/p>\n
Praying \u201cgive us this day our daily bread\u201d reminds us that all good things come from God. It reminds us to be grateful. It places us in a posture of submission and sensitivity. It is a prayer that can quickly transform our prayers:<\/p>\n
\u201cGive us this day our daily breath.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cGive us this day our daily break.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cGive us this day our daily coffee.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cGive us this day our daily discovery.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cGive us this day our daily strength.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cGive us this day our daily fun.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cGive us this day our daily work.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cGive us this day our daily health.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cGive us this day our daily oxygen.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cGive us this day our daily creativity.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cGive us this day our daily hope.\u201d<\/p>\n
You get the idea. Each prayer is a reminder that, as the children of Israel had to depend on God for a daily delivery of manna to their doorstep, so praying \u201cgive us this day our daily bread\u201d teaches me to pray for the things I need\u2014even those things I would otherwise take for granted. Maybe especially those things I take for granted.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
Adapted from The Red Letter Prayer Life<\/em> by Bob Hostetler (Barbour Books 2015)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" When Jesus taught His first followers to pray, He gave them a framework of fewer than five dozen words. He started with three requests that draw the person praying into the mission and priorities of Jesus Himself: \u201cMay Your name be kept holy, may Your kingdom come and may Your will be done on earth […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":78,"featured_media":31133,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"ep_exclude_from_search":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[211],"tags":[14,72],"ppma_author":[465],"class_list":["post-24994","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-prayers-for-stronger-faith","tag-spiritual-growth","tag-stories-of-faith"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n