Give
us this day our daily bread. ---
Matthew 6: 11
God transcends time. For God,
past, present, and future are all equally accessible. For God, all time is NOW.
But we’re not God. When we try to
live in the past and/or in the future while simultaneously trying to get things
done in the present, we end up stressed and unproductive.
I’ve had those moments. I’ve been
so far behind on work I should have already done or so concerned about projects
that were coming up that all I could do was shuffle papers around and open new
windows on my laptop without actually completing anything. The anxiety of trying to exist in multiple
timelines was paralyzing.
Jesus, Who understands both human psychology and the intricacies of
temporal physics, said: Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for
tomorrow will worry about its own things. Sufficient for the day is its own
trouble. (Matthew 6: 34)
Today is enough to worry about today.
We say that God will never put more on us than we can bear (1 Corinthians
10: 13), but we human beings have been known to ask God for too much for one
day. So Jesus teaches us to pray: Give us this day our DAILY bread.
Bread means food, necessities, income, opportunities, clients, contracts,
gigs, sales, provision.
So just enough of what I need, Lord, for me to deal with today. Not all of yesterday’s and tomorrow’s piled
on top of the present 24 hour space.
Just enough for me to process today.
And guess what?
Today has plenty. But we still
overload today.
We overload the day by procrastinating, pushing the bread-making of the
present into the future, hoarding up tasks until they burst out of our
calendars and spill into panic.
In our procrastination, we’re like the Israelites wandering in the
wilderness. In Exodus chapter 16, God
sent them bread from Heaven, called manna.
God’s direction were simple. Behold, I will rain bread from heaven for
you. And the people shall go out and gather a certain quota every day, that I
may test them, whether they will walk in My law or not.
And Moses said, “‘Let every man gather it
according to each one’s need…
Let no one leave any of it till morning.” (Exodus 16: 4, 16, 19)
Manna was their DAILY bread.
But the Israelites didn’t want to follow instructions. They tried to push some of the daily manna
into the next day.
Notwithstanding they did not heed Moses. But
some of them left part of it until morning, and it bred worms and stank. (Exodus 16: 20)
It’s like all that work piled up on my desk. There really is enough today to do. But when
I procrastinate, I basically leave part of yesterday’s bread to stink up today.
When the Israelites did that Exodus 16: 20 goes on to say: And
Moses was angry with them.
Yeah. I can see that.
Lord knows we tend to say (rather arrogantly), “I can get this all done
tomorrow.” He knows that we think we
know, even though we don’t know. After
all God knows the past, present, and future; but we’re not God.
That’s why He says: Do not boast
about tomorrow, For you do not know what a day may bring. (Proverbs 27: 1)
Resist the temptation to procrastinate by seeing what we have in front of
us as special gift, specifically given by God for THIS day.
Give
us this day our daily bread.
When you work like there’s no tomorrow, then you’re won’t mentally project
your provision for today into the future.
Now, I want to be clear. Jesus does not teach us to go into everyday
stressing like all deadlines are this afternoon. Jesus taught His disciples (and us) to
understand what our tasks for today are.
To take the steps designated for today and not to stress over the steps
we haven’t come to yet.
Over and over, especially in the book of John (2:4; 7: 30; 8: 20), Jesus
refused to take extra steps on His mission because those weren’t the tasks for
THIS day, because His hour had not yet
come.
Jesus knew He was working a long term plan, but He took that plan day by
day. He was present in and attentive to
the now.
When you can focus on the now, a strange thing happens. Time itself seems to move differently.
Think about the kind of slow-motion perception that happens in a crisis,
like a car accident, when what took seconds seems to last forever.
Science explains it like this:
According to Dr. David Eagleman, a
neuroscientist at Baylor College of Medicine, it's all about memory, not turbo
perception.
"Normally, our memories are like
sieves," he says. "We're not writing down most of what's passing
through our system."
Think about walking down a crowded street:
You see a lot of faces, street signs, all kinds of stimuli. Most of this,
though, never becomes a part of your memory. But if a car suddenly swerves and
heads straight for you, your memory shifts gears. Now it's writing down
everything — every cloud, every piece of dirt, every little fleeting thought,
anything that might be useful.
Because of this, David believes, you
accumulate a tremendous amount of memory in an unusually short amount of time.
The slow-motion effect may be your brain's way of making sense of all this
extra information.
"When you read that back out,"
David says, "the experience feels like it must have taken a very long
time. But really, in a crisis situation,
you're getting a peek into all the pictures and smells and thoughts that
usually just pass through your brain and float away, forgotten forever.”
When you are focused on the right now, you see more, you notice more, you
remember more. Basically, being totally
present in today makes you smarter. You
can accomplish so much more that it’s like time is standing still.
Sufficient for the day is its own trouble. In
other words, there’s enough data available right now to occupy you----- if
you’ll pay attention.
Give us this day our daily bread.
Ironically, the key to slowing down time so you can do what you have to
do today, is to slow down yourself. To
rest.
Sometimes the bread Heaven sends for the day is the bread of rest, the
bread of the Sabbath.
With the Israelites in Exodus, God gave twice as much manna on the 6th
day of the week, so that on the Sabbath, they could rest and worship. The manna on the 6th day, they laid it up till morning, as Moses
commanded; and it did not stink, nor were there any worms in it. (Exodus 16: 23, 24)
God knows the past, the present, and the future. And, God knows us. He understands the intricacies of time-space
perception and the depths of the human minds that He designed. And so, God gave us----- the Sabbath.
As Jesus said: The Sabbath was made
for man, and not man for the Sabbath.
(Mark 2: 27)
A 24 hour period each week to stop trying to catch up or push ahead. A day of commanded rest.
Sabbath rest, means a day of worship and meditation, a day to refresh and
reflect. A day to take your foot of the
social accelerator so you start the next week calm enough to take things day by
day.
So, you don’t get to blow off Christian worship in the name of holy
naptime. Jesus continued His teaching on
the Sabbath by saying: Therefore the Son of Man is also Lord of the
Sabbath. (Mark 2: 28)
So Jesus is Lord/ Chief/ the most important part of the Sabbath, not
ESPN.
I have learned the hard way that there is a point at which you can’t move
any faster until you slow down, a point at which you can’t get any more done
until you step away from your work for a while, a point at which you can’t
figure out the answer by thinking about the question.
At that point you have to accept the bread of rest.
One Sabbath day, a group of Jews asked Jesus what signs He could do
compared the miraculous manna that Moses had given in the wilderness.
Then Jesus said to them, “Most assuredly, I
say to you, Moses did not give you the bread from heaven, but My Father gives
you the true bread from heaven. For the
bread of God is He who comes down from heaven and gives life to the world.”
Then they said to Him, “Lord, give us this
bread always.” (John 6: 32 – 34)
They said to Him, “Lord, give us this bread
always.”
They said, “Give us every day this daily bread.”
And Jesus said to them, “I am the bread of
life.” (John 6: 35)
You want to find the focus every day to produce like time is standing
still? Then every day, make Jesus the
center of your focus.
You want to find rest and refreshment on the Sabbath day? Remember that the Son of Man is also Lord of the Sabbath, and make Jesus the
focus of your Sabbath day.
When you do, it changes the way you perceive all the tasks, challenges,
opportunities that a day brings. Making
Jesus the essential daily bread of your life changes your mind.
For “who has known the mind of the Lord that
he may instruct Him?” But we have the mind of Christ. (1
Corinthians 2:16)
Jesus said to them, “I am the bread of life.”
Give
us this day our daily bread.
Every day, God gives you enough to do that dayEnough to move you a full
day closer to achieving the goals that God has blessed. Enough to move a day closer to the blessings
God has already placed in your path. .
Enough to move you a full day closer to fulfilling your calling.
But you can only get there, one day, one Jesus-centered day, at a time.
Give
us this day our daily bread.
---Anderson T. Graves II is a writer, community organizer and
consultant for education, ministry, and rural leadership development.
Rev. Anderson T. Graves II is pastor of
Hall Memorial CME Church in Montgomery, Alabama, executive director of
the Substance Abuse Youth Networking Organization
(SAYNO) and director of rural leadership
development for the National Institute for Human Development (
NIHD).
Email atgravestwo2@aol.com
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Send a donation of any amount by check or money order.
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Hall Memorial CME Church
541 Seibles Road
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