Christian Living

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Give Us This Day Our Daily Bread

Jesus said as part of what we call the Lord’s Prayer: “Give us this day our daily bread” (Matthew 6:11). Many think Jesus is talking about physical food. However looking deeper into the passage reveals He is talking about spiritual food. The literal wording of Mt. 6:11 is: “Give us this day our bread for tomorrow”. Also some versions say: “our needful bread”. In both cases spiritual bread is signified. “Our bread for tomorrow” denotes an eternal quality to the bread. “Needful bread” corresponds to the bread of heaven as being our primary need.


John 6:30-32 says: “They said therefore to Him, “What then do You do for a sign that we may see, and believe You? What work do You perform? “Our fathers ate the manna in the wilderness; as it is written, ‘HE GAVE THEM BREAD OUT OF HEAVEN TO EAT [Psalm 78:4] “Jesus therefore said to them, “Truly, truly, I say to you, it is not Moses who has given you the bread out of heaven, but it is My Father who gives you the true bread out of heaven. “For the bread of God is that which comes down out of heaven, and gives life to the world.”


Bread represents hunger. Bread also represents the Word of God. “For the bread of God is that which comes down out of heaven, and gives life to the world.” They said therefore to Him, “Lord, evermore give us this bread. “Jesus said to them, “I am the bread of life; he who comes to Me shall not hunger, and he who believes in Me shall never thirst” (John 6:33-35). Jesus was the bread of life and life and light to the world. Scripture says: “IN the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things came into being by Him, and apart from Him nothing came into being that has come into being. In Him was life, and the life was the light of men” (John 1:1-4). Jesus was the bread of life.


What the Lord was saying in the “daily bread” part of the prayer is the hunger that we must have for the Lord. The statement is a command to seek the Lord to satisfy our hunger for Him. We are to seek Him day and night. Our hunger for God should be our waking thought just as breakfast (hunger) is our waking physical drive. Isaiah said: “Indeed, while following the way of Thy judgments, O LORD, We have waited for Thee eagerly; Thy name, even Thy memory, [memorial name] is the desire of our souls. At night my soul longs for Thee, Indeed, my spirit within me seeks Thee diligently” (v. 26:8-9). Isaiah had a hunger after the Lord that nothing else would fill.


David in the midst of despair cried out: “AS the deer pants for the water brooks, So my soul pants for Thee, O God. My soul thirsts for God, for the living God; When shall I come and appear before God? My tears have been my food day and night, While they say to me all day long, “Where is your God?” (Psalm 42:1-3). David was seeking the bread that satisfies that which only came from the Lord.


That hunger is our protection and our life. It is a life and death matter. Just as lack of physical food is life threatening so lack of the bread which comes from God leads to Spiritual death. That is why the Lord commanded us to pray for our daily spiritual bread. It is translated “bread for tomorrow” to emphasize the eternal nature of God’s food.


Our appropriation of the bread of life is a daily requirement. It can be likened to Israel’s receiving manna every morning. Exodus 16:14-19 describes Israel’s first receipt of manna: “When the layer of dew evaporated, behold, on the surface of the wilderness there was a fine flake-like thing, fine as the frost on the ground. When the sons of Israel saw it, they said to one another, “What is it?” For they did not know what it was. And Moses said to them, “It is the bread which the LORD has given you to eat. “This is what the LORD has commanded, ‘Gather of it every man as much as he should eat; you shall take an omer apiece according to the number of persons each of you has in his tent.’” And the sons of Israel did so, and some gathered much and some little. When they measured it with an omer, he who had gathered much had no excess, and he who had gathered little had no lack; every man gathered as much as he should eat. And Moses said to them, “Let no man leave any of it until [the following] morning.”


Why did God tell them not to leave any manna until morning? They quickly found out. “But they did not listen to Moses, and some left part of it until morning, and it bred worms and became foul; and Moses was angry with them. And they gathered it morning by morning, every man as much as he should eat; but when the sun grew hot, it would melt.


That is symbolic of the word or bread of life. We need “daily bread” from heaven. We cannot get by on yesterday’s manna. We must have daily contact from God if we are to be the army of the Lord that defeats the enemy. We must have that “Living Word” (Hebrews 4:12) that is our daily bread. It takes a hunger after the Lord to get this daily bread. That is why the Lord but this passage so bluntly. It’s a demand before the Lord. “Give us” our daily bread!


That is why some churches have it so wrong. They believe and teach that the initial salvation experience is all that’s needed to be saved. While that may be true on one level the Son of God must be fed every day. They are not relying on their salvation experience because that is old manna. They are concerned with going on with God in following Him wherever He goes. That takes a daily contact with God. Paul said: “More than that, I count all things to be loss in view of the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them but rubbish in order that I may gain Christ, and may be found in Him, not having a righteousness of my own derived from the Law, but that which is through faith in Christ, the righteousness which comes from God on the basis of faith, that I may know Him, and the power of His resurrection and the fellowship of His sufferings, being conformed to His death; in order that I may attain to the resurrection from the dead” (Php 3:8-11).


He went on: “Not that I have already obtained it, or have already become perfect, but I press on in order that I may lay hold of that for which also I was laid hold of by Christ Jesus. Brethren, I do not regard myself as having laid hold of it yet; but one thing I do: forgetting what lies behind and reaching forward to what lies ahead, I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus. Let us therefore, as many as are perfect, have this attitude; and if in anything you have a different attitude, God will reveal that also to you” (Php 3:12-13). Paul didn’t rely on yesterday’s manna but was always reaching forward to the next step, the next delivery of bread from the Lord. He said that we should have that attitude as well.


This hunger after the Lord is reaching for something that has not been on the earth since the days of the early church. Jesus explained that in John 6:37-50. First He said: “Jesus said to them, “I am the bread of life; he who comes to Me shall not hunger, and he who believes in Me shall never thirst. “But I said to you, that you have seen Me, and yet do not believe” (John 6:35-36).


The Pharisees were grumbling about Jesus saying He was the bread of life come down from heaven. Jesus answered then thus: “Do not grumble among yourselves. “No one can come to Me, unless the Father who sent Me draws him; and I will raise him up on the last day. “It is written in the prophets, ‘AND THEY SHALL ALL BE TAUGHT OF GOD.’ Everyone who has heard and learned from the Father, comes to Me. “Not that any man has seen the Father, except the One who is from God; He has seen the Father. “Truly, truly, I say to you, he who believes has eternal life. “I am the bread of life. “Your fathers ate the manna in the wilderness, and they died. “This is the bread which comes down out of heaven, so that one may eat of it and not die. “I am the living bread that came down out of heaven; if anyone eats of this bread, he shall live forever; and the bread also which I shall give for the life of the world is My flesh.” The Jews therefore began to argue with one another, saying, “How can this man give us His flesh to eat?” Jesus therefore said to them, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink His blood, you have no life in yourselves. “He who eats My flesh and drinks My blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day. “For My flesh is true food, and My blood is true drink. “He who eats My flesh and drinks My blood abides in Me, and I in him. “As the living Father sent Me, and I live because of the Father, so he who eats Me, he also shall live because of Me. “This is the bread which came down out of heaven; not as the fathers ate, and died, he who eats this bread shall live forever” (John 6 43-63).


As we can see the phrase “Give us this day our daily bread” is not the simplistic statement it appears at first glance. It covers Christ as our daily bread which we eat as His flesh and blood. The prayer is a demand for the Lord to give us the His spiritual bread – His blood and body. Our hunger for this bread must be beyond our understanding. It is the cry of the hungry seeking food from His Master. We should wake up every day with this cry. There is new food to eat each day and we must be there to obtain it.

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