Provisions

Who is your daily bread?

When I was a young child, our family often travelled the 22 miles to our grandma’s house in Shady Cove, Oregon for Sunday or holiday meals.

The first thing I would smell coming in Grandma’s door was the yeasty yumminess of fresh baked rolls and bread. After my siblings and cousins had stuffed ourselves at the dinner table, we loved to go for a walk, up Grandma’s road on the Rogue River.

Before leaving Grandma’s house, we would each grab a roll or two to stuff in our pockets. We called our contraband, “our provisions”. It’s not that we were still hungry, but we always took the rolls, just in case, so we wouldn’t starve. It was in a sense, our daily bread and what we trusted to sustain us.

Fast forward about 50 years when I was diagnosed with celiac disease. Now when I travel, I need to pack my own provisions, my “daily bread” so that I can eat safely and be satisfied. I make the bread with my own hands, and it feels like, I am making my own provisions, but still, it is God who provides my daily (gluten-free) bread.

This is not unlike how God provided daily sustenance to the Israelites as they wandered in the desert for forty long years before entering the Promised Land. Every morning, he fed them with manna, enough to sustain them for the day. At first, they were grateful, but in time they began to grumble. Though God’s provisions remained constant, the Israelites grew tired of their repetitive and limited diet.

As I was pondering these things, I began to think of other provisions God blesses us with. Most of us are blessed with a place to live and food to eat. We have friends, family or community - the people we do life with. We have cars or bikes that take us to the grocery store to purchase our daily needs. We ask God to provide the funds for those needs, but sometimes we forget to thank him for His many provisions.

Every day is a day to thank God for his good and perfect gifts. Beyond the physical blessings, God give us even greater provisions. He has given us His Word - the Bible - our true Daily Bread. It is our source of life that leads us to Him, where we find peace and rest for our souls, as we satisfy our hunger to know Him more fully.

No matter how empty, drained, or challenged I may feel, the Word of God feeds me. It sustains, comforts and directs my thoughts from myself to Him. He is my provider. When it feels like I have nothing left to give and an empty fuel tank from dealing with the hardships of life, God faithfully provides daily direction, encouragement and sustenance from His written word.

Not only that, but He has given us the Living Word. We read in the gospel of John 1:

^“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. ² He was in the beginning with God.” (ESV)

Who is this Word?

This is Jesus, the 2nd person of the Trinity. This is God the Son sent by God the Father to make provisions for our sins.

“For the Son of Man came to seek and save the lost.” - Luke 19:10 (ESV)

Jesus, our living Word, came to seek and save the lost. To do this, He endured a cruel, torturous death on a cross. Beyond the physical pain, He endured the sins of mankind, heaped upon him. He is our Passover Lamb; the Word made flesh who came to bear the sins of the many. He gave himself, his very life, to save me and you from sin, death and eternal destruction.

Jesus is far more than a couple of rolls in your pocket, to pull out in case of an emergency.

Jesus is the Bread of Life, the manna sent from heaven to redeem us from our sins, to save us from death, and give us life everlasting. He literally killed sin. When Jesus died, he descended into hell where he left our sins forever, then he rose again, victorious over sin and death. He provided all that we need to come to him.

So come and accept His good and perfect gifts, by believing on His name and putting your trust solely in Him as your Lord and Savior.

Jesus is the provision that never fails. He never forsakes us. Even now, if you have received him as your Savior; He is praying for you, interceding to the Father for your needs, your hurts and your sins. After He rose from dead and appeared in bodily form to many witnesses, Jesus ascended back to the right hand of the Father in heaven. But he did not leave us alone. He sent the Holy Spirit, the third member of the trinity to live within us.

Our family has been going through some deep waters lately, and every day we feel the brokenness of this world. But when we bring our sorrows, worries, cares and burdens to Him, we can trust that He will provide all that we need, his Word tells us that. His Word is true.

He sustains us with His strength, His joy, His love, His good gifts, showering these provisions on us each and every day.

He is our daily bread - The giver and sustainer of life.

Look to Jesus in all things, for He is our life.

Jesus Is:
Our provision
Our daily bread
Our helper
Our deliverer
Our Savior
Our hope
Our joy
Our crown
Our King
Our shelter
Our fortress
Our God
He is all we need.

Thanks be to God for his inexpressible gift! 2 Corinthian 9:15 (ESV)