Give Us This Day Our Daily Bread

"Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God." Matthew 4:4

What are you relying on to fulfill your needs?  How are you thoughts, time, and energy spent pursuing that which fulfills you? Psalm 127:2 warns us about “eating the bread of anxious toil.”  Perhaps you find yourself frequently anxious about the future of your pursuits and relationships.  Maybe you are rising early and going to bed late, frantically pursuing the fulfillment of one goal or another, relying on your own strength to meet those goals.  Or maybe at times you are in the opposite camp – what Proverbs 31:27 calls, “eating the bread of idleness.”  You find yourself lacking proper diligence and passively letting life go by, hoping that taking it easy is the best means to fulfillment. 

Some of us tend to be more prone to one of these extremes, others of us are people of extremes and so we find ourselves often at both ends of this spectrum.  In the middle we find... the example of Jesus in Matthew 4:1-11.  He is not worried, nor is He fretful about how His needs will be fulfilled.  Neither is He idle or passive.  He has been faithfully following His Father's lead, fasting, seeking God, sustained by "every word that comes from the mouth of God."  He has been doing exactly what he asks us to do just two chapters later in Matthew 6:33.  "Seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be added to you."  Jesus has been faithfully living in right relationship with His Father, trusting that God will faithfully fulfill His needs. Indeed God does provide for Jesus' needs in verse 11, check it out!

How about us?  Are we seeking God first?  Are we trusting God's provision even as we work hard where God has placed us?  Perhaps you are currently a student.  Are you working hard at school, but trusting God for the outcome? Or are you idle, or perhaps you are anxiously toiling?

Let's not eat the bread of anxious toil nor the bread of idleness. Let’s call anxiety in our lives what it is – a lack of faith in our God.  Let’s confront idleness in our lives and refuse to be unfaithful to God’s desire for us to be fruitful for His kingdom.  Let’s pursue our fulfillment in God, eating up every word we find in Scripture and applying it to our lives.  Let's be seeking God first, trusting that He will not only provide for our needs, but also sustain us as we feast upon His Word.