Shepherd of the Springs
Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod

Now there is great gain in godliness with contentment, for we brought nothing into the world, and we cannot take anything out of the world. But, if we have food and clothing, with these we will be content.

In some respects, this may seem an inadequate petition of the Lord’s Prayer to serve as preparation for the passion of our Lord during the Lenten Season. Give us this day our daily bread is a petition that is calling our attention to all of the temporal blessings in this life that our Lord showers upon the just and the unjust even without asking. But, here we pray that we might receive them with grateful hearts and voices of thanksgiving. We certainly do not want to confuse our temporal blessings with the reasons why the incarnate Son of God must keep a date in Jerusalem with a cross of shame and suffering. And, to be sure this kind of confusion is rampant in our current religious scene. The gospel of wealth and temporal well-being with many of its variations is a very influential force selling its brand of good news about Jesus as the provider of wealth over all of today’s media. We will not follow their lead, and neither does St. Paul in his advice to Timothy in our text. While the evangelists of material wealth seek to drum up discontent over the lot of one’s temporal blessings, St. Paul urges a thankfulness for what you have, be it every so humble, with contentment about its sufficiency. You are doing OK because the Lord is looking after you.

But, the message of the Gospel of Wealth folks is just the opposite. You are not doing OK or even a fraction of how you could be doing. If you will just have faith and sufficient prayer fervor, you can get from the Lord much, much more than you have and be much happier, and more fulfilled because of the greater bounty you will be receiving. These people have reduced the problem of evil to a scarcity of goods and services in this life and they have transformed the saving significance of Jesus into a divine provider of a great stimulus package for you and yours that will bring you a greater fulfilled life here on earth and with our creator God. We will have nothing to do with this false gospel.

When we pray give us this day our daily bread during the Lenten Season, we are reminded that we are traveling with the Lord over all creation who has, does, and will continue to take care of all our temporal needs even when we seem to be traveling in the wilderness settings of life with less that a few loaves bread and a couple of fish. There is sufficiency in the Lord here in our temporal conditions and we are to trust in His bountiful goodness and be thankful and content. Yet, in opposition to the gospelers of wealth, while we are contented with our temporal condition here in this fallen, we are not about our spiritual state of affairs. We travel to Jerusalem with the Lord very much as impoverished beggars who are in great need of some bleeding charity. While we are sufficient in this fallen world with the Lord’s temporal care as he provides for all his creatures, we are not sufficient in our fallen natures. All of our temporal needs are cared for out of God’s providential care and blessing, but something special and particular is needed for the cure and maintenance of our souls. We need leaving water to drink and we need the bread that comes down from heaven that we might receive new life and fellowship with God now and in the life to come.

So this petition, give us this day our daily bread, reminds us that we are beholding to God for all that we need for life in this world, and life with God. And while nothing special is required to receive the gracious bounty of the Lord’s temporal blessings - we are simply called to be grateful and thankful - it is going to take a divinely nurtured faith and trust in the cross to which the Lord is going in order to benefit from the sacrifice of his body and blood. Here is a feast that He will serve from rugged Cross to Holy Supper in order that we might enjoy a wealth of favor and forgiveness that will grant healing, health, and vitality to our life with God both now and always. And we may be confident that out of these saving gifts, the Holy Spirit will be there to feed our faith and energize our life in Christ with all of the fruit of the Spirit that will provide us not simply life with God, but a life with abundant joy, peace, patience, and self-control.

The Lord’s gift of daily bread reminds us that we travel to Jerusalem with the One who is the Bread of Life by which we may be thoroughly furnished with all that we need for life with God forever. We bring nothing of our own spiritual sustenance, but are confident that we will be receiving the riches of God’s grace and favor where the bread from heaven is added to our daily bread and we are outfitted not only for temporal life but for life everlasting. There are to be no doubts about God’s providential care, even during economic downturns and times of scarcity. And there can be no doubts for the we the people of God about the riches of God’s grace that await us in the cross of Christ. It is the wealth of his righteousness, not some lavish earthly living that He promises in the here and now. Indeed, we have received the inheritance of a better day when the curse of the ground will be lifted and the land of plenty is restored with Paradise Regained. For now however we are content with our portion of daily bread in a fallen world while we are partakers already of the riches of his grace.

In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. A-men.