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Sorin Sabou


Letter to the Romans, Nicomachean Ethics, and more

Our Daily Bread

- it is tempting to race through the Lord’s Prayer; do not let greed get in the face of grace
- spend time adoring our Father in heaven, seeking the honor of his name, and praying for his kingdom
- they said a lot of things about Jesus during his lifetime; ‘a glutton and a winebibber’
- a quote from Deuteronomy 21; what to do with a rebellious son; they will stone him to death
- he is disloyal to our traditions; he deserves to die
- but Jesus was following the agenda he set out in the Lord’s Prayer; he was not a rebellious son, he was loyal to the one he called ‘Father’
- his eating and drinking with his motley collection of friends was a deliberate sign of the Kingdom
- the prayer to the Father for daily bread was part of his wider and deeper agenda
- the great festive banquet which God has prepared for his people
- the land flowing with milk and honey
- the banquet is a sign that God is acting at last, to rescue his people and wipe away all tears from all eyes
- they criticize him because he was celebrating the feast of the kingdom with all the wrong people
- Jesus was re-inventing the Kingdom of God around his work; and at the heart of it was the great sign of welcome to all-comers
- they criticize him because he was celebrating the feast of the kingdom at exactly the wrong time; the wedding guests cannot fast as long as they had the Bridegroom with them
- the prayer he gave his followers was a prayer for the complete fulfillment of that Kingdom: for God’s people to be rescued from hunger, guilt and fear
- daily needs and desires point beyond themselves, to God’s promise of the kingdom in which death and sorrow will be no more
- in his knowledge of their needs, for bread and all else besides, is no threat, but only promise
- Scripture is full of stories of people who brought their deep natural longings into the presence of God, and found them answered by being taken up within his purposes
- our natural longings, for bread and all that it symbolizes, are not to be shunned as though they were of themselves evil
- this clause reminds us that God intends us to pray for specific needs
- we must lift our eyes beyond our own needs; we should see ourselves, as we pray the Lord’s Prayer, as part of the wider Christian family, and human family, standing alongside the hungry, and praying, in that sense, on their behalf

[Adapted notes from Wright, Tom. The Lord and His Prayer. London: Triangle, 1996]
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