I want us to look here, and we're
still dealing with this Lord's Prayer, this model prayer, I
should call it, when he said here in verse 9, Matthew 6, 9. After this matter, therefore,
pray ye, Our Father, which art in heaven, hallowed be thy name,
thy kingdom come, thy will be done in earth as it is in heaven.
Give us this day our daily bread. and forgive our debts as we forgive
our debtors. You know, we've been dealing
with this business going through here talking about our Father.
What it means for God to be our Father. And that He's in heaven. That's why we are very, very
cautious and don't go enter into the presence of God nor for the
sacrifice of fools. God's in the heavens. Be still
and know that I'm God. He's the high and lofty One that
inhabits eternity. And this idea that we're going
to give Him a hand clap. We're going to make Him happy
by our presence. And we need to do something to get His attention. That's why we come into His presence
with awe and reverence. He's the Creator. We're the creatures.
And then it says His name is holy. It's holy. And we hallow His name. We regard
it as holy. We speak of it as holy. And we
respect His name. And we regard His name. And we
uphold His name. A reverence His holy name. And
then He comes to this. When we deal with these great
and glorious things, His kingdom on this earth, and the kingdom
that we pray to be coming, and His will done in earth even as
it is in heaven, then we come to this. Give us this day our
daily bread. Give us this day our daily bread. And this is an astounding thing
to me, this one God, our Father, this one in heaven, It's one
whose name is holy. It's one who dwells in the beauties
of holiness. The clouds are the dust of his
feet. The frost is the breath of his mouth. The arrows are,
the lightning are his arrows out of his quiver. The earth
is the Lord's and the fullness thereof. He said, if I ask of
you, if I was hungry, I would not ask of you. He says, all
the cattle on a thousand hills is mine. All the gold is mine. And yet he says this, this God,
this high, eternal, holy God is concerned with us. He says
he numbers the hairs of our head. He said there he cares so much
about the things in this world of his own creation that he says
that the sparrows, they don't fall without him and that we're
more worth than many, many sparrows. And he's concerned about our
little old lives in every detail, small or trivial. David said
like this, my times, my times are in your hands. And you don't
know how many times we go through in this world. All the different
times. When I talk about times, I'm
not talking about taking 60 second minutes 60 minutes in an hour
and 24 hours in a day. Times. The times of our ups.
The times of our downs. The times of our laughing. The
times of our joy. Times of our troubles. The times
of our heartache. The times of our sickness. The
times of our health. All the different times that
we go through. Times of trial. All the different times that
we go through in our lives. And oh beloved, you can only
find this in Scripture. That God Almighty would take
such an interest in His people. that God would condescend to
consider our needs even down to our daily bread. And they
said that's what he said to his disciples. He said, after this
matter, pray ye. He said, this is the way you
are to pray. Give us this day our daily bread. Now what does
it mean when he says, give us this day our daily bread? Is
he talking about just food? Is he talking about just food?
No, no, what he's talking about here, you're utterly and absolutely
dependent upon me for everything you have in this life. All that's
necessary to your life and your living. Give us this day, and
this is what he's teaching us to do, give us this day, today,
what's necessary for us today. We're to ask for what is sufficient
for us and necessary for us today. And it's meant to cover everything
in our lives. Everything spiritual, everything
material, everything temporal. Cover it all. Now let me show
you something. Look with me in Proverbs 30.
Here's a perfect illustration of a man who knew what this meant.
Proverbs 30. And that's what it means, you
know, when we say, Lord, give us this day. Give us this day. It's your day. This is the day
the Lord hath made. And every day is His day. And
we esteem every day His day, and we look to Him for everything
we have for that day. And oh, we all have necessities
for the day. Spiritual necessities, material
necessities, temporal necessities. We all have one moment you can
be in such a joyful state, and the next minute, just in the
snap of the fingers, you can be brought to just your crying
in your heart and soul, Lord, I need you so, right now. Right
now, that's what he's talking about. But look here at Proverbs
30 and verse 7. This is the words of Agur. Two
things have I required of thee. Deny me them not before I die. This is the first. Remove far
from me vanity and lies. Give me neither poverty nor riches. Feed me with food convenient
for me, what's necessary, or my allowance. And this is why,
lest I be full and deny thee, and say, Who is the Lord? If
I have more than what's necessary for me, if I have more than my
allowance, I'll get full, I'll get rich and increased with goods,
say, Who is the Lord? And then he says, or lest I be
poor and steal, and take the name of my God in vain." Now
that's what he means, just give me what I need today. Don't let
me have too much, lest I deny you and say, who is the Lord?
And don't let me be too poor so that I have to steal and take
the name of God in vain. That's a pretty good prayer,
isn't it? That's a good place to be. Just give me what I need. Just give me... Paul says, you
know, I've learned in whatsoever state I am therewith to be content.
I know how to be full and to abound and I know how to be abased.
I know how to be empty. And this is the way we are. And
I said, what he means by that? And I'll try to tell you. I'll
get on with my message. Before the world, we're always full.
We have need of nothing for the world. We know how to abound
before the world. But when we come in the presence
of God, we're empty. We have need of everything. We
ain't going to let the world know we need nothing. We've got
Christ, we've got God, we've got everything. Listen to what
he says here, back over in our text. Give us this day. And the
first thing, this is where our Lord is teaching us to pray.
Give us this day. And first thing he says, give
us. That means that everything is a gift. Everything we have
comes from God. Every good and perfect gift cometh
down from the Father of lights, in whom is no variableness, neither
shadow of turning." And we've quoted this so many times in
1 Corinthians 4, 7. Who maketh you to differ? What
have you got that you didn't receive? What have you got that
you didn't receive? And everything that we have is
a gift from God. In the spiritual realm, everything
we have is from God. We have life, it comes from God.
We have light, it comes from God. We have knowledge, God gave
it to us. We have spiritual wisdom, God
gave it to us. We had no Christ, God made us
to know Him. We were in darkness, He brought
us into light. We were dead, He's the one that
gave us life. And everything we have in the material realm,
And this is the thing about it, God made us to be protective
human beings, but you know how many people go out there and
labor every day and don't get enough even to make a living
for the day? And yet everything we have, we have to say, God
gave this to me. God's the one that provided this
for me, that He is the one that gave me the ability to get these
things and have these things, and He can take them in the drop
of a hat. And everything in the temporal
realm. We have wisdom, riches, peace, health, rain, sunshine,
healthy children. Oh, all the things that we have. Everything temporal, everything
spiritual, everything material. We have to say, Lord, your hand
gave it. We have to say that. Because
it's true. Because it's true. It's true. And oh, you know how poor we
are when it comes into the presence of God? Now, as far as the world
is concerned, we're not talking about it. We're talking about
it before God. That's why He says, give us. You know how poor we
are in the sight of God? We're absolutely and utterly
indigent. You know what indigent means? That means you ain't got
nothing. You ain't got nothing. Huh? Look at Psalm 40, verse
17. You know, we're all beggars. And we live off another's goodness
and free gifts. We live off of the goodness of
God. We live off the goodness of God. And I'll tell you, there was
a time that I didn't understand that. I didn't know that. And
I don't want to be one of these fellows that walk around and
say, look here what my hand has made, look here what my hand
has brought, look here what I've accomplished. I don't want to
be one of those people. I want to be able to say, the Lord did
this, the Lord gave that, the Lord produced it. And He just
made us stewards of it. It's all His. And He just made
us stewards of it. He said, I'm going to let you
take care of this for a while. I'm going to give you them children
for a while. I'm going to give you that property
for a while. I'm going to give you your health for a while.
I'm going to give you good sense for a while. And that's all we're
going to have for a while. We're only going to have our
strength for a while. We're going to have our health for a while.
We're going to have our lives for a while. We're going to have
our children for a while. We're going to have our wives for a while. All these
things He says, I'll let you have these. These are the things,
the gifts that He gives us. And bless His holy name. We want
to kiss His blessed hand for everything. We are beggars. We
are beggars. You know, the loudest sin says
we're rich and increased with goods and we have need of nothing.
You know what God said about them? Knowest thou not that you're
poor, blind, naked, wretched, and needy? Oh, no, no, no, no. You don't know Me like I know
Me. Well, God, though, sees it like it really is. That's what
David said here in Psalm 40 and verse 17. But I am poor and needy,
yet the Lord thinketh upon me. Thou art my help and my deliverer,
make no tarry. Oh my God. How poor and needy
are we? I'll tell you how poor and needy
we are. You know what we had heard from our parents Adam and
Eve? Nakedness. Poverty, they had
everything. Here they were, they were in
paradise. Here they were, they had everything they needed to
eat. Here they were, had communion with God. Here they were, walking
with God, enjoying one another. And then when sin entered into
that place called paradise, They became naked. They became ashamed. They were separated from God.
And they became poor and needy that if they were clothed, God
had to clothe them. If they had food, from then on,
they had to earn it and had to work for it. But yet, God provided
it for them. He caused the fruit of the earth
to come forth. And all beloved, they thought the devil deceived
them into thinking they'd be gods. And they weren't very good
gods. They couldn't even take care
of themselves. And a lot of people think that they're a pretty good
God, but we can't even, you know, I'll tell you how good of gods
we are, we can't even provide for ourselves. Can't even provide
for ourselves. We can't stop a headache without
some help. Can't stop a toothache without
some help. And I mean God can bring us, as old Scott Richardson
said, He can bring us to dust in the blink of an eye. Blink
of an eye. And all beloved, no wonder the
Lord Jesus says, blessed are the poor. For theirs is the kingdom
of God. But where is the poor man? Here's one right here, standing
before you, both hands out. Both hands out. I acknowledge
that everything I've got is from the hand of God. And if all is
a gift, give us, if all is a gift, then we ought to seek every mercy
every day from God. and seek His mercy. Give us this
day. You give it to us. This is Your
day. Get up in the morning and after
we're up, if you don't think of it when you first get up and
you drink your coffee or whatever you're doing, stop for a minute
and say, Lord, this is Your day. Give me this day. Give me the
day that You want me to have, a day of wisdom and strength
and grace and mercy. Let me laugh today if it pleases
You. If it's necessary that I cry, I'll cry. Whatever is necessary
for me today, give me that day today. It's your day. And oh,
it makes a difference how you view the day. And then if all
is a gift then, give us this day, if all is a gift, then it's
not a debt. And we can't say to God, pay
me now what you owe me. We can't do like that debtor,
you know, when the Lord, when the servant said, come here and
pay me what you owe me. And he said, oh, if you'll be
patient with me, I'll pay you all. And he did, and he ran out
and found somebody that owed him some money, got him by the
neck and said, pay me what I owe you or I'm going to put you in
prison. An unjust steward, he says, pay me what you owe me.
Oh, we can't do God that way. Pay me what you owe me? If it's
a gift, we can't say it's a debt. Who can give to God? that God
would owe him. For of him, and through him,
and by him, and through him, and because of him are all things.
Who has ever given to him that God has to give back to him?
And oh, I want you to see this in 1 Chronicles. 1 Chronicles. Just keep going back there to
your left and you'll find it. 1 Chronicles. Past the Psalms,
back on back to your Psalms. You've got Job and then you've
got your Chronicles. Just keep on going back. 1 Chronicles 29. You know, we can't give anything
to Him but only what He has given to us. Everything we give to
Him is what He's already provided for us. And that's the truth of the matter.
Anything we give to Him, we're just giving back what He's given
us. 1 Chronicles 29, look in verse 10. One of the men read
this here recently, I think, in one of the Scripture readings.
Wherefore David blessed the Lord before all the congregation,
and David said, Blessed be thou, O Lord God of Israel, our Father,
for ever and ever. Thine, O Lord, is the greatness,
and the power, and the glory, and the victory, and the majesty.
For all that is in the heaven and in the earth is Thine. Thine
is the kingdom, O Lord, and Thou art exalted as head above all.
Now watch this, both riches and honor come of Thee. And thou
reignest over all, and in thine hand is power and might. And
in thine hand it is to make great, and to give strength unto all.
Now therefore, O our God, we thank thee and praise thy glorious
name. But who am I, and what is my
people, that we should be able to offer so willingly after this
sort? Now watch this right here. For
all things come of thee, and of thine own have we given thee. What you put in our hands, what
we give back, is just what you've already given us. Isn't that
right? Now look down at verse 16. Here
in 1 Chronicles, O Lord our God, all this store that we have prepared
to build in house for thine holy name, cometh of thine own hand,
and is all thine own. That's the way it is. Everything
we give, Lord, You put it in my hand. I'm just giving back
what You put in my hand. Oh my. And that's why it says,
we love Him. Why? Because He first loved us. If all is a gift, and it is,
give us, give us this day, then thank God for His goodness. That's
why the psalmist says, taste and see that the Lord is good.
He shall give thee that which is good. God, good is His mercy,
and it endueth forever. The whole earth is full of the
goodness of the Lord. And I'll tell you something,
beloved, He's not weary in giving. He's not weary in giving. You
can't never, He's never weary of giving. You know, David said
it this way, he said, I had fainted. I had fainted unless I had believed
to see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living. And
he also said this, he said, surely, surely, goodness and mercy shall
follow me. How long? All the days of my
life in this world. When you get there, you won't
need that goodness and mercy anymore. But while we're here,
we've got two wonderful saints following us, two of God's precious
gifts, two of God's blessed persons, two of God's blessed angels,
two of His blessed angels. Goodness and mercy. for us all
the days of our lives. And he delights in this giving.
Delights in it. And you know, God even spreads
a table in the presence of his enemies. Yeah. That's how good God is. He spreads
a table in the presence of his enemies. And he does this for
his goodness to lead them to repentance. But very few repent. And if all that God gives us
is a gift from God, How horrible the ingratitude of those who
would dare lift up their mind and heart and wills against Him
when everything comes from Him. He even feeds those that fight
against Him. Those that are against Him, He
even feeds them. Oh, I mean, men and women that
just absolutely despise Him, He sets the table for them. It's
like Absalom, David's son. Absalom was a handsome man. Oh,
he had this long, flowing, beautiful, long, curly hair. And everybody,
when he walked by, they said, Oh, how glorious Absalom is.
Look what Absalom. Oh, what a beautiful man Absalom
is. Oh, there's nobody like Absalom. David was so proud of him. David
was thankful for him. But one day, because they said
Absalom, and they bragged on him, he said, I'll get the throne.
He walked up and kissed his own daddy. And then when he kissed
him, he went out and plotted treason to try to get his father's
throne. Huh? Oh my, here's David his
son, David his father, in Absalom his own son, after David had
been so good to him, raised him, respected him, bragged on him,
trusted him, and then he turned around and plotted treason against
him. Oh my, that's the way people are. God is so good to men and
women, yet they plot treason against Him. And the mercies,
the mercies, That men and women sin against God with, they'll
be witness against Him at the day of judgment. That's why He
said, give us, give us, everything we have is a gift, give us this
day. And people say, well, we've got plenty already, so why pray
give us this day our daily bread? You know, pre-millennials think
this is for the tribulation period. You know, they say, we've all
got plenty of bread, you can go to the store and buy all the
bread you want. So they say this is for the tribulation period
when things will be so scarce and things will be so tough that
then God will have to provide you a meal every day. Well, I
don't believe that, but I tell you, give us this day our daily
bread. And I tell you that God may bless. We're saying God give
us everything we need. We may have food, but you bless
it. Would you bless everything that we have in this life that
we may enjoy it? That we may enjoy it. You know,
our Lord Jesus, when the devil came to him and tempted him and
he was hungry that meat for 40 days, he says, there's a stone
there. If you're the Son of God, tell
that stone there to turn into a piece of bread. And the Lord
Jesus says, man's not supposed to live by bread and bread alone,
but by every word which proceedeth out of the mouth of God. Oh,
so that's what we need. And you know Gary was telling
me before service, you all remember in 2000 when everybody was scared
to death all the computers were going to crash and everybody
thought the world was going to come to an end and all the banking
system would fail and the airplanes would fall out of the sky and
people were buying every generator and they were building basements
and places to store all kinds of stuff. I mean they stocked
up like they did and the world was going to come. And Gary was
telling me about a fellow, Great big sacks of beans and rice and
everything else and stuck them up under his bed and whenever
the world didn't come to an end, he'd start dragging them out
there in the beetles and the wolves and worms and eat them
all up. It's just done. That's what happens,
you know, when that manna comes down. You got just enough for
that day and if you kept it overnight, you got up to the next day, it's
full of worms. Steve was telling me about all these cabinets full
of canned goods. They had them stacked up and
left them there and said if you pick them up they'd be sitting
there so long they was trying to hoard them. So at the same
time it got tough in the bottoms and rotted out and the bottoms
fell out of the bottom of the cans. Rusty. Oh my, I'd hate to have to live
like that where I'd be scared to death that I don't know what
tomorrow is going to bring and I have to just stock up and stock
up and stock up because God can't provide. I remember my mother-in-law
Ethel, bless her heart, she loved to raise a garden, she'd work
at it. But I remember her saying this so many times, when she'd
go out to plant her garden, she'd put a bean in the ground and
she'd pray over every one of them. She said, now Lord, I can
plow and I can plant and I can put the bean in the ground. But
there ain't going to be no beans if you don't bless them. She
gave him thanks that she could do it. Gave him thanks that she
had that ability to do that. But she said, Lord, if there's
any beans, you're going to have to bless this. You bless this.
And ain't that right? That's right. I know that's so.
And oh, beloved, and then the food may be in our hands, but
the blessing comes from God's hand. Ain't it a blessing to
be able to eat food and it not make you sick? Ain't it a blessing
to be healthy enough to have an appetite? You know, Todd Nyberg got sent
home from the hospital when he had that esophagal surgery. And he laid there in the bed
with his wife every day. She'd go in there and she'd have to
feed him through a tube in his side. Fed him in a tube in his
side for a long time. I was in the hospital with a
man years and years ago, a young man. He'd drunk a big bottle
of lye. He'd eat his whole throat out.
Trying to commit suicide. He ate his whole throat out.
Couldn't talk, nothing, his throat just gone. Just a big open thing,
they had a thing over it. And he had a tube right here,
and he had it wrapped around his stomach, and he'd had his stuff, and he'd
just have a big funnel-like thing and dump that over. Oh, I want to be able to take
food in my hands. And that's why we say, God give us this
day. Not only that I have the food, but you bless the food.
Make me enjoy the food. Make me thankful for the food.
Make me thankful for the food you provide, for the hands that
provide it, and the taste that I have in my mouth when I eat
it. You say, boy, that's just too simple. Well, that's what
our Lord says to pray. And if God doesn't send a blessing,
nothing would do us any good anyway. We wouldn't enjoy it.
We wouldn't enjoy our food. We wouldn't enjoy our clothes.
We wouldn't enjoy our health. We wouldn't enjoy anything. And
though we have plenty, and most of us have more than we ever
dreamed we would, we still need to pray, God, you give us the
comforts, give us the sense, give us the wisdom to use what
you give us, to enjoy what you give us, and to use what you
give us wisely. and generously. And how many
has had plenty and lost it in a flash? You know, I read something
this morning, you know, that fame can win a man's heart, gold can
win a man's heart, wealth can win a man's heart,
but only God. Only God. can win a man's heart
with the gospel. A lot of things can win a man's
heart, but when God wins a man's heart, those other things take
a second place. And, oh, beloved, as Ruth said,
I went out for Nome and said, I went out full. But the Lord
brought me home empty again. I went out full. I went out with
a husband, two sons, and God brought me home empty. And that's
why we say, Lord, give us. Make us mindful, make us mindful,
O Lord, of your blessings before they're gone. And one of these
days they'll be gone. And this day, and it says this
day, give us this day. Not a month, not a year, but
this day. Why this day? Two reasons. First
is that we should not be anxious and care for the future. That
we should not be worried and fretful about the future. Look
here in verse 34 of Matthew 6. Don't be anxious for the future.
Be careful for nothing, Paul said. He said here in verse 34, our
Lord's teaching here, Take therefore no thought for the morrow, for
the morrow shall take thought for the things of itself. Sufficient
unto the day is the evil thereof. What are you going to do tomorrow? Well, I'll do whatever I'm supposed
to do. Ain't no sense being too concerned
about it, because there's going to be enough evil, there's going
to be enough things going on tomorrow that we'll deal with them tomorrow
when they get here. If it's God's will, we'll get out of bed, we'll
work in the garden, we'll have a good breakfast, we'll have
a good cup of coffee, and we'll sit down and we'll enjoy a little
news, and we'll go someplace, see somebody do something if
it's God's will. Give us this day. And then give us bread this
day. What did he say? Give us this,
the second reason. Give us this bread this day to
teach us to live every day. Every day. As if this very well
may be our very last day. Because one of these days we
truly, and this is just reality, this is fact. One of these days
we're going to get up and it will be our last. It will be
our last. We don't even know if we'll,
you know, they said, boast not thyself of tomorrow, for thou
knowest not what a day may bring forth. And those of us who have plenty
have great cause for thankfulness, because we have more than we
ever prayed for. I never dreamed, you know, I
couldn't dream as much as, you know, God, Paul said it this
way, He gives us exceedingly abundantly more then we can thank
or ask. I can thank awful big and I can
ask for a whole lot, but He's given me more than what I could
think of and more than what I could ask for. Has He done you that
way? Oh my, we ask for bread for one
day and He gives us enough for weeks. Sometimes He gives us
enough to provide for us for all of our lives. And two things
should cause us to be thankful. First is this, God has given
us much, much more than we deserve. And secondly, He gives us more,
always more, than we pray for. More than we pray for. Whether
little or a lot, we have more. Much more than we pray for. Give
us. Lord, it's yours. It's your day. You give us what's necessary,
what's needful for me today. And tomorrow, we'll ask you again. And the day after that, we'll
ask you again. And oh, some of you just, you'd
just like to have, there's a lot of folks that would just like
to have a yesterday back. But you don't. You've got to
have today. today. And I thought of this on the
way up here this afternoon. I am so thankful. Give us this
day that I'm in God's hands to give to me what's necessary for
me. I am so grateful for that. I heard a young woman get up
the other day and she was telling a group of people, she said,
talking about these bailouts, she said, I desperately need
one of these bailouts. I said, could you go talk to
the President and tell him? I don't want to have to ask the
President for anything. I don't want to stand up in front
of a crowd of a bunch of people and say, I desperately need a
bailout. Oh, no. I need God. In spite of everything going
around, we need God. And I want God. I want God. And I want Him to give me what's
next. That's what we're going to do, stand with both hands
out. Amen. Oh, our Father, our precious,
precious Father, how wonderfully gracious You are, how wonderfully
merciful, kind, tender, full of pity, kindness and grace. Oh, Father, that You care for
us. Tell us how to pray. Tell us what to ask for. And
then when we ask You, You give us exceedingly, abundantly, more
than we could thank or even ask. Lord, you gave us so much, and
so we come back to offer our thanks, to bless your name as
David did, and say, Lord, everything comes of your own hand, comes
of your hand, and we thank you for that. We acknowledge that.
And we bless you. We just ask you to give us the
wisdom. to take care of what you've blessed us with, to be
good stewards. And we ask you, dear Lord, to
enable us to be generous with the things you've given us with,
that we may share with others and help the others that's in
need. Father, we thank you for the day. Thank you for the saints. Thank you for answered prayer.
Thank you for Bill and how you've allowed him to be home. Pray
again for Pam, that you'd continue to strengthen her body. Thank
you, Lord, for Carlos and Dorthin, what you're doing for them. Oh,
God, we thank you. That's your answer prayer. In
our Lord Jesus' name, Amen. Amen.