Daily Devotion - Thursday, November 26, 2015

In one of his classic devotions, renowned Presbyterian pastor, missionary, author and theologian E. Stanley Jones wrote that when most of us pray the Lord's Prayer it's the only time most of actually mean the words, "Give us." 

Jones was referring, of course, to the part of the prayer that goes like this, "Give us this day our daily bread." He said that if we truly wanted to see the kingdom of God come to earth, and for all of the world's economic needs to be met, we would mean what we say when we say "Give us..."  But unfortunately, most of us spend a lot of time praying to God, "Give me." 

Jones writes, 

"If we continue to look after none bout ourselves, thinking only of No. 1, we'll think of ourselves so much that we become sick of ourselves, our complexes and obsessions.  That will be our punishment.  We asked for ourselves, and we got ourselves a problem.  Why? Because we said, 'Give me.'" 

Jones was writing in the late 1930's and early 1940's but his words still ring true to us today.  

It's Thanksgiving Day today.  A day when most of us will sit down and eat with our families, and perhaps we'll pause to say grace before we do.  We'll thank God for the food we are about to eat, and maybe include a few nice words about the people we are gathered with at the table.  

But what if we paused with our family and our friends and thought together about what it means when we ask God to "Give us our daily bread."  And when we say "us" let's finally mean all of us.  Because there will be people in the world today that will go hungry--both physically and spiritually. There will be people who will spend this day alone.  

And we might be able to show them what it's like when God's people share the blessings that are truly for us.    

May you have a blessed and wondrous Thanksgiving.