Category: refuge

Need: A Lack of Something Requisite, Desirable or Useful

For the bread of God is he who comes down from heaven and gives life to the world.
(John 6:33 NIV)


When we get to this familiar request in the Lord’s prayer, we are halfway through the recitation. It is the most practical and basic of requests. Yet the surrounding thoughts feed through this request. 

We make our daily request based on the knowledge of God as our Father. We can depend on the promise of provision as it is His will to provide for us. And when He grants this request, we have everything we need to hallow His name and our lives. Once we have experienced His provision, we seek the deeper spiritual needs: asking for and offering forgiveness and requesting the way out of temptation.

The significance of this simple request becomes clearer, if you dig into the original language. When Jesus spoke, he used the local dialect–Aramaic. In Aramaic, this sentence translates roughly to this: “Give to us today, this very day, the bread of our need.”

Bread is a basic staple of most diets. To meditate on the bread of our need, takes me back to the Old Testament and then directly to Christ as the fulfillment of the promise. In Old Testament worship, they placed the Bread of Presence on the altar before God. During the wandering desert days of the Israelites, God sent down b read (manna) from heaven to meet their daily need for sustenance.

Jesus is our our daily bread. The bread of our ultimate need is salvation. Jesus satisfies this need completely. To know Jesus is to have everything requisite, desirable and useful, in order to relate with our Father in heaven.

During the sacrament of communion, we eat bread to recall Jesus’ broken body on the cross, broken on our behalf. A friend recently pointed out that the phrase, “Taste and see that the Lord is good,” takes on a richer meaning for her, whenever she partakes of communion. As I put together her insight and the daily “breadness” of Jesus, I rejoiced in the goodness of God. The rest of the verse (Psalm 34:8) states: “Blessed is the one who takes refuge in him.” I marveled at how these mixed metaphors of bread and refuge give me something more to chew on. 

To dwell within God’s presence is our daily benefit. So by all means, let’s ask “Give us this day our daily bread, our daily refuge, our daily need, our daily portion of goodness.” 


What comes to mind, when you pray, 
“Give us this day our daily bread”? 



Posted on by kelrohlf 2

Hideout: A Place of Refuge

 
This cool log fort caught my attention while
on retreat a couple weeks ago at
Plays With Purpose’s country place.
Wish we were still there!
 
You are my hiding place;
You will protect me from trouble and
surround me with songs of deliverance.
(Psalm 32:7 NIV)
 
 
 
 
Where was your favorite childhood hideout?
 
 
 
 
 
 
Linking up with . . .
and
 
Posted on by kelrohlf 10

Here: At This Point

But as for me,
the nearness of God is my good;
I have made the Lord GOD my refuge,
That I may tell of all Thy works.
(Psalm 73:28 NASB
 
 
 

 
 
 
here
close by
snug
 
near
close by
hug
 
share
close by
shrug
 
your
burdens
unto
Me
 
 
 
 
 
Linking up with:
 
 

 
Posted on by kelrohlf 14

Take Courage

 
Be strong and let your heart take courage,
all you who wait for the Lord!
(Psalm 31:24 RSV)
 
 
I woke to themes of of Handel’s Messiah parading through my memory, the themes which proclaim the coming King, our very Jesus, who triumphed and fulfilled God’s word. What great music to accompany us, as we “wait and watch” for the Resurrection and the Life to break out and escape death, and  to deliver us the joy of the empty tomb.
 
But before the celebration tomorrow, I contemplate the sealed tomb.
 
Taking shelter in the tomb, Jesus waited for the manifestation of the Almighty Father in overcoming death with life.  Reading Psalm 31, an echo of what Jesus might have been praying falls upon my ear. Were these the words He recited to Himself, during His travail in the garden, His trial before angry men and mobs, and His time upon the cross?
 
Did you ever think of the tomb as a waystation or a refuge in times of trouble? A new thought: The tomb was the cave of refuge that kept our Rock safe, until He reappeared in the fulness of life for the tremendous finale.
 



In You I shelter;
rescue me in Your goodness,
let me not be shamed.
 
 
Make haste to hear me.
Be, Lord, my rock of refuge,
stronghold of safety
 
 
You are my stronghold,
since you lead me and guide me
for Your own name’s sake.
 
 
(Psalm 31:1-3 in Haiku by Fr. Richard Gwyn)

 
 
 
 



Posted on by kelrohlf 2