The Bread Thread

ZiSunka

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Bread is a big theme in the Bible. The manna from heaven, the bread that Jesus broke at the Last Supper, the unleavened bread that is eaten at Passover, and all.


How about we do a chain of verses about bread?

And add a little commentary about what the verse means to you, or how you would apply it to your life, or what it says about God, if you like.

You don't have to add any commentary if you don't want to, just post the bread verse.

I'll start:

But Jesus said, "You feed them."
"Impossible!" they protested. "We have only five loaves of bread and two fish. Or are you expecting us to go and buy enough food for this whole crowd?" Luke 9:13



What you have to offer God may seem pathetically small compared to all the need in the world, but He is only expecting you to give what you can, no more, and He waits til you offer it.
 

Kristen

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Duet 8:3
And he humbled thee, and suffered thee to hunger, and fed thee with manna, which thou knewest not, neither did thy fathers know; that he might make thee know that man doth not live by bread only, but by every [word] that proceedeth out of the mouth of the LORD doth man live.

This means to me that we need not just food to survive, but also the word of God.
 
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ZiSunka

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"I am the bread of life," Jesus told them. "No one who comes to Me will ever be hungry, and no one who believes in Me will ever be thirsty again... Therefore the Jews started complaining about Him, because He said, "I am the bread that came down from heaven." They were saying, "Isn't this Jesus the son of Joseph, whose father and mother we know? How can He now say, 'I have come down from heaven' ?" Jesus answered them, "Stop complaining among yourselves. No one can come to Me unless the Father who sent Me draws him, and I will raise him up on the last day.

John 6:41-44

Boy did these words make the Jews angry!

This man, this ordinary man, the boy the had seen grow up in their own neighborhood was claiming not only to have come from heaven (!), but he claimed to be the one who gave them life! Only God could do that!

The next time a Jehovah's Witness tells me that Jesus never claimed to be God, I'm going to read this passage to them. The Jews that heard Christ's words clearly thought that He was identifying Himself as God, and not as a good teacher or an ascended human. By saying that He was the one who gave the manna to Moses's band of itinerate Jews in the desert, by claiming to BE the bread from heaven, by claiming to have come from heaven, they knew He was saying that He was God.

Remember, the OT doesn't talk about humans going to heaven after death. Enoch and Elijah had been remarkable special cases. The Jews of Jesus's time thought that Elijah and Enoch were the lone humans in heaven, and that all the others were the angels, the demons and God. The belief that babies receive their souls from heaven came much later, around the 1300's.

So, if Jesus was claiming to have come from heaven, He could only be an angel (which he clearly wasn't), a demon (they could see he wasn't that, either), or God.

And since He was saying that He was the and giver of life and the provider of sustenance, they knew He was saying that He was God.

Jesus could not have been a learned teacher or an ascended human. By this passage, we can see that He was saying that He was God.
 
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ZiSunka

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Give us today our daily bread .

Matthew 6:11

This is, of course, a part of the Lord's Prayer. It's obviously a prayer for provision. It is saying, "God, please provide for me today. Meet my needs, not only for food, but for all my essential needs"

But it is more.

This prayer isn't just about you and your needs.

It's a prayer for all the people that produce the food you eat. The farmers, the processors, the packagers, the truckers, the store purchasers, the stock boys, the cashier at the market. It is a prayer for them, that they might be healthy and able to work, that their machines will function properly, that there won't be any logjams in the delivery process and that your food will arrive on your plate in wholesome, edible condition. It's a prayer that all their needs will be met, too, so they can be good workers.

It's a simple sentence, one of the shortest in the Bible. But few sentences have so much meaning.

And few prayers cover so many people!
 
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ZiSunka

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Stolen bread tastes sweet, but it turns to gravel in the mouth. Proverbs 20:17

How hungry have you ever been? Really, really hungry? Hungry enough to steal?

When I was little there was a certain kind of candy that I really, really wanted to try. but my parents wouldn't let me have it, because it contained an artificical sweetener that they didn't think was very good for me. Later, that sweetener was removed from the market, so by denying me that candy, my parents were really looking out for me and my health. They knew that I would have to live in this body the rest of my life, with the after effects of everything that happen to it, and they feared that sweetener would harm me.

But, not being able to understand this, I desired and even lusted after that candy.

One day it entered my head that I could steal some, at the checkout counter while they weren't looking, and finally have that longing fulfilled. I would have what my parents denied to me. No one would ever have to know.

But, my conscience got to me, and there never seemed to be an opportunity to steal without being noticed, and I was afraid of the consequences of being caught. I would certainly be severely punished--for stealing and for disobeying their command not to eat that kind of candy.

The guilt, or pre-guilt, as it were, stopped me from taking that candy, so easily within reach, so attractive with its promise of pleasure, to artfully packaged and advertized as something all the in-crowd enjoyed.

I longed for that candy for many years, and when I finally grew to the point that I could have gone into the store to buy it myself, I didn't, because its spell over me had worn off.

All kind of sin is like that. It's packaged and advertised as being the thing the in-crowd does. It promises pleasure, but provides harm. It's so easy to reach and so hard to resist. God is like the good parent, who sees His child at risk for harm, has put boundaries on us, forbidding us to do what He knows is bad for us.

If you listen to your conscience, if you think about the consequences, if you resist the temptation, eventually it will wear off and no longer have any power over you.

Stolen bread (representing any kind of sin) may taste sweet, but in the end is much pain, guilt, and harm. And it's not worth it.
 
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BigEd

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Mt. 4:3 The tempter came to him and said, ?If you are the Son of
God, tell these stones to become bread.?
Mt. 4:4 Jesus answered, ?It is written: `Man does not live on bread
alone, but on every word that comes from the mouth of
God.?? [Deut. 8:3]


This verse has many meanings I think.
First, that is really only one true hunger and that is for God. When I hunger for the things of this world like bread, I eat but I will again be empty only the Lord can fill me and nourish me.
Second, this also has another importance to me. I am a food addict, I had eaten myself to 317 lbs with no stoping, until I started a 12 step program with Overeaters annoymous (this program also helped to bring me to Christ.) What I have learned is that If I continuely stuff myself with "bread", I will miss the true nourishment that comes from God.
 
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