Give Us This Day Our Daily Bread (Matthew 6:11)

Immediately before this request for daily bread in the Lord’s Prayer, we read, "Your kingdom come. Your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven” (Matt. 6:10). In God’s kingdom, receiving our daily bread is a certainty, but in our world marred by sin, daily sustenance is questionable. Although God has given humanity everything we need to produce enough food to feed everyone on earth, we have not ended hunger. Thus Jesus’ first word about wealth or daily provision is this petition, “Give us this day our daily bread." We turn to God for the bread we need.

But note that the petition is plural: Give US this day OUR daily bread. We don’t pray only for our own bread, but for bread for those who have none. As people longing to maintain right relationships with others, we take others’ need of bread into consideration: we share what we have with those who have need. If every person, business, institution, and government worked according to the purposes and principles of God’s kingdom, no one would be hungry.

Give Us This Day Our Daily Bread (Matthew 6:11), Theology of Work Project, Copyright © 2014 Theology of Work Project, Inc. Also find this article in Theology of Work Bible Commentary, Volume 4: Matthew through Acts. For additional resources, please see The Theology of Work Project Series.