Take this bread and eat

One thing I often get twisted is when I see my own effort as the source of my provision. 

Scripture tells me over and over again that God is the giver of bread. It’s not my glory that God needs - it’s God’s glory that I need. 

God works with and through the unspectacular and common. God’s molding clay is the flawed, imperfect, and inadequate parts of my life. God takes the seemingly mundane and fills it with God’s glory. 

If I could do this - if any human or group of humans could do this - we would’ve created a perfect world thousands of years ago. However, we can’t escape this reality: In my life (and as it seems to be in our human collective life) - the best things are happy accidents that emerge not from my perfect plans, but from the rubble of my failings. 

I don’t plan for the best things. I plan for the most personally glorifying (and, on the flip side of this coin, the most self-sabotaging) things. In the pursuit of them, I end up breaking stuff. I get frustrated and start projecting my frustration at everyone around me. The scapegoating feels so good but it leads to more and more cynicism and hardness of heart.

And then it happens. Out of the blue. I look up and realize that the bread of life that God has given me is all around me. It looks so new but it’s been there the whole time. It might not be the most egoically glorifying thing (in fact, the best things for me never are) but it’s... perfect. Take it or leave it. 

I usually leave it. But I pray that I’m learning to take it. To take this bread and eat. 

Amen

Grace & Godspeed,
Jonas