9-20-15
“Living a Life of Daily Dependence on God”
Today we are starting a new series on “Living a Life of Daily Dependence on God.” The theme scripture
for this series will be Matthew 6:11, which is part of the Lord’s Prayer. In this verse Jesus teaches us to
pray, “Give us today our daily bread.”
In this series we will learn that this prayer is a call for us to absolutely depend on God for everything we
need.
The main scripture story we will be looking at in this series is the Israelites journey out of Egypt, which is
found in the book of Exodus. It was a 40 year journey of daily depending on God for “manna” as they
wandered in the desert.
We will learn that living on “manna” is a wonderful, yet sometimes challenging journey on which we
learn to trust God for our daily provision.
We will learn that this journey of daily depending on God never stops. It is a day after day journey of
praying over and over, “Give us today our daily bread.”
This series of sermons may be more for me than it will be for you. For most of my life I’ve been a
worrier. Way too often I’ve let anxiety get the best of me. I’ve always claimed to trust the Lord, but so
often my thoughts and actions haven’t lived up to my claim. So I need to learn how to daily depend on
God for everything in my life. I am hoping this series will build up the level of trust in my life. I pray this
series will do the same for you also.
There are some key truths in this series that we will be introduced to today. The first is:
We can’t survive without depending on God.
When Jesus taught His disciples to pray, “Give us today our daily bread,” He wasn’t just teaching them to
pray that phrase over and over. He was reminding them, and now us, that we can’t survive without
depending on God.
Jesus was taking His disciples back to the story of the children of Israel and how they were completely
dependent on God’s daily provision of manna that they needed in order to survive the harsh realities of
their journey through the desert into the Promised Land.
In the book of Exodus we see that with God’s miraculous help, the Israelites were able to leave behind
400 years of captivity and slavery in Egypt. They miraculously crossed the Red Sea on dry land escaping
the Egyptian army. They saw how much God loved them and how He protected them.
But, in Exodus chapter 16 we see that after all the resources they had left Egypt with were gone, the
people began to grumble. We see their grumbling in Exodus 16:2-3:
2 In the desert the whole community grumbled against Moses and Aaron. 3 The Israelites said to them,
“If only we had died by the LORD’s hand in Egypt! There we sat around pots of meat and ate all the food
we wanted, but you have brought us out into this desert to starve this entire assembly to death.”
It is tempting for us to accuse these Israelites of not having much faith. I mean, think about it, they had
just witnessed all the plagues that God had poured out on Egypt, through which they were spared. The
Egyptians lost the firstborn child in every family and they lost no one. The army of Egypt was defeated
and they didn’t even have to fight. They walked across a sea without even getting wet. It seems to us
that they had very short memories.
But before we pass judgment on these people, we need to take an honest look at ourselves. We need
to admit that we actually have a lot in common with the Israelites.
If we have walked with God for any length of time, we have seen Him do miracles in our lives.
We have been the recipients of His provision, His deliverance and His blessing. But when things get a
little tough and we don’t have what we think we need, we often accuse God of not taking care of us.
We think, and sometimes say, things like: “Lord, after all I have sacrificed for You, I can’t believe You
would let me go through this.”
I, for one, am glad God is a very gracious and patient God, because I’ve grumbled my share of
grumblings.
When the Israelites grumbled, the Lord, out of His grace, provided for them. He gave them “manna.”
Each day He gave them just enough to meet their needs. Every morning they woke up to find this
amazing bread-like substance that tasted like honey. They were to gather just enough to meet their
needs for each day. God did it this way to show them they had to trust Him every day for what they
needed.
This is where it gets tough for us. Do we trust God to provide for us tomorrow? Can we really believe
that because He provided for us today that He will provide for us the next morning?
For the Israelites, their very lives were on the line. If God didn’t come through, they would starve and
die in the desert.
When we have to depend on God for tomorrow, our faith and trust are challenged.
Often we decide that we need to gather and store up and hoard as much as we can just in case God
doesn’t provide for us tomorrow.
Let’s be honest, we love it when God pours out on us so much that we don’t even have room enough to
store it all. We don’t like it when He pours out His blessings one day at a time.
You see, when Jesus tells us to pray, “Give us this day our daily bread”, He is instructing us to trust the
Blessing Giver more than the blessings themselves.
God wants us to enjoy the blessings, but He never wants us to replace our trust in Him, with a trust in
the blessings.
He wants us to learn that, with Him, we are safe regardless of the circumstances. He wants us to learn
that His miracles will come in daily portions and that we don’t need to receive what we need for
tomorrow ahead of time. He implores us to trust that He will take care of tomorrow and all we have to
do is trust him for today.
Trusting in God’s daily provision means refusing to trust in our store house of reserves.
We see this truth illustrated in Exodus 16:13-20:
13 That evening quail came and covered the camp, and in the morning there was a layer of dew around
the camp. 14 When the dew was gone, thin flakes like frost on the ground appeared on the desert floor.
15 When the Israelites saw it, they said to each other, “What is it?” For they did not know what it was.
Moses said to them, “It is the bread the LORD has given you to eat. 16 This is what the LORD has
commanded: ‘Each one is to gather as much as he needs. Take an omer for each person you have in
your tent.’ ” 17 The Israelites did as they were told; some gathered much, some little. 18 And when they
measured it by the omer, he who gathered much did not have too much, and he who gathered little did
not have too little. Each one gathered as much as he needed.19 Then Moses said to them, “No one is to
keep any of it until morning.” 20 However, some of them paid no attention to Moses; they kept part of it
until morning, but it was full of maggots and began to smell. So Moses was angry with them.
Through Moses, God told them not to hoard the manna because to hoard it was to slap God in the face.
Hoarding was a way of saying God couldn’t be trusted, that He wouldn’t come through.
Hoarding was plan B. In effect those who hoarded said: “God, just in case you don’t provide the way
you said you will, I’m going to create a plan B as a back up.” Well plan B didn’t work. The extra manna
rotted and filled up with maggots.
Let’s face it, our plan B’s don’t work either because they are our plans, not God’s plans.
Too often we say to ourselves, “What if God doesn’t come through? What will I need if He doesn’t come
through?” Then we start gathering the resources we think we need for our back up plan. When we
think we have finally gathered enough, we look at God and say, “Okay, I’m ready now to do what you’ve
called me to do.”
Could it be that while we are gathering up our Plan B provisions we are actually missing out on God’s
plan A for us? What happens to God’s plan A when we wait until we have stored up enough for our Plan
B? What are we missing as we strive to have enough for Plan B? What is God not getting from us?
I’m convinced that God wants to use us to help Him transform the lives of others by loving them to Him.
That is what we are here for. But for us to be part of this plan of transforming the lives of others, we
have to give up our pursuit of Plan B. God wants us to be totally dependent on Him. He wants us to let
go of whatever crutches we are leaning on. He wants our trust to be in Him not on our crutches.
I really believe Jesus is calling us to not put our trust in our reserves, but instead to put our trust in Him
now so He can use us now, not sometime later.
What Jesus is calling us to do is terrifying for most of us. He is calling us not to trust in our money, our
energy, or even our own abilities, strengths and talents. He is telling us that all we have hoarded means
nothing. He is calling us to give up all our reserves and then trust Him to come through tomorrow.
I don’t think I’ve arrived at this level of trust yet. That is hard for me to admit, but I do know one thing,
someday very soon, I want to wake up in the morning and not have to worry about whether I will have
enough to make it through the day. I want to wake up with a sense of anticipation and a sense of
excitement about what God is going to give me that day to meet my needs so I can give my entire day to
helping Him transform lives.
When we commit ourselves to trusting God for today, we don’t have to wonder if God is going to come
through.
There is no risk for us. God says He will provide for today. He proved He can be trusted by what He did
for the Israelites.
When we commit ourselves to daily dependence on God, we may not know how God is going to
provide, but we know He is going to do it.
I believe the key to trusting God is to know what we want from God.
Let’s admit it. We want more than what God promises to provide. God promises to meet our needs for
today and tomorrow one day at a time. But what we want is a guarantee from God that He will help us
to have enough money to live comfortably for a long time.
Having enough to meet our needs for food, shelter, good health and love is not what we really want
from God. We want comfort, luxury, and enough to satisfy our wants, not our needs.
What do we really want from God?
If all we want is what He promises to provide, our whole focus changes. If we want what He will
provide, we can live in peace and contentment. We can experience joy in place of worry and anxiety.
Someday soon I hunger to be satisfied with what God promises to provide for me so I can be free to give
Him more of me for Him to use in His call to use me to help Him transform the lives of others.
This leads to another key truth:
If we really want to live a life of complete daily dependence on God, then we must see God as our only
provider.
After they quit grumbling, most of the Israelites realized that they weren’t going back to Egypt. They
now had only one provider. They had to trust in Him alone.
And, when they did trust in Him alone, He came through day after day for 40 years.
To live on “manna”, on God’s daily bread provision, we must refuse to buy into the lie that we need
more than what God will give. We must refuse to believe that the things of the world will provide what
we need. They won’t! They never have and they never will.
The following is what I want to commit myself to learn in my life as we go through this series. My desire
is that soon:
I will daily ask God to give me my daily bread, by meeting my needs. I will choose to believe God is going
to come through. Yes, it seems like there is never enough money, or time, or energy, or love or
whatever. But, I choose to believe that somehow, some way, God is going to provide. I’m choosing to
trust instead of worry. I’m choosing to depend on God instead of having panic moments. I will keep
praying and calling out to God with everything I have because I am convinced He is the only one that can
take care of whatever it is I need Him to do. I choose to have a heart of expectation regarding what God
will do.
I choose to embrace the truth that God will provide no matter what. My peace will no longer be
dependent on my circumstances, but instead on the God who is in me.
I believe God wants to use me and you to help Him transform the people around us by loving them. I
believe He will provide what we need to see these transformations take place. I pray that the
transformations start with me and with you.
My prayer is that, through this series, we will let God dig deep into our lives, and when He does, we will
see those people and places and things that we have been depending on instead of on Him. And, when
we see these dependencies, we will let all that stuff go and choose to place our dependency on God
alone as our provider.