Give us this day our daily bread

Talk 3 on Friday morning continued tis excellent series of lectures, focussing on God's provision for us in our daly lives. Dr bray observed that we move in this clause from praise and adoration of God to intercession.

Dr Bray observed that the pattern of request does not include the niceties of 'please', but is indicative of a beggar who is completely dependent. God is not someone who can be cajoled into giving us what we want - rather he is our Father from whom everything comes - we are utterly dependent upon Him. We can be bold in our approach to him, directly calling to him for help. He distinguished between God as a friend and a Father. Friendships in this world can be fragile, yet God is utterly unlike earthly friendship - he remains our Father and we never cease to be dependent upon him. I found his observation that our prayers are collective really challenging - we are taught not to pray in a self-focussed way, but collectively, as we ask of our Father on behalf of others.

Time also played a big part in the lecture. As he addressed what it meant for our requests to be for 'this day' he spoke of God being outside of time because he lived in 'the eternal present'. One of the things that really struck me was when he said 'This day must be our immediate concern because this is where we are.' A timely reminder, especially given the uncertainty of where I will be once college finishes.

'our daily bread' reminds us that our livelihood in this world is in his care. Praying for our daily bread is a trest of our faith and shows that we are living one day at a time. Not that we are not looking forward, but that we trust that God's provision will not fail. He looked at the connection between daily bread and the eucharist. They are coonnected but not to be confused. The eucharist shows the connection between the spiritual and physical life. The broken body of CHrfist has given us all we need, our sins are paid in full

Question time was again interesting. I was struck by his argument that being in the image of God is what gives us the capactity to know God. What is the image and likeness? It is personhood - as God is personal, 3 in relationship. A person is a being with capacity for relationship. Indeed a person is a being in relationship with God, for whether regenerate or unregeneration they have that relationship, it is just a question of whether the relationship is healthy or not. He argued that person and individual are not synonomous - person is a relational word that indicates our connectedness, whereas individual is a separational word, referring to a thing that can no longer be reduced any further.

Looking forward to lecture 4!