My wife does a great job with our groceries. Having four boys who seem to grow an inch a week, she does such a wonderful job buying food to keep up with their voracious appetites without breaking the bank. Before she goes to the store, she makes a plan for what we will eat for the next couple weeks. I won’t pretend to know HOW she does this so effectively; but I am thankful she does. Prior to our house becoming total destitute of all sustenance, she will have made it to the store to replenish our cupboards. She has considered every meal for the children based upon their nutritional needs. Certainly four boys would love to eat chocolate cake every day for breakfast, but that is not what they need. The number of meals has been planned, the menu has been predetermined and all materials that are needed to prepare the food has been well thought-out.
My wife usually goes to the grocery while the children are asleep in the early morning. The night before she makes all her preparations with coupons that she has collected and the plan of which stores to go to first and what to buy and is ready to buy the food is laid out. When she arrives back home, we get the food in the house and she places the food in its proper place. The perishables go in the refrigerator and food where it will be safe and preserved the longest. Often all this happens without the children even knowing it.
The boys will wake up, sleepy eyed and stumbling into the kitchen and make a request; “Mommy, I’m hungry, can I have some breakfast?” They are ready to eat and they make their desire for food known.
Their mother knew that groceries were needed in the house. She knew how much food they would need and the number of meals, what nutrients boys need and what foods they needed to eat to fulfill those requirements. She had planned for all this and provided for their needs before they even asked for it.
If parents are faithful in planning and providing the basic needs of their children, how much more is God the Father faithful in providing according to His plan our basic needs? I cannot provide food for my children unless God gives us the means to do it; so even in my example, the planning process of my wife is totally dependent on God providing money and resources to obtain the food. But our menu is only for a couple weeks, God’s plan is for all things, everywhere, at all times. God not only plans, but ordains all things to come to pass. Knowing that I will need food, God planned and provided for the soil, the plants and animals, the farmers, and everything in between the farmers plan to my mouth.
“He [God] could withhold the sun and its influence; He could stop the rain; He could make our land absolutely barren so that the farmer with all his modern implements and chemicals could not raise a crop. He could blast the crop if He wanted to. We are absolutely in the hand of God, and the supreme folly of this century is the folly of thinking that because we have acquired a certain amount of knowledge of the laws of God, we are independent of Him. We cannot live for a day without Him.” D. M. Lloyd-Jones
What a loving Heavenly Father! He knows what we need before we know what we need. Like my children, they ask when they are hungry for food, yet their mother, long before they requested the food, knew they would be hungry for breakfast and provided. Your Father knoweth what things ye have need of, before ye ask him. So when we pray "give us this day our daily bread" we know that God will give us our daily bread, and we know that He has planned for it and ordained it to come to pass.
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Douglas Newell IV
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