Our Father is Waiting to Give Us Our Daily Bread

I was reading a book about confidence in God (affiliate link) this afternoon, and one passage about the Our Father made me pause. The author, Father Thomas de Saint-Laurent, states:

In our temporal necessities, it is not enough for us to await the assistance of God; we must also ask Him for it. Jesus Christ left us the perfect model of prayer. Therein He makes us ask for our “daily bread”. . . . In regard to this obligation of prayer, is there not possibly frequent negligence on our part? What imprudence and foolishness! We deprive ourselves, out of levity, of the protection of God, the only supremely efficacious one.

The Book of Confidence

I thought to myself: how many of us actually pray the Our Father daily? And I had to grudgingly admit that my own track record is pretty embarrassing. Unless it’s at Mass, during the Rosary or the Chaplet of Divine Mercy, I don’t say the Our Father very often. Still less do I pray it with the intention of requesting our daily needs.

If we take a moment to consider, the truth is clear. God is our Father, Who loves us and cares for us. He gives generously to us each and every day, but He also tells us that He wants us to ask Him to provide for our needs. I think this is partly because there are some gifts He cannot give to us unless we choose to ask Him for them. But perhaps even more importantly, I think He tells us to ask because the very act of asking is a potent reminder. We cannot take care of ourselves. We have to receive His help. When we ask, we humble ourselves before Him. In a real sense, we adore His infinite goodness by asking for His assistance. Praying the Our Father raises our eyes to God and invites Him to cast His loving gaze on us. It helps us to remember the one relationship that matters most.

So, I am forming a resolution today, and I invite you to do the same. Pray the Our Father once a day, every day, to ask God to provide for your needs. I guarantee you: He will!