Sometimes when we are just too frugal and “economical”, we often think that we are being wise spenders or may be reserving something for the rainy day. The real truth here may be that we are not seeing Jesus every day. Pour exemplum, if I have just one sachet of tomato paste and four cups of rice, and I know that in every way, two cups of rice is just enough for the day for me, and that one sachet of tomato paste is just sufficient to give me a decent pot of jollof rice for dinner, if I decide to divide that one sachet of tomato paste into two equal halves because I want to reserve a half for the remaining two cups for a “tomorrow”, such that my pot of rice of today becomes what my mother calls ‘win the war’ ( food for survival), then I have simply denied my trust in Jesus as my constant supply. When Jesus taught His disciples to pray, He encouraged them to ask for their daily bread. He was simply trying to teach us to trust God, Abba Daddy for a one-day-at-a-time life. In the Old Testament, God was called Jehovah Jireh because on the mountain He provided. This is to say that Jehovah Jireh knows how to provide just when we need it. Today, He has not changed His nature but He just changed the relationship with us that makes Him provide. Yesterday, the children of Israel found it difficult to learn that character of God, which their father Abraham learned. They always saved some Manna as a reserve for the next day against Jehovah Jireh’s instructions. They had trust issues and that was very repulsive to Him. Today, He has become Abba Father, our Daddy. Jesus taught that if corrupt human daddies do well at giving, then our Father should do best. He supplies our needs according to His riches in glory through Christ Jesus. In fact Jesus taught that food, clothes and the like should not be part of what we should ask for because Daddy knows that we need them, we should bother about seeking His kingdom and His righteousness because all the other survival necessities would follow. Today, Jesus is asking us to trust God-ours and His Father, for supply and abundance every day. Nevertheless, Jesus does not encourage waste or gluttony (remember the gathering after feeding the 5000 to their full). He wants us to enjoy every day, if we have a natural reserve, we may keep them naturally for the next day, or we could share if
necessary, but we must not pass ourselves through a miserly miserable life in the name of being wise- even if that is wisdom, then it must be the wisdom of the world. Every day Jesus provides just as we need it!
By Favouromeje, 2016.
Christ a poet 