Eat Bread Every Day

Lots of people make resolutions at the beginning of the year.  Many times, we refer to diets!  Lots of rich food and excess during the holidays gives way to restricting what we eat at the beginning of the new year.  For quite a few of us, it is with the motivation of shedding a few pounds.

Bread is filled with carbs and usually falls on the “don’t eat” list.  Vegetables are in, carbs and fat are out.  But I want to encourage the consumption of a different bread.  It is spiritual bread.  And it is always healthy for you.

Bread in the Bible often times refers to the food that is provided by God to his people.  It was impossible to think of food to feed the masses in Israel without thinking of wheat ground and baked into bread.  And I have traveled the world tasting all kinds of bread.  Makes my mouth water just thinking about it.

The Bible also refers to manna which was a bread-like substance that God provided to his people while they sojourned in the dessert following their deliverance from Egypt.  Manna fell everyday to provide sustenance for God’s people.

When Jesus was tempted by Satan in the wilderness, he countered Satan with the words, “It is written: ‘Man shall not live on bread alone, but on every word that comes from the mouth of God’” Matthew 4:4.  With this, Jesus was showing the parallel between our physical food which our bodies need and the spiritual food that our souls need.  God graciously provides both!  Later Jesus called himself the “bread of life” (John 6:48).

The Bible is therefore referred to often as spiritual bread.  It provides us with sustenance for our souls by revealing to us God and His perfect embodiment, Jesus the Son.

Why not put eating some bread at the top of your diet “needs” for the coming year?  There really are some great tools today to help us do this.  Let me introduce just a few.  One of my favorite websites is biblegateway.com.  This website offers translations of the Bible in 30 English versions, and many other languages from all over the world.  In addition, you can perform words searches.  But I recently ran across another cool feature, an audio Bible.  You can hear the Bible read outloud to you by famous orator, Max McLean.  He has an awesome voice!

But I need some daily reminders.  So I also like this site: oneyearbibleonline.com.  Pick a version and a plan.  I like the chronological plan which puts all of the books and passages of the Bible together in chronological fashion.  Using these tools, I can read bread every day, or I can hear McLean read it to me!

Some of you with smart phones will also enjoy a download called YouVersion.  It also allows you to create reading plans and also features an audio Bible.  This is a super hot application that puts the Bible (and reminders for reading the Bible) in the palm of your hand.

There are lots of tools available to help you eat bread every day.  Start the year off right by giving your soul something really nourishing to feast on!