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Give Us All Our Daily Bread: Prayer Part 3

“Give us each day our daily bread.” - Luke 11:3

The first portion of the prayer is to give us an expanded awareness of the spiritual, of the sacred and the holy in our everyday lives. The second portion is to increase our determination and desire to see a world filled with equity and justice for everyone. This third portion focuses us on our desire to see that everyone has their basic needs met.

Whose needs? Give us our daily bread. Not give me my daily bread. Who is us? We have a natural tendency to want to limit or exclude others, to draw our circles tight, to define who is in and who is out. We are like the lawyer in the previous chapter who wanted to clearly define who his neighbor was in order for him to also know who his neighbor wasn’t.

Jesus’s parable of “The Good Samaritan”, teaches us to be a good neighbor to those who need us to be rather than asking who our neighbor is. Similarly, the model prayer invites us to desire that everyone including ourselves, regardless of affinity or affiliation has their basic needs met.

Give us all our daily bread.

I’m Horace McMillon. This is 60 Seconds of Hope. Peace be with you.

#60secondsofhope #Devotion #inspiration #dailydevotion #dailyinspiration #dailymeditation #discipleship #positivemindset #dailydevotional #positivity #growth #personaldevelopment #Luke11 #prayer #TheLordsPrayer #modelprayer #sacred #holy #justice #equality #thegoodsanaritan #betheneighbor

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It May Be Crazy, But It’s Not Too Late

“Maybe, it's not too late, to learn how to love and forget how to hate" Crazy Train - Ozzy Osbourne

There are those who are convinced that the world is going to hell in a hand basket. And then there are those who look at this same world with the hope and courage to say, ‘Yes, but maybe it’s not too late.”

The first group lives in resignation and condemnation. The second group lives with the hope and optimism that compels and propels them to keep trying, to keep striving, to keep thriving.

The second group doesn’t deny our current reality. In fact it sees everything clearly, but also believes:

If we humble themselves, and pray, and seek God’s face, and turn from our destructive ways; then the heavens will hear us, our wrongs will be redeemed, and our world we be healed. (Based on 2 Chronicles 7:14)

The world around us may be going off the rails, but it’s not too late.

I’m Horace McMillon. This is 60 Seconds of Hope. Peace be with you.

#60secondsofhope #Devotion #inspiration #dailydevotion #dailyinspiration #dailymeditation #discipleship #positivemindset #dailydevotional #positivity #growth #personaldevelopment #hope #healing #redemption #ozzy #crazytrain

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Longing For A Better World: Prayer Part 2

“May your kingdom come.” -from Luke 11:2

After we pray for God to gives us a sense of the sacred and the holy in our everyday lives, after we develop a sense of reverence for the world God is creating and sustaining, we then shift our focus towards our longing for God’s preferred world to become our very own.

The kingdoms of this world are built and sustained by money and power amassed the violence and exploitation. The abundance created by the sacrifices of the many end up in the storehouses of the few. We do not accept this world. Instead we pray and work for a world where “no one has too much, and no one has too little.”

We do not accept injustice and inequality no matter how intractable and pervasive they may be. We long for a better world. We pray for it every day. Then we go out and do our part to bring it into being. Let Your kingdom come.

I’m Horace McMillon. This is 60 Seconds of Hope. Peace be with you.

#60secondsofhope #Devotion #inspiration #dailydevotion #dailyinspiration #dailymeditation #discipleship #positivemindset #dailydevotional #positivity #growth #personaldevelopment #Luke11 #prayer #TheLordsPrayer #modelprayer #sacred #holy #justice #equality

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Every Place Sacred, Everything Holy: Prayer Part 1

“When you pray, say: Father, may your name be revered as holy” - from Luke 11:2

The model prayer that Jesus taught his disciples in Luke begins with our reverence, with our desire to have an expanded sense of the sacred within and around us.

We live in a seemingly secular world. The definition of secular here that I’m using means things and activities without spiritual significance. So, normally to us some things are of spiritual significance but most things aren’t.

But if the “earth is the Lord’s, and the fullness thereof, the world and those who dwell therein” and if the cosmos “lives and moves and has its being in God”, how can there be anything or anyone that is without spiritual significance?

Trusting in the presence of a loving God, the first purpose or goal of prayer in Luke is to help us develop a sense of and a connection to this presence in our daily lives. Every place becomes sacred. Everything becomes holy.

I’m Horace McMillon. This is 60 Seconds of Hope. Peace be with you.

#60secondsofhope #Devotion #inspiration #dailydevotion #dailyinspiration #dailymeditation #discipleship #positivemindset #dailydevotional #positivity #growth #personaldevelopment #Luke11 #prayer #TheLordsPrayer #modelprayer #sacred #holy

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How We Thrive

“But I am like a green olive tree in the house of God. I trust in the steadfast love of God forever and ever.” - Psalm 52:8

A brief web search reveals that olive trees live for a long time and are able to be and remain productive even under harsh circumstances.

The psalmist declares that our trusting in the steadfast love of God enables us to be like these trees.

This contrasts with the folks in the previous verse “who would not take refuge in God but trusted in abundant riches and sought refuge in wealth!"

It is true that we all need money and material resources to survive in this world. But no amount of money can ever make us thrive.

We thrive when we live lives rooted and grounded in the steadfast love of God in communion with others who are doing the same.

When conditions are rough and life gets tough, who and what will we depend on to see us through? If our primary focus is on money and power we will discover that we will not thrive even if we get them.

On the other hand, if we live our lives trusting in the power of God’s love to sustain us, we will thrive and be productive anyway.

I’m Horace McMillon. This is 60 Seconds of Hope. Peace be with you.

#60secondsofhope #Devotion #inspiration #dailydevotion #dailyinspiration #dailymeditation #discipleship #positivemindset #dailydevotional #positivity #growth #personaldevelopment #Psalm52 #overcomingadversity #howtothrive #faith #selfcare #howtothrive

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There Is No Nationalism in Christianity

These are the words that were spoken as some of the earliest Christians were baptized into Christ:

“There is no longer Jew or Greek; there is no longer slave or free; there is no longer male and female, for all of you are one in Christ Jesus.” - Galatians 3:28

The ancient world of the Mediterranean of this time was highly polarized and divided by race, class, and gender. Who a person was, how they were treated, and what they could hope to be and do was largely determined and constrained by that person’s status.

Prior to baptism there was no thought or possibility of equality, mutuality, true honor or sincere respect across these divisions. We were estranged and alienated from each other with all the suspicion, mistrust, and hatred such divisions bring.

Being baptized into Christ ends these divisions as our identity together as children of God supersedes all others. The divisions of race, class, gender, and I believe any other divisions we can think of, are ended. There’s no nationalism in Christianity.

I’m Horace McMillon. This is 60 Seconds of Hope. Peace be with you.

#60secondsofhope #Devotion #inspiration #dailydevotion #dailyinspiration #dailymeditation #discipleship #positivemindset #dailydevotional #positivity #growth #personaldevelopment #baptism #unity #identity #Galatians3 #christian #nationalism #christiannationalism

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Pass Me Not: Inviting The Presence of God

“He said, "My lord, if I find favor with you, do not pass by your servant.” - Genesis 18:3

We don’t know exactly what Abraham was feeling 24 years after he and Sarah gave up their comfortably settled lives to pursue a bigger vision and nothing had happened yet.

Doubt? Uncertainty? Had he heard it right? Had he made the right choices, taken the correct path? Did he go left when he should’ve gone right.

Was he feeling exhausted and fatigued? As the years passed, did his hope start to wane? Was he beginning to regret?

We don’t know what he was feeling. But we do know that he recognized the presence of God had come near him. He did everything he could to invite this presence to stay with him if only for a while.

He didn’t pray, in this case for any vision or clarity of direction. He didn’t pray for any material or physical possessions. He only prayed that the presence of God would stay with him and not pass him by.

Sometimes the old hymn is our best prayer. “Pass me not oh gentle savior. Hear my humble cry. While on others thou are calling. Do no pass me by.”

I’m Horace McMillon. This is 60 Seconds of Hope. Peace be with you.

#60secondsofhope #Devotion #inspiration #dailydevotion #dailyinspiration #dailymeditation #discipleship #positivemindset #dailydevotional #positivity #growth #personaldevelopment #Genesis18 #patience #faithfulness #prayer

#abrahamandsarah #selfcare

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In Due Season

“Then one said, "I will surely return to you in due season, and your wife Sarah shall have a son." - Genesis 18:10

It is hard to wait. It is hard to wait for our needs to be met, our expectations fulfilled , and our dreams achieved. It’s even harder to wait when we don’t have the details of how, where, and when.

We are going to be tempted to give up hope. It’s very likely that were times when Abraham and Sarah thought about quitting, thought about turning around and returning home to their old lives.

There were times when they, being tired of waiting, tried to take matters into their own hands and come up with their own unfortunate solutions. Hagar and Ishmael suffered greatly as a result and they were pretty miserable themselves.

We may not know how or where or when. But we must never forget who and why. God had promised them that they would leave behind a legacy that would one day bless the world, in due season.

We have to guard our hearts and minds from frustrations, impatience, and disappointments. We have to focus on being faithful and consistent particularly when we don’t see our efforts making a difference. In due season they will.

I’m Horace McMillon. This is 60 Seconds of Hope. Peace be with you.

#60secondsofhope #Devotion #inspiration #dailydevotion #dailyinspiration #dailymeditation #discipleship #positivemindset #dailydevotional #positivity #growth #personaldevelopment #Genesis18 #patience #faithfulness #indueseason #abrahamandsarah #selfcare

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