Hello friends, welcome to Embolden. I'm Chris Shatter, an ordinary Christian living with and learning about an extraordinary God. We're on day 11 of 30 Days of Giving Glory to God here on the Embolden Podcast. In today's post comes from 1 Corinthians 10, 31.
So whether you eat or drink or whatever you do, do it all for the glory of God. And please join me in this prayer at your next meal. Blessed God, we praise you for who you are. You are the God who cares for our needs.
We see this meal before us as a demonstration of your wonderful grace to us. We glorify you for the day we have had. Thank you for the family gathered here and for every blessing we enjoy. Amen.
When my kids were little, we started praying at dinner time. We found a simple prayer that they could take turns saying, and it was, God is great, God is good, let us thank Him for our food. Amen. It was an easy way to add glorifying and thanking God to our daily lives.
The problem was, after quite a few years, it became wrote. There was no feeling, no personalization, or even love behind the prayer. It was just something we did quickly so we could start eating. You know, for some of us, we never even pray before meals.
Oh, we pray only during certain meals. But Jesus, He gave thanks at every meal, glorifying the Father for being a provider of needs. Luke 2430 looks back and says, when He was at the table with them, He took bread, gave thanks, broke it, and began to give it to them. The beauty of that scripture is what came next.
You see, the disciples had been walking along with the risen Jesus, chatting with Him, not realizing who He was. For whatever reason, they urged the stranger to come stay with them and join them for dinner. After they gave thanks and broke bread, the next part of that scripture says, their eyes were opened and they recognized Him. It wasn't until 2020 when the COVID pandemic hit that the love and glorifying act of praying before meals finally sunk in for me.
Each evening, when my husband came home from his job of caring for senior citizens completely exhausted, we decided to pray. Before dinner, we prayed for anything good that happened that day. We prayed for help. We prayed for the health and safety of his employees and residents.
We prayed for our leaders. We thank God for providing. And my eyes were opened to Jesus. Here's another prayer that I found, just like the other one, online called Beautiful Prayers for Beals.
It goes, Lord God, not a sparrow is not known to you. Not a lily is not clothed by you. You know what we need, and we are thankful that you have provided the meal set here for us. Keep us from worrying about tomorrow, but to be grateful for what you have provided for us this day.
Amen. A friend of mine has encouraged me to start praying before every meal, and yes, even in public, which in the area where I live, you just don't see very much. You know, at meal times, we can see the obvious work of God in our lives. Whether what's on our plate as a feast, we're just enough to sustain us for one more day.
We need to give all the glory to him who provides. Have a blessed day. I hope you enjoyed this episode of The Abolden Podcast. Be sure to follow along so you don't miss any episode.
And check out my blog at Embolden.net.