Lord, you are my bread, the nourishment for my soul and spirit. You allow me to hunger; sometimes you even create it. Like all hunger, it makes me restless.

Nothing satisfies that restlessness in my soul until I find a quiet place, and be still with you. Not a mindless stillness, but expectant quietness. I expect you to emerge from the shadows of my heart and pour your love on me.

And you always come. When I cease looking to anything else to still my hunger, you are easy to find. I stretch out my hands to you, and find you. I find your love, your compassion, your wisdom. Your delightful Person, confiding things to me, little treasures I would have missed.

Though invisible to my earthly eyes, you are real, you are present, you are glad to be found by me.

Relief floods my soul. The hunger is stilled. Peace comes, that peace which has no reason. It comes with you. It IS you, and permeates my soul. It causes every anxious thought to fade away.

My mind lets go of its endless fretting over solutions for the day’s concerns, and rests. I breathe in deeply; I breathe in You.

It is you that nourishes me. I marvel that you can do this thing, which seems more unlikely to me than watching you heal a dread disease.

Appetites and cravings have driven me all my life. I found varied ways to silence them, but none ever satisfied to deeply, or truly nourished me as You.

I absorb your written Word, which creates new appetites, new hope and expectation in knowing you. The Scriptures bring me to you, but you yourself are the daily bread for my soul.

Often as I partake, my soul, in acknowledging your presence, releases its waters from deep places. All that relief and rest and peace flows out in gentle warm tears, like a drink offering poured out at your feet.

You let me know hunger. You forbid anything else satisfy my heart. You wait. And when I come looking for you, you feed me, as always, with who you are.

Why I have faith in His nourishing Presence:

He humbled you, causing you to hunger and then feeding you with manna, which neither you nor your ancestors had known, to teach you that man does not live on bread alone but on every word that comes from the mouth of the Lord. Deuteronomy 8:3 (NIV)

Satisfy us in the morning with your unfailing love, that we may sing for joy and be glad all our days. Psalms 90:14 (NIV)

The eyes of all look to you, and you give them their food at the proper time. You open your hand and satisfy the desires of every living thing. Psalms 145:15-16 (NIV)

Then Jesus declared, “I am the bread of life. Whoever comes to me will never go hungry, and whoever believes in me will never be thirsty.” John 6:35 (NIV)