Faith: Sensible or Senseless?

Today we’re going to talk about faith and the senses. As we were wrapping up our discussion last week, a consensus seemed to be developing that faith is an experience outside of the senses—some kind of extrasensory experience. Science, in contrast, is highly dependent upon the senses. We evaluate things by sight, touch, hearing, smell, and even by taste. (Early physicians diagnosed diabetes by tasting the urine of their patients to see if it was sweet.) Our life experience is a continuous sensory happening.

Faith, on the other hand, has an otherworldly feeling, rooted not in the senses but in something we might call ethereal. Why, then, if faith is not an extrasensory experience, do so many of the stories of faith we’ve been studying seem to rely heavily upon the senses? Moses sees a burning bush. He feels the heat of its flame. He’s told to take off his shoes so that his feet can feel the solid Earth. It’s God’s way of saying: “I am here. I am trying to address you, even!” then does actually go ahead and address Moses through the aural sense, stating that he is the “I Am.” This sensory overload for Moses was to establish God’s existence in Moses’ presence at that moment. The rod that turns into a snake, the leper’s hand that becomes healed, the 10 plagues of Egypt… they all had the same purpose.

Sensory experience follows sensory experience in these stories. What is the value of sensory experience in establishing faith? Is it necessary that faith be underwritten by a sensory experience? The easy answer is that a sensory experience supports and, in a sense, validates our faith. But how valuable and how reliable are these sensory experiences? Can you rely on your senses for your experiences, for your life? Especially, can you rely on the senses for your faith? Are they a reliable barometer of faith?

Donald has mentioned several times in class how, using various lenses and various projections and lights, a good photographer can make photographs say almost anything he wants them to say. Suppose you know two men—we’ll call them Jason and Christopher. You can’t see their faces or their hair. They are about the same size. But Jason has Christopher’s clothes on and is wearing Christopher’s cologne, and you recognize both his clothes and cologne. So as Jason walks by, you don’t see his face, you don’t see his hair, you only see what you see and smell what you smell. Your senses will conclude that Christopher just walked by. It’s so easy to see how quickly and easily your senses can be deceived. How reliable can they be in terms of faith?

The mind processes information acquired through our senses. Our minds act on what we see, hear, feel, smell, taste, and touch. Perception is the expression of being in touch with the external world. We rely on perception as the true basis for knowledge. We believe what we see, we even say: “I wouldn’t believe it except I saw with my own eyes, (or ears, etc.)” This is evidence of things seen. This is evidence of things heard. This is evidence of things felt and smelled and tasted. This is not evidence of things not seen. This is what we call rational.

Is faith then irrational? Many Christians believe we can compartmentalize faith as a way of knowing something about God completely separate from our senses, and from our perceptions and from our reason. Is this a true concept? Or must we experience our picture of God through the senses? In other words, is faith rooted in the irrational, or in the rational?

Throughout the Old Testament, and in the stories of faith we’ve studied for for the last several months, and in the gospels with the message and the mission of Jesus, we see stories which appeal to faith through the senses. The introduction to the Book of Luke talks about this sensory experience. Luke says:

Many have undertaken to draw up an account of the things that have been fulfilled among us, just as they were handed down to us by those who from the first were eyewitnesses and servants of the word. With this in mind, since I myself have carefully investigated everything from the beginning, I too decided to write an orderly account for you, most excellent Theophilus, so that you may know the certainty of the things you have been taught. (Luke 1:1-4)

This, Luke says, is a sensory experience that requires eyewitness account and putting it down on paper. Peter says a similar thing:

For we did not follow cleverly devised tales when we made known to you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but we were eyewitnesses of His majesty. (2 Peter 1:16)

Again, Peter both underwrite and underscored the importance of the visuals and the senses in affirming the faith and the truth about God.

The Bible is loaded with many stories, historical events. God himself declares himself to be a historical god—the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Then the question is: Is a leap of faith a plunge into irrationality, or is it a bold step toward God? Is it a leap into the darkness, or is it a jump toward the light? Faith, says Hebrews 1, is the substance of things hoped for; the evidence of things not seen. Does that mean then that faith is against that which we see? What is blind faith? And can blind faith lead us anywhere? Paul says we walk by faith and not by sight. And what about revelation? Is that dependent upon the senses? Is it a way of knowing something about God outside of the senses?

Consider faith in relationship to how we how we know things. How is it that we can and do come to know things? The rational would argue that true knowledge comes only from the mind; that using logic and intelligent patterns we can we can come to know what is truth. The empiricists rely upon the senses as we’ve been discussing. There is a perception that empiricism and observation is required to understand truth, and to understand truth, particularly as it relates to knowledge.

Revelation is mystical, otherworldly, and lacks the sensory affirmation, supposedly. In the story of the apostle Thomas we see the sensory experience leading to revelation. In John 20:19 he is doubting and won’t believe until he feels and sees Jesus for himself, which he does. Jesus responds:

“Place your finger here, and see My hands; and take your hand and put it into My side; and do not continue in disbelief, but be a believer.” Thomas answered and said to Him, “My Lord and my God!” (John 20:27-28)

So here we see sensory experience leading to a revelation. But the gold medal for sensory experience needed for faith is the story of Gideon in Judges 6. Recall how he has an encounter with the angel, and the angel calls him to do a special task. He goes in and food is prepared and brought. It consists of bread and broth and meat. The angel fire fires up the grill and completely consumes his food. He then has the experience with the fleece and the ground and the ground and the fleece and then he overhears the Midianites talking amongst themselves about how fearful they are that God is going to deliver the Israelites from their hand. We see here all the five senses being employed to bolster and to augment the faith of Gideon. We see sight, we see taste, we see touch, we see, hearing, and we see feeling; so we see all of the senses there in the book of Judges, chapter 6.

Does faith require the senses? Are they only required for those who have weak faith? Or is faith something that can bolster those who have strong faith as well? Can faith be known through the rational mind? Or is faith itself something which is too irrational? Throughout Scripture and the Old Testament and the Gospels, we see God willing, even eager it seems, to share a sensory experience to augment faith. “You have doubt? You have discouragement? You feel despair? Do I have a sensory experience for you! Let me provide a cloud by day and a fire by night. Let me part the Red Sea. Let me bring water from a rock. Let me have a donkey talk to you. Let me make food for 5,000 from five loaves and two fishes. Flames that won’t burn you up? How about a lion’s den where you won’t get eaten? A fleece which is wet from dry ground?” Etc., etc.

Do we need these sensory experiences? And if we do, what should we expect God to provide for us? There’s only one place I’m aware of (maybe others can correct me) where a demand for a sensory experience seems to exasperate God, and that’s Moses in Exodus 4:13. After all of what God has done—the burning bush, the rod that turned into a snake, and all of the sensory experience which Moses has gone through in an attempt to try to bolster his faith, his response is: “Please, Lord, now send the message by whomever You will.” In other words, “Send whoever you want, but don’t send me—I don’t qualify.” And then:

Then the anger of the Lord burned against Moses, and He said, “Is there not your brother Aaron the Levite? I know that he speaks fluently. And moreover, behold, he is coming out to meet you; when he sees you, he will be overjoyed. (Exodus 4:13)

So here is the only time where it seems that God gets exasperated. Not even with Gideon—over and over and over asking for a different kind of sensory experience—does he seem to lose patience. So there you have it. What is the relationship between the senses and faith? Are they true bedfellows? Or are they really antagonistic? Do they really need each other?

Donald: It seems we are challenged by our senses because they seem to be connected to the emotional, and emotional decisions are not necessarily wise decisions. It seems to me we don’t want to rely on our emotions or our senses. Let’s just deal in facts. What are the facts? Of course we all know that facts are not necessarily factual! However, that being said, think about the scar on Christ’s hand, think about the Second Coming,… Talk about a sensory experience! And when you talk about heaven, it’s almost beyond comprehension. Give me the facts. What’s it going to be like? What are the parameters? I just think that there’s a tension, but the Bible is full of examples where the senses are used to make a point. So should there be the tension, I guess, is my question. Should we be more comfortable with the idea of our emotions?

Bryan: If by definition faith is belief in the unseen, then faith and sensory inputs may be unrelated. I might even suggest that sensory impacts such as Moses experienced might be a reward for those of great faith. If faith is like the flow of water through a hose, with heaven being the source, us being the conduit, and faith flowing through us to the world, so that others may be able to see heaven through us (which hopefully is the point) then the more we allow the flow, the more our capacity becomes, the more the flow increases, and the more it’s used. And so I’m not sure that sensory impacts and faith—which by definition is belief in things unseen—are really related, but may suggest those with great faith are rewarded with direct input from heaven.

C-J: I don’t think God was angry with Moses for asking for assurance. I think it was that Moses lingered with the access and privilege that he had as one of the sons of Pharaoh. Yes, he killed an Egyptian but he could have pleaded before Pharaoh and said he made a mistake. But with God, I think he was saying, “What is wrong with you?” People with much less have not received, seen or touched. I don’t think God ever becomes impatient with us for our lack of understanding. I think he gets angry with us when he has given us so much reason to increase our faith, and then we go, “Not interested. Find somebody else. Too much work. Too much of a commitment.” I really think God is very generous.

David: I’m going to drag us all back to basics. We talk about judging by the stories in the Bible that faith can arise through emotions, the senses, and revelation. I was privileged recently to receive a document quoting from the Selected Messages of Ellen White. She wrote:

It is not the words of the Bible that are inspired, but the men that were inspired. Inspiration acts not on the man’s words or his expressions but on the man himself, who, under the influence of the Holy Ghost, is imbued with thoughts. But the words receive the impress of the individual mind. The divine mind is diffused. The divine mind and will is combined with the human mind and will; thus the utterances of the man are the word of God.

The Bible is written by inspired men, but it is not God’s mode of thought and expression. It is that of humanity. God, as a writer, is not represented. Men will often say such an expression is not like God. But God has not put Himself in words, in logic, in rhetoric, on trial in the Bible. The writers of the Bible were God’s penmen, not His pen. Look at the different writers. 1 Selected Messages 21. 1-2

I absolutely agree with what she says. It solves a lot of the problems I’ve had with the Bible, and I think it applies to this discussion, where we’re reading stories where faith is depicted as emotional or physical/sensory or revelatory. But we’ve got to remember that men, human beings, wrote these inspiring Bible stories about a divine concept, a spiritual concept influenced by the Holy Ghost. Thus, it seems to me faith is neither sensory, emotional, nor revelatory in the sense of a blinding flash. Faith is always there, shining steadily as the inner light. It is always inside you and you know it. Faith resides in that knowledge. Everybody’s given a measure of faith. Yet here we are, struggling with a relationship between faith and the senses when that relationship is a purely human assumption. I don’t think it is the intention of the Bible to infer such a relationship. I think Ellen White’s insight is absolutely right: It’s a matter of the Holy Ghost.

Jeff: I too have a hard time connecting faith to sensory experiences. This is not to say that those things don’t have the the ability to strengthen or affect faith in wome way, but I don’t think faith is derived from them. Faith is your ability to say that there is an inner light, there is a guiding force, there is a power of goodness, and “I surrender myself to that. I believe that that power is in control, I believe that God is in control.”

Jay: The last verse of Hebrews 11 is pretty troubling—all these tortured people who don’t get what God promised, yet God is in control. That’s not what we want as the outcome of faith, especially great faith, and that’s where I think we struggle. We believe that great faith gives us the privilege, the right, and the power to mold our happiness or our prosperity or whatever we want. In the end, great faith may do the opposite, but if that happens, great faith brings peace or comfort or understanding to that end.

Reinhard: Jesus tried to instill in the disciples trust in God. I think that’s the basis for us as Christians. During that time, of course, they saw Jesus face to face. Eventually, he had to be able to leave the earth and we just have to remember his teaching without seeing him. Blessed are those who believe without seeing.

When the Jewish people asked him to show supernatural signs—miracles—he was reluctant, saying the sign of the fish—Jonah—was enough. Just before the ascension, knowing the disciples were a mess, in shock that their leader was to leave them and wondering how they were going to maintain their faith and their work, he said the Holy Spirit would guide them and teach them to the end of time.

We are, of course, guided by our senses and intellects. Of course we’re dealing with reality, but as believers who have accumulated all this knowledge and belief in our spiritual journey, I think we can see, we can feel, that God is really there, and apply that in our actions. That’s how we deal with our fellow men. That’s why we we come to worship every Sabbath, because we know there’s a supreme power above us.

David wrote in Psalm 8 that God created this vast universe and we are men that he cares about. We are a creation with which God really aimed high, with the purpose to channel his love to all of us. So faith takes more than just what we see in the real world. Based on our experience, we surrender to God. That’s why we have all this moral law, that can only come from God, not from men.

So put all this together in our life experience, there is a God that we worship. Maybe it’s hard to explain by our senses and intellect. But with the Bible in our lives we hear God’s word everyday, and in our spiritual journey we can feel there is God to protect us. We are only human. We live in this world. We are mortal creations. There’s got to be something that God planned for us, so I think we just have to remain straight on our path and we will come to God and need to surrender to Him.

Donald: To me, faith requires the senses and requires emotion because it’s unseen. How do we get there? Conversion experiences are usually emotional, and emotions are not facts. Some of us only like to make decisions based upon facts; some almost see them as entirely emotional decisions—there’s a continuum. But if faith was based upon facts than it isn’t faith, it’s just a matter of logic. So some emotion, which is built upon our sesnses, is going to be part of this faith journey. It seems to me.

Don: My question is this. Do I have a right to demand a sign from God in the form of some kind of sensory experience?

Donald: To want a sign from God seems to me to remove the thing that is mysterious about faith, to relegate the relationship between you and God to a conveience, like an umbrella in the rain. Why would you want a sign from God?

Don: I want to sign from God because I want my life to be easier and better. And God knows what that will be for me.

Donald: So it’s about you and not about your relationship with God.

Don: Yeah, I think so.

Jeff: I think you have all the right in the world to ask for a sign from God that you want. Knock yourself out and ask for five of them. That didn’t end up bad for Gideon. We often think that in that story (which we like to use) is that those incidents are why Gideon ends up with great faith. I would argue that Gideon ends up with great faith because he takes an army down from 3000 to 300 and goes against thousands. That’s faith. He allows God to be God and do something that makes no sense. That’s what Gideon does. Read the end of Hebrews! There are some people I do not want to be.

Don: Sawn asunder and pilloried and so on,

Jeff: Right. I don’t want to be any of those people. They got great faith, though. So you want to ask a sign from God? Go ahead! In the end, to those who have faith, whatever God does, God does; whatever God gives them in the end, God gives them in the end. As Hebrews says, it’s not what they were promised, but it is what God gives them. It takes a lot of faith to be okay with that.

Jay: I don’t think God gets angry when we ask for things, but God’s gonna do what God’s gonna do. Maybe for one individual, that’s what God needs to do. The problem is that when we ask and then God doesn’t do it, we wonder why he did it for Gideon? Good enough for Gideon is not good enough for me? Can’t I get a little sign? Can’t I get a little dry fleece on a wet day? We think: “God should have done this!” That’s the opposite of faith, saying, “I know what God should do, and God should do this.” Faith is that “God does what God does, and I’m okay with it.”

C-J: I think that people of faith rely on those promises. And God has given us many promises: “I’m a God of provision, I am faithful. I’m loving, kind, just, all knowing, all powerful. I only want good things for you.” My faith is built on multi sensory experience, and the bottom line for me is that my God is a God of provision. And then all those other things are there. Whenever I get in a place where I’m wondering: “What just happened?” or “What should I do?” it doesn’t matter what I think. God has got a provision. He has nothing to do with me. God will do what he’s gonna do.

Bryan: It seems like we’ve almost come full circle in this discussion back to how we avoid being disappointed in God, because of our faith not being able to do what examples in the Bible have shown us they were able to do. To me, that’s a real problem, and that’s why, for me, faith has to be disconnected from sensory outpouring. You can ask for whatever you want but you’re not going to get it, and where does that leave you? It leaves you disappointed. Why can they get it and I can’t? Why did they get it? Why didn’t I? What do they have that I don’t have?

And so if you think that’s a component of faith, in my view it’s going to leave you disappointed. If you take it out of the equation, so that faith becomes simply belief, then if in fact you are rewarded with a direct intervention, then how much better for you! I mean, you can you can see God through that. Others might not be able to. But to me, you can’t expect that because it leaves you wanting

Tanika: God knows our personality type and he knows how we think. The Bible has stories of people from different backgrounds and different ways of thinking and shows those experiences where some, like Gideon, have a very sensory experience, but that’s what he needed. So even though our expectation is a sensory experience, God knows maybe that’s not what you need to build your faith. So I think it’s also very individual-dependent, and God knows what’s the best way to help us in building our faith.

Chris: What if the sensory experiences were not faith themselves, but a tool that God uses to affirm one’s faith? When I think of all of these experiences—Moses and the burning bush, Gideon putting the fleece out, and the men are drinking, and this and that, and he’s pairing them all away—what if God knew that these people needed affirmation of something they already had, and that they were acting on? So that in the end, God’s will is done.

Don: What we want from our faith is somehow for the faith to make life better. It seems that we cannot divorce faith from outcome. The idea that you can have faith and be a person of faith, yet still have a rotten life, is not something that goes together in our mind. We want our faith to somehow elevate us out of the stresses of this life. And that’s what we bargain with God. We want our faith to heal us. We want our faith to make us well. We want our faith to keep us from adversity. Why is it that we can’t see faith as something that is not dependent upon outcome?

David: It’s because we conflate the two worlds. We conflate the spiritual with the worldly. All our problems would be resolved if accept that what God is talking about—what the Bible is really talking about—is spiritual faith, faith in the spiritual realm, faith in God, faith in the promise of the afterlife, faith in a heaven. Not faith in winning the lottery or being spared from losing your job in the pandemic. None of this worldly stuff. The problem is that the Bible appears to say that God is a God of provision, that he’ll provide for you in this life. No, God will not provide for you in this life. God will provide for you in the next life. Period. End of story.

Don: That’s a lousy God, if he can’t help you in this life…?

Donald: The problem is if you tie the two together, you can lose faith very easily. “If something doesn’t happen, I’m out of here. This isn’t working.” I know someone whose world is a mess yet she still has faith. How does that work? It’s easy for me, because my life’s pretty good. But hers isn’t and she hasn’t lost her faith. I think she’s disconnected the two: She has faith, and then there’s life, and life happens.

C-J: I’m reminded frequently how fleeting our awareness of this span of time we call life, and how some people have a very short life and other people have a very long life. Some people don’t do anything noteworthy, and other people do these amazing things. I think it’s about relationship. It’s always about relationship and understanding that we we’re in a transient parallel universe which, if we thought this is all there is, would be very limiting. But if we think that we are spirit beings and our relationship is with the divine, then it makes it much easier to encompass this idea and use those senses that God has given us in this form to reaffirm, and to draw us closer, and to bring enlightenment, and increase our faith

We can say: “I do believe, I do believe, I do believe!” but that’s not going to increase our faith. It’s a gift. At least for me. When I’m having a really tough time and saying to God, “I’m done, I’m done. I just can’t take this anymore.” But when I change the paradigm to “They meant it for evil, but you meant it for good.” That whatever is happening I don’t understand and is very painful for me, but it’s an opportunity to grow. It’s an opportunity to grow spiritually, it’s an opportunity to become more disciplined. It’s an opportunity to just pause and wait for whatever God is going to do. It’s not for me to try and fix it. It’s very hard. But I think this whole thing with COVID and things that have happened in my neighborhood: “You meant it for evil, but God meant it for good” has really given me comfort. A lot of tears, but it has also given me comfort.

David: Sounds like Blessed are the poor in spirit, for they shall…

C-J: … inherit the earth, and see great things.

Reinhard: Gideon had no doubt about God’s power to defeat the enemy. He saw God’s power during the exodus. I think the proof he wanted is like us. We have no doubt God can do this and that for us, but is God going to be with us at a time and place of our choosing? I think that’s the problem we are facing. But if we surrender to Him and have complete faith in him, God will not only reward us for the life to come, I believe, but will be with us as he has promised. We can enjoy our life as long as we put everything in his hands.

Tanika: I do think that sensory experience augments faith. I love music. Certain songs and words can sometimes affect people in an emotional way.

Jeff: It strikes me that since the beginning of time, we’ve been trying in our human world to connect ourselves with the divine in some way. I keep going back to the concept of faith as being this connection, and then trying to determine what our role is in the connection between us and God. My entire existence and tradition growing up in the Adventist Church seems to me has been to try to curate that connection and try to build on it in some way. And that seems to be futile.

Don: Futile in terms of your life experience,

Jeff: In terms of it may not be something I have any direct control over. As much as we try through thought and action and lifestyle, I’m not sure that we can affect that connection between my soul and the divine. I think God has that connection. Maybe it’s there regardless of what we do.

It strikes me that the times when I’ve felt the most satisfaction in life and the most goodness is not so much when when I’m straining to figure out God or to read the Bible in a deep manner or search for meaning one-on-one between me and God. Rather, it seems to me like those best moments in this life and the most satisfaction and vision of goodness I can see is when I connect—maybe even inadvertently—with those around me and connecting or experiencing shared relationships with other humans.

To me that may be more a manifestation or more a sensory manifestation of the connection with God than actually looking for a concrete sign or in some way through prayer and study and living trying to curate my knowledge or me trying to get closer to God through my actions.

Don: Well, there’s a novel idea the idea that faith connects us to people, not necessarily connects us to God.

Jeff: I don’t know if that’s the case. It’s something to consider. I maybe I’m coming more more closer to the idea that faith is there though it is not something we can see and maybe I should stop worrying about my connection with God as being a manifestation of my faith and accept that that’s there. If God is God and will do what God does, it’s not my role or my position to try to interpret that. Rather, it’s my my position and role to work to connect with those around me.

Don: But I just can’t give up my my desire to control God’s power on my behalf. I just can’t give that up. I want God to work on my behalf, to defend me, to liberate me, to elevate me. I can’t give up on the fact that if I just say the right thing, I do the right thing, I be the right person, that God will somehow help me.

Donald: I wouldn’t use Jeff’s word “interpret.” We actually want to manipulate God. And that’s a very strong and probably negative word of God being here and we move in and out through faith. God doesn’t move. We’re the ones moving back and forth. To me, that’s a stronger faith and that’s a weaker faith. But faith is. I would agree concur with that. But I don’t think life’s experiences necessarily should play a major role in this. It’s hard, because it does. We can lose our faith quite easily if God doesn’t do what we ask God to do. But if he does, should that mean that we’re closer to God? Because, you know, he’s responding to us and he’s answering my prayer?

Jeff: We say all the time, but I don’t know if we really think about it, that we’re moving into a closer or farther relationship with God. Do you suppose God sees it that way? Do you think that God sees you as way out there and not right in here? Do you think that our value to God waxes and wanes? There’s no way that’s the case! So is there this moving in and out of God, of goodness, of grace? Like there’s more grace the closer you’re in, and less grace farther out there; more love in here, less love out there; more forgiveness the closer you are, less forgiveness, the farther away you are. These are very humanistic things that I’m not I’m not sure resonate.

Is it our responsibility to eliminate the gap between us and God that sin has brought in? Or is sin God’s responsibility?

C-J: I think of it as a parent, when a child is trying to understand why an answer was “No.” And the lesson in it—that higher order thinking the parent is trying to get their child to do it—the parent kind of leans in and says to the child, “Can you tell me more about that?” Or “Go and think about it.” Or “Have you considered…” without really telling the child the answer. And really, the goal is to get the child to not just agree with God, but to understand the process. The process is just as important as the end result, maybe more, because truth is in a state of flux: What we thought was true might change.

My relationship with my God is I like the garden when Adam and Eve were walking in it and God walked with them. There were no questions off limits. It was just this exploratory conversation, like we’re having. That’s how I see my relationship with God. It’s not like “You were supposed to do this. You were supposed to protect me. You made a promise to me. You know I’m only human so I’m not going to get this right!” I just see my relationship with the divine as an ever-evolving partnership. I hope it’s something we both want. I think the creator loves us and wants it dearly. We might back up and say, “I’m a little disappointed in you, God. I’m gonna give you a little do over here, how much time you think that might take?”

It’s a profound relationship. The ebbs and flows, we learn, we grow, we come back and we say, “Dad, I was thinking about what you said,” or “Is this what you were trying to tell me and I just didn’t understand?” And then my dad would give me a smile, kind of shake his head and say “Want to go for a walk?” And we wouldn’t talk about it anymore. We’re sort of like, “You’re on the right road, sis, it’s okay.” It’s just different when we are knowingly in relationship with the divine,

Don: We found some interesting ground today. You may be happy about it. You may be discouraged about it. Hopefully you’re at least enlivened to think a little bit more about it.

David: I think that the chronicler, the person who recorded the Lord’s Prayer, added something of himself to that prayer. I believe that Jesus would have ended it with “Thy will be done.” The rest of it about daily bread I don’t believe came from Jesus.

Don: Let’s give it some thought.