The Bread That Keeps On Feeding In the early 1980s I casually reminded a pastor's wife that Sarah had prepared bread for the Almighty God - and He ate it. She was speechless at first, then, "What did you say?" I repeated it and I could see the wheels turning over in her mind. "Oh, you remember," I said, "when the three men came to Abraham's tent and He bid them rest awhile in the shade of his tree?" (Genesis, Chapter 18). She remembered, but until that moment, she had not gleaned from the story the wondrous fact that Sarah had prepared bread for the Lord Himself, and that He, and the angels with him, had eaten it... Abraham killed the fatted calf and set the meat, butter, milk and bread before his guests and stood by them under the tree as the lowly servant while they dined and rested - after they had been honored on arrival with the washing of their feet. And that in itself is a story… That lowly servant of Abraham, who washed the feet of the Savior, did not know whose feet they were that he washed and dried. Then the day came, two thousand years later, when he again met the man whose feet he had washed. Imagine that it had been hidden from him all those centuries – while he was in Abraham’s bosom – and now the man stood before him, just resurrected, the Messiah of Promise, ready to escort them all into Heaven. What a blessing for the once-lowly servant – what a story! What a wonderful testimony to the generosity and humble spirits of Abraham, Sarah and company... I have never ceased to be amazed when I think about Sarah sifting out three measures as Abraham had told her to do. Imagine her elderly and practiced fingers kneading the dough from her finest flour to feed a stranger who just happened to be the Bread of Heaven. I doubt she knew who He was at that time. It didn't matter, Abraham and Sarah were hospitable to all, friends and strangers alike, but there was something different about these three and Abraham knew it even if Sarah didn't... You see, we have the advantage - we can look back in hindsight and see the miracle wheels turning on that day, but Abraham and Sarah were looking through the glass darkly. In their minds, they were simply feeding and giving comfort to weary travelers, it didn’t occur to them their kindness would have far-reaching returns for their descendants. The Lord had heard Abraham instruct Sarah to make the bread, and notably, Sarah didn't grumble. She was pleased to promptly obey her husband... She did laugh when the Lord prophesied that she would have a son "in the time of life" (nine months). She never meant to laugh at him, but to laugh at herself for her womb was dead - she was 89 years old and Abraham was 99. Having a child at her age was impossible - she had ceased to be a woman of child-bearing age a long time ago. But the prophet assured them it would be so... Although the birth of Isaac was the plan in God's timing alone, his ascendancy from Sarah’s long-ago dreams to today’s reality, came through the Word of prophecy, spoken from the lips of the pre-incarnate Christ. Once again, that very night, Sarah found pleasure in her husband's arms, even in her old age. Nine months later she gave birth to Isaac, the first in the prophesied royal line, bearing in his loins the promise for all the ages, the Seed of the woman, (Genesis 3:15) the Seed that would become our Bread of Life... Some two hundred years later, Joseph, son of Jacob, second in power in all of Egypt, had saved the bread of seven plenteous years to stave off the famine of seven lean years that followed, and he fed this bread with his heart filled with love and forgiveness to the same eleven brothers who had sold him into slavery twenty years earlier, knowing he probably would not survive. Because there was famine in all the Middle East, including Canaan, Jacob and all his descendants and their families went down to Egypt to the kindness and care of Joseph who they had believed was dead and was now resurrected. God had sent Joseph ahead, even into slavery, later to save Egypt, and in so doing, he had saved the nation of Israel also... Forty years Israel wandered in the wilderness. Forty years God fed this young but mighty nation with daily manna from heaven. Every morning, six days a week, they gathered the bread that was not prepared in any earthly oven or tent, nor was it kneaded by mortal hands, but it fell like the dew, covering the ground for the morning collections. Flour kneaded in the tent at Mamre had become daily fields of bread in the desert... Some fifteen hundred years later, Jesus fed 5,000 people with the multiplied loaves of one lad's lunch. Again, it was manna from heaven, in different form, and with different texture but bread of substance from the Bread of Heaven who kneaded it Himself with the prayer of blessing. Later, just before He was betrayed, He said, “I was hungry and you gave me meat; I was thirsty, and you gave me drink: I was a stranger, and you took me in. Naked, and your clothed me: I was sick, and your visited me: I was in prison, and you came unto me. “Then shall the righteous answer Him, saying, Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you? Or thirsty and gave you drink? When did we see you a stranger, and took you in? 0r naked, and clothed you? When did we see you sick or in prison and visited you? “And the King shall answer and say unto them, ‘Verily I say unto you, inasmuch as you have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, you have done it unto me” (Matthew 25: 35-40) Do you see? Do you understand? The kindness of the moment reaches into thousands of years to bless our seed. Isn't it amazing that God, in His infinite wisdom and in His own immeasurable kindness, keeps track of it all, and multiplies it here and there to cover the need and bless the children... Oh, what a Mighty God we serve...what a mighty voice we hear and believe…what a Savior… Joan Krempel
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