The Canaanite woman came to ask the Lord to do something for her. She begged the Lord to heal her sick daughter. However, the Lord’s answer did not give any hint that He was going to do something. He said that He was the bread to feed her. By this we understand that we do not need the Lord Jesus to do anything for us; instead, we need to eat the Lord Jesus. Sisters, is your husband ill? Do not ask the Lord first to heal his sickness. The reason your husband is ill is so that you may eat the Lord Jesus. Take the Lord Jesus into you, and then your husband’s illness will be healed. Are you vexed by your children’s disobedience? You often pray that the Lord will perform a miracle to make your children obedient. However, the more you pray, the less effective your prayers are; the more you pray, the more disobedient your children are. Now you have to learn this secret: You have to eat the Lord more. Eat the Lord well, and your child will be healed.
Whenever you have a need, it is a proof that you need to eat the Lord Jesus. Have you lost your job? Do not pray to the Lord for a good job. All you need to do is eat the Lord Jesus, and the job will appear. When unbelievers hear these words, they will think that I am talking nonsense, but the experienced ones know that the job comes out of our eating the Lord. Do not ask the Lord Jesus to do something outside of you. Rather, eat the Lord Jesus and take Him into your being.
Brothers and sisters, we have all seen that the Lord Jesus has truly come to be our food. We need to change our concept. The elders in all the localities are faithfully managing the churches, bearing the churches on their hearts, and earnestly hoping that the churches will go on. Being anxious for the churches is good but not effective. Do not ask the Lord to help you take good care of the churches; you have to turn to take a few bites of the Lord Jesus. When you eat more of the Lord Jesus, the churches will be enlivened.
This is the central viewpoint in the New Testament. The Lord came not to work for us but to feed us. It is wrong to ask the Lord to till the ground for you like an ox; it is also wrong to shear the Lord of wool for your beauty. When the Canaanite woman in Matthew 15 asked the Lord Jesus to heal her sick daughter, the Lord replied in effect, “Do not ask Me to be an ox to till the ground for you; I am the crumbs for you to eat! Regardless of whether or not your daughter is sick, just eat Me! Eat Me, and your daughter will be healed!”
Brothers and sisters, your family life has problems because you do not eat Jesus. When the wives eat Jesus, the husbands change for the better; when the husbands eat Jesus, the wives change for the better. When the children eat Jesus, the parents no longer are a problem. When the parents eat the Lord Jesus, the children have a turn. You need to take the Lord Jesus into you and let Him become your life, your food, and your everything; then your circumstances will change. Actually, we do not care whether our circumstances are good or bad; we only care to eat and enjoy the Lord. The Lord is for you to eat! You first eat under the table, and then after a while you eat what is on the table. When the Gentile dogs eat Christ, they become the children of God. After the children eat more of Christ, they become the precious stones. In Revelation 2, the Lord told the messenger of the church in Pergamos, “To him who overcomes, to him I will give of the hidden manna, and to him I will give a white stone” (v. 17). The white stone is the one who overcomes. The one who eats the hidden manna eventually becomes the white stone for God’s building.
When the prodigal son returned home, outwardly he was clothed with the best robe prepared by his father, but inwardly he was still hungry. Therefore, the father said, “Bring the fattened calf; slaughter it, and let us eat and be merry” (Luke 15:23). This is the thought in the New Testament as well as in the whole Bible.
The Lord Jesus also said that the preaching of the gospel is likened to a man preparing a great dinner. When we preach the gospel, we often tell people to repent and frequently speak about man being sinful. However, in this parable the Lord Jesus said, “Go and invite the guests! The dinner has been made. Come, for all things are now ready!” Come to do what? Come to eat! Do not worry that the unbelievers will fail to confess and repent of their sins. When they eat the Lord, they will rejoice. Later when they realize that they are sinful, they will weep. Such weeping and confessing of sins are better than what they would do after listening to your persuasion. Therefore, when we preach the gospel to others, we have to urge them to eat. Man needs to eat the Lord, to take the Lord in.
Paul said in his Epistles that he fed the believers with milk. Peter also said that as newborn babes we should long for the guileless, spiritual milk. Milk is not only for drinking but also for eating. Milk is nourishing food. Thus, the thought of the Bible is eating! The Bible is a book on eating! Eat! Eat! We need to eat the Lord Jesus!
(Eating the Lord, Chapter 2, by Witness Lee)