November 1, 2024 Daily Devotion

When God Is In Charge, People Flourish

Your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.

Matthew 6:10

Sheridan Voysey writes in Our Daily Bread, a powerful story of factory owner George Cadbury set in Victorian England in the 1800’s. The factories and neighborhoods were dark places. Cadbury asked, “How can the working man cultivate ideals when his home is a slum?” So, Cadbury built a new kind of factory that benefited his workers. The result was Bournville, a village of more than three hundred homes with sports fields, playgrounds, schools, and churches for his workers and their families.

They were paid good wages and offered medical care, all because of Cadbury’s faith in Christ. Jesus teaches us to pray for God’s will to be done “on earth as it is in heaven” (Mathew 6:10). This prayer can help us imagine, as Cadbury did, what our workplaces would be like under God’s rule, where our “daily bread” is earned and our “debtors” forgiven (VV.11-12). Whatever our role, whether paid or voluntary, it means tending to the well-being of those we serve with. So, imagine if God were in charge of our neighborhoods and workplaces…