As Western thinking Christians today, it is a common practice for us when praying before a meal to say, “Lord bless this food to the nourishment of our bodies and our bodies to your service.” Where did this practice of blessing the food before the meal come from and can we find a biblical base for doing it? Some research into the history of this subject provided some interesting answers.
First of all, in the Hebrew Scriptures that Jesus would have grown up on, there is not a single instance in which there is a command to bless the food before a meal. The only passage that would come close to indicating this would be Deuteronomy 8:10, “When you have eaten and are satisfied, bless (praise) the Lord your God for the good land He has given you.” In this verse however, it says to bless, “after the meal” and not before the meal. Also, this verse says to direct the blessing towards God and not the meal itself. Marvin Wilson says, “Unlike the practice of most Western Christians today, in Bible times, the Hebrew people did not see the need to bless food, drink, or other material things. In prayer, they focused only on blessing God, the Creator and Giver.” Why was this the case? Wilson continues, “The ancient Hebrews would have never thought of blessing what they ate. The idea would have been totally foreign to them; it would have been an insult of sorts, to God! If everything that God created was very good (Genesis 1:29-31, and Genesis 9:3-4), why should someone imply that it was unholy and profane and needed to be blessed again by God? The idea that you had to sanctify, cleanse, or purify what God had already said was good would have been foreign to the early Jewish people. To do this would have suggested that food and drink were unacceptable until they were blessed and made holy through prayer.” How then did our practice of blessing the food originate? In all likelihood, this practice has its origins in Greek thought. The Greeks and Gnostics shared the belief that material (physical) things were, by nature, unholy and unclean. Therefore, according to this belief, it was necessary to “make holy” the things that were of this world.
You could point out that there are several examples in the new Testament of Jesus giving a blessing at meal time. For example, in Matthew 14:19 it says, “He gave thanks and broke the loaves.” Also, in Matthew 26:26 it says, “While they were eating, Jesus took bread, gave thanks and broke it.” Almost every Bible scholar agrees that the “thanks” or “blessing” that Jesus would have given at these meals would have been the b’rakhah (blessing, benediction) that Jews have said for over two thousand years before meals. Jesus would have said, “Barukh attah, Adonai Eloheynu, melekh-ha’olam, haMotzi lecheem, minha’aretz”, or in English, “Blessed are you O lord, our God, King of the Universe, who brings forth bread from the earth.” In this age-old prayer that Jesus would have recited, again God is the one being blessed and not the food.
What does this short study tell us? Let’s not bless the food since food is already one of God’s blessings to us. Instead, let us bless God for providing our daily bread for us! We should express our gratitude and thanks to God who provides all our needs, including our need for food. By blessing God and thanking Him for our food, it will help us to focus on God and to thank Him in every area of our life. As Paul says in Colossians 3:17, “Whatever you do in word or deed, do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through Him.”
Note: I gleaned this lesson from the following sources that you may want to look at further. They are:
- Sitting at the Feet of Rabbi Jesus; Spangler and Tverberg-pages 91-99, ”For Everything a Blessing”
- Our Father Abraham; Wilson, pages 177-178, “Where the Church Went Wrong”
- A Continuing Quest; Pryor, pages 205-207,”Why Do We Bless Our Food”
- Jewish New Testament Commentary; Stern, “Notes on Matthew 14:19
About the author:
Bob is the creator of this site and a disciple of Ray Vander Laan. Along with his wife of 50 years, he teaches a Bible study at Christ’s Church in Roswell, NM. He is also an avid hunter and fisher.
Great insights! I support the idea that all food is a blessing from above. Thus, it’s a redundancy to say “Lord, bless this food…” for it’s the same way of saying “Lord bless this blessing…”
1Cor. 10:31 says, “Whether therefore ye eat, or drink, or whatsoever ye do, do all to the glory of God.”
The problem is that some things we call food aren’t food at all.
I once was criticized for not blessing a bag of chips I was eating while the same time I pointed out that person did not bless a bottle of water before drinking. There response was there was no need to bless drink only food. Is this true? Thank you in advance for your reply.
This is true. You blew it big time lol
AMEN AMEN glory be to God thank you for this was very helpful may god bless all the brothers and sisters in Jesus name.
You say “let us bless God”.. I find this an odd expression, especially in light of your earlier reasoning that we shouldn’t bless food because that indicates that it is somehow unclean. Wouldn’t it be better to say “let us thank God”?
That’s exactly what I was thinking.
I totally agree with M Lewis. We should thank the Lord for the blessings he gives us, including food
For a long time I’ve found it strange that we must bless the food or else, what? The food will rot in our stomachs until we get sick? Instead, I chose to believe it is a common ritual that offers more purpose to summon a family to eat together. It is the beginning of the family meal ritual.
I mentioned to my children that I held this opinion and my very orthodox wife immediately told the children that I was wrong and that the purpose of blessing the food was so that the food would be blessed. (That didn’t go over well with me.)
Unfortunately for my wife, she married someone that likes to understand the purpose and history of things. This leads to asking “why” questions and a general rejection of all appeals to antiquity: “We do it for the sake of doing it because people have been doing it since the beginning of time and who are we to question the wisdom of our distant knuckle dragging ancestors?”
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I bless my food and I even go back and thank God after I eat. I find that it’s a way of appreciating a God that feed us rather we believe he’s the one doing it or not. It’s not a ritual or tradition it’s facts in the bible even God bless the food he made for him and his disciples when he blessed it.
Great article. Used it as a basis for my own thoughts. Referenced, of course. Keep up the great content.
Wow. I’ve been saying the “bless and make nourishing” spell my whole life. #blindreligion at its best.
Read Exodus 23:25, and 1 Timothy 4:4-5
Thank you for sharing these
Whe I “bless” my food I simply thank God for the wonderful abundance He has given me. I don’t actually ask Him to “bless” the food because I’ve never seen this done in the Bible.
Luke 24:30
Matthew 14:19
Acts 27:35
Nothing is wrong when we ask God to “bless the food”. We should not make it complicated.
I agree, to not over complicate it. God is a loving, understanding God. When we acknowledge Him through blessing our food, we are blessing God who provides so that we may eat. I believe it is pleasing to Him. Also, in today’s society where our food comes from so many sources that we may not be aware of whether it’s prepared at home or in a restaurant, my family and I are definitely asking God to sanctify and bless the food for the nourishment of our bodies.
Amen.
What about Matthew 26:26, doesn’t that indicate that the Messiah blessed the food before eating it?
No – he gave thanks to God. Remember the question is ‘Why do we Bless our food’. The thinking here is we should Thank God and not Bless food that is already blessed and provided by God.
And to add my 2 cents to the article: Human beings are creatures of habit and it’s a good thing of forming a habit of expressing our gratitude unto God for providing us food while so many are starving.
I believe the purpose of asking God to bless the food is to acknowledge that our bodies are holy and to ask that the food we put into them is sanctified, just as we ask God to sanctify us.
Yes, we always give God thanks. Meal time is no different. Remember all food comes from a seed. Give that some thought. Now look at your authority in Christ. I bless my food in the name of Jesus Christ that what is grown on this earth will give life, health and healing to my body, the temple of the living God.
: Matthew 26:26
Notice that “they were eating already”
Then Jesus took opportunity to share with them that which should happen to him…that his body should be broken for us. The blessing of bread and wine mentioned here is that referred to by the Catholic church as the Eucharist (the miraculous transformation of bread and wine into that of jesus’ literal flesh and blood).
Whether literal or symbolic is not the issue here, the issue is that this blessing of bread and wine is to be a “remembrance of me”‘… an homage to Jesus and a declaration of or faith in his accomplished work. This blessing is not a blessing of food to nourish our bodies. Our food nourishes or bodies whether we bless it or not. Unbelievers get nourished by food with no connection to God at all. This blessing of bread and wine is not a blessing of “simple, common food”. It is a much greater act or event. It is our declaration of faith and acceptance of his revelations as truth. In essence we declare god as our father.
We declare that we can’t reason a better explanation of truth. We believe in God.
Notice that Jesus himself blessed the bread and the cup. And when we pay to bless “the bread and the cup” we ask Jesus to bless it. It is therefore imperative that we understand that this blessing of food is to convert common food into “his flesh and blood” (literal or symbolic).
When we eat beans and rice or hamburgers and French fries we are not partaking of the Lord’s supper.
When Y’SHUA did the Bracha (blessing) it was to The Creator.
If the Hebrew people believe that everything God made is good why do they have the purity laws in Leviticus?
what laws are purity laws in Leviticus?
Jesus was our model of life here on earth, he gave thanks for the food in more places than the one place in the old covenant deut 8:10. Besides we are to always before after and forever give thanks and praise to our Father.
To bless is to confer or invoke divine favor upon. Therefore, we as man simply cannot bless God. Only God dishes out the blessings. We should be thankful for what God has given us, thus.. saying a prayer prior to consuming food.
Let’s take for instance Psalm 34
I will bless the Lord at all times: His praise shall continually be in my mouth.
To bless can also mean:
(especially in Christian church services) call (God) holy; praise (God).
praise · worship · glorify · honour · exalt · adore · pay tribute to · pay homage to · give thanks to · venerate · reverence · hallow · magnify · laud
Growing up as a child we said this pray before all meals whenever, wherever we were eating and drinking and I still say it to this day: For what I am about to receive, may the Lord make me truly thankful, for Christ’s sake. Amen.
KJV Acts 2:46 And they, continuing daily with one accord in the temple, and breaking bread from house to house, did eat their meat with gladness and singleness of heart,
(What I gather from this verse is that the believers in those times got together daily in the temple to pray and then whoever’s turn it was to host the fellowship party, they went to that person’s house and ate and drank with gladness so prayer came before eating. If I’m understanding this wrong, someone please explain. Thanks.)
Good thoughts. But notice that though the verse mentions that the disciples “did eat their meat with gladness and singleness of heart,” or even if it was rendered “thankfulness of heart,” it doesn’t say anything about blessing before or after. So they may or may not have prayed for their food before or after the meal. But all we have is what scripture says, and as a rule we should draw out the meaning based on what it does say, not read into the meaning and say it means something it doesn’t actually say.
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If you read scripture it tells you bluntly put attic God is already blessed ssj God and Jesus are the same Jesus bless the food already every food he made he’s already blessed it read scripture and Ice God to give you a better understanding we should thank God for providing the food because he is the provider the word say give him thanks that he provided the food and the means to have food Amen brother
Am glad for this controversial discussion. I will like to state 3 attitude a Christian or Christians should follow during meal to balance biblical concept.
1. Thank God for your meal.
2. Pray for your meal, speak to your meal to posses healing power and nourishment value cos sometime our food lacks nutrients but via prayers such food will carry virtue to repair warm out cells by faith in us.
3. finally thank God for the food, for many had die while eating but you finished yours by mercy. praise the Lord.❤
I think what people are missing about this topic is that the Bible doesn’t make a clear command that we should “bless our food.” It does say we should do all things in Jesus name, that we should be thankful in all things, that we should give thanks in all things through Jesus, things like these. So it’s not wrong to thank God for your food, or to ask Him to bless your food, or to do it before or after. It would do more help than harm if we went ahead and did both! But let’s not act like the Bible commands one of these specific practices regarding meals. It simply isn’t there in the scriptures.
Jesus did bless and separately give thanks for the loaves and fishes before distributing it. That would not be blessing God, but the actual food. Other than that, Alma said we should pray over ALL things…crops, servants, family, jobs, etc. I’m sure food is included, though not specifically asking a blessing upon it…or to make the food holy. I believe giving thanks for food is something any Christian should do, but asking a blessing upon it (“God, make this food holy, nourishing, stengthening to us, etc…”) is repetitious prayer, redundant, and a ‘cultural’ thing that gives false doctrine creep in the church.
The sole objective of our life is to become holy, ” to be perfect as your heavenly Father is perfect”, to quote Jesus. Since Jesus is The Son, it seems to me obvious that He would render thanks to His Father for all that the Father gave Him, regardless that Jesus is God, co-equal and co-eternal to His Father-Who-is-God.
In the O.T. God made respect of one’s parents a commandment, and giving thanks is one way we show our respect and our love for our parents. Christ is the perfect Son who also taught us that He had not come to demolish the (Mosaic) Law but to bring it to completion; He said not one ‘jot or tittle’ would be removed from the Law. Therefore Christ Himself fulfilled perfectly the 4th commandment at every moment of His life, including giving thanks to God, His (and our) Father, for the gifts given in the natural world, including food and drink at mealtimes.
I think we would all feel that a child who just gorged his food without giving a thought to the parents who put it on the table was rude, insensitive, basically a selfish brute.
In conclusion, the argument about whether to bless and give thanks because food is already one of God’s blessings on us seems to be missing the point. Imitation of Christ, our perfect exemplar, will lead us into greater holiness.
Giving thanks with gratitude is always good. As well as the food being sanctified so you don’t get sick from it! Pray over food or don’t. But for me, in today’s world and what their putting in food, I’ll continue to pray over it!
1Ti 4:3 men who forbid marriage and advocate abstaining from foods which God has created to be gratefully shared in by those who believe and know the truth.
1Ti 4:4 For everything created by God is good, and nothing is to be rejected if it is received with gratitude;
1Ti 4:5 for it is sanctified by means of the word of God and prayer.
Jesus blessed and prayed when he fed the 5000 people he ask the father blessing before he broke the fish and bread
Yes its a good sign of a true heart to be greatful. We should follow Philippians 4.6 all the times. Also Hebrews 10.22 we should always be thankful in all things, and the more so if we are true in heart. Know this we have all grabbed a potato chip or French fry or glass of tea, soda, candy bar, candy..ect in hurry never said thank you God or the cook! Now we need not feel shame for this . God knows you and I and all people everwhere, he knows your heart very well. There is no fooling God, read 1 John 3.18-21. God’s not waiting to pounce on us. Folks its not a good and perfect works thing. Live your new life with joy and thanks giving I have asked the blessing. And given thanks for the food I was about to eat and got sick anyway, that’s ok, still love the Lord, still pray, still like to eat. l bet God knew I needed to get that food up and out for some reason, I may have had a stomach virus that need to go. It’s ok to thank and or bless over food. It’s not ok to get caught up in. Simple things that satin uses to cause distraction or divison. Amen. Stay focused Love God, he LOVES you.
Yes it is signs of a true heart toward God to as much as possible to say the blessing, return thanks , give thanks, you label it the way you like. Know this we have all grabbed a candy bar or glass of tea or soda or some candy , one potato chip, French fry something and not said thank you to GOD or the cook.! God is not even disappointed in us for this he already knows if you live life as a greatiful person or not because he knows us. Please don’t get caught up in a lot of bog with your walk enjoy the new life he’s given you. It’s not a good works thing. I have ask blessings and gave thanks in relation to the food I was about to eat and still got sick. That’s ok still love the Lord’ still ask the blessing still give thanks . The Lord might have known I needed to throw up that how he blessed me . Amen in all things give him glory.
To “bless God” is not odd at all. It is something we should do, no? “Bless the Lord, O my soul, let all that is within me, Bless His Holy Name.” (Ps. 103)
How good it would be if, in addition to saying “God Bless America”, we also would say “America Bless God”.
IT IS WRITTEN,
1 Timothy 4:4-5 NIV
For everything God created is good, and nothing is to be rejected if it is received with thanksgiving,
because it is consecrated by the word of God and prayer.
Philippians 4:6-7 NIV
Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything( this cludes food ) by prayer and petition ,with thanksgiving,present your requests to God.
Exodus 23: 25 NIV
Worship the Lord your God,and His blessings will be on your food and water.I will take away sickness among you.
When I pray for my food and drink ,I always worship,bless and and praise God before I thank God for providing my food and blessings upon the hands that prepared my food and drink, If I prepare my own food then I thank God for the ability and the strength to do it,
Come on folks prayers are deep with God, he already know what you going pray before you even ask Him,
I worship God as soon as I wake up and open my eyes and breathe in God air into my lungs,all day long, it’s called praying unceasingly, if you get big families like I do and many friends and families in Christ, then we praying all the day as God set upon our hearts all those God place in our lives on a daily basis,
Come on folks let’s be real and not legalistic ok.
God said when we don’t know what to say then just open your mouth and The Holy Spirit will speak ,will give you the words,
Believe me, I have studied this lesson on why do we bless our food before we eat our food and what got me was that he said there is no command to bless our food but to bless God not our food, I went deep into study with this, and I came across lots of scriptures but the one I shared here is the ones God wanted me to share and yes I didn’t know what to say ,I prayed and I studied Gods Words not man’s words and The Holy Spirit speaking through me as I open my mouth,
I see and hear so much confusion and division in many of you because you do not know your bible and what God Words says,
I humbly come in the name of Lord Jesus to bless, heal,provide and protect y’all and help y’all to study deep into God Words and not mans words . Man will always fail us ,God never fails us!
God is Mighty ,Merciful and Gracious, Forgiving and Loves us all Unconditionally !!! HALLELUJAH YESHUA!
PRAISE YE THE LORD!
ALL FOR THE GLORY OF GOD!
AGAPE AND SHALOM!
LOVE AND PEACE!
YOUR SISTA IN CHRIST!
HALLELUJAH YESHUA!
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THank you for clarifying this… I have been pondering this saying all week because I was raised saying it that way. So I am glad I have some clarity and insight as to where it actually came from….
I’m suprised of everyone claiming that we should know what our bible says about this topic, not one person mentioned Exodus 32:2.
“And ye shall serve the LORD your God, and he shall bless thy bread, and thy water…”
Many of u talk of things in the law (like blessing food) but u forget the mightier things in it.
Malachi 1:6 says, “A son honors his father, and a slave his master. If I am a father, where is the honor due me? If I am a master, where is the respect due me?” says the LORD Almighty.
Do u serve him?
Be honest
Not in your own way either. Do u serve him? Do u show him honor by serving him “in his church” with your body? Or do u lie to him and yourself and serve him in your own special little way?
Do u offer him pure offerings In honor of his name? (Malachi 1:11).
Or Do u steal from God?
Be honest
Do u rob God in tithes and then turn your prayers into an abomination and ask him to bless your chicken?
Malachi 3;10 says “Bring the full tithe into the storehouse, so that there may be food in My house. Test Me in this,” says the LORD of Hosts. “See if I will not open the floodgates of heaven and pour out for you “blessing” without measure.”
Im a missionary. A servant of Jesus Christ. I woke up this morning for some reason, agitated inside, about how Godless and asleep, lukewarm
so-called Christians ask God to bless their food. So I needed to research this thought.
1. Don’t love the Great Commission or the Great Commandments over the Great Creator!!!
2.Love him with all your heart!!
3. If u do u “will“ love your neighbor
4. U will follow the Great Commission
5. If u want your food blessed do what he blesses.
6. He blesses those who serve him
7. And those who bring their tithes to him
He takes pleasure in offerings yes. But more pleasure in a BODY. THATS YOU. A living sacrifice.
Next time u pray thank the Creator for his creation. (The food.) Ask him, in front of your family, to lead you in paths of righteousness in the name of JESUS. To teach and guide you to follow him. Ask him to help u obey his voice so that he will Bless your food and your water according to his word.
In JESUS name
It’s all about HIM
GOD BLESS
Dear friends,
To serve the Lord requires the wisdom of the Holy Spirit – Now we are blessed (Gen1:28) but it does not mean we were not deviled, that’s why we speak a blessing over a person, to convey or impart.
We imitate Jesus he blessed the bread and gave thanks – the fish and bread multiplied
If you can bless your car, house, children what about your food. God blessed everything during creation -SEED – so are we saying there is no contamination, outbreak such as poisoning due to human error – our faith is not a formality we speak so shall it be – Exodus 32:2 “God says, I will bless” – so what’s wrong with bread and water – did God not bless them in the beginning
Psalms 103:1-2 (KJV) 1 [[[A Psalm] of David.]] Bless the LORD, O my soul: and all that is within me, [bless] his holy name. 2 Bless the LORD, O my soul, and forget not all his benefits:
Pray before eating . 1 timothy 4:4-5
I think the practice and reasons for blessing food stems not from the need for God to bless something before we can consume it. In fact I think it come exactly from the aforementioned passage that all things made by God are good, and if all things are good and made by God, who then are we to take them, to consume them. We are God’s most loved creation, but that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t respect every single other creation, plant and animal alike. When we must take the life of such we ask God to bless the soul of the life he created to sustain us, we thank him for providing us these things instead of barren lands. All things exist to sustain the existence of all things, even we as we return to dust become sustenance for our land. It’s should be out of respect for God’s creation that we ask him to bless again that creation, as he has blessed us with that creation.
It is Good to bless food after Eating as it is evidenced in Deuteronomy 8:10
What a bunch of superstitious fools you all are. How can you believe this Voodoo crap in this day and age?
If u order something from these fast food places u better ask God , allah and Tom cruise to Bless it cause you really don’t know what you’re eating and what these folks are doing to it before it touches your mouth ! Lol
Can an individual bless something or someone without asking the Lord to bless it? For example. is it incorrect to say “I bless this food” instead of Lord bless the food? What authority do we have to bless something without asking God? Thanks