The Empty Breakfast Table on Ashley Down
In 1861, George Müller stood before three hundred orphan children seated at long wooden tables in his Bristol, England orphanage on Ashley Down. The plates were set. The cups were in place. But there was no food and no money to buy any.
Müller bowed his head and prayed aloud: "Dear Father, we thank Thee for what Thou art going to give us to eat."
A knock came at the door. The local baker stood outside, explaining he had been unable to sleep the night before and felt compelled to rise at two in the morning to bake fresh bread for the orphans. Minutes later, a milk cart broke down directly in front of the orphanage, and the driver offered his entire load of fresh milk rather than let it spoil.
Over the course of sixty years, Müller cared for more than ten thousand orphans without ever making a public appeal for funds. He simply prayed and waited. His journals record over fifty thousand specific answers to prayer — each one a testimony that the eyes of the Lord truly rest on those whose hope is in His unfailing love.
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