Today's readings present us with the story of two different miracles: - the story of Elisha, who in the midst of a famine feeds a hundred men with 20 loaves of barley bread - and the story of Jesus, who when faced with a great crowd of hungry people, over 5000 men, women, and children according to the other gospel accounts of this story, feeds them with five loaves and two fish.
Both stories share certain things in common.
Elisha's servant, on being told to feed the men with the offering brought by the man who came from Baal Shalishah, does not think it possible and complains to the prophet saying: "How can I set this before a hundred men?"
And with Jesus too, as with Elisha, there is a servant, a disciple, who does not think it is possible to feed the people with what is available - the five loaves and two fish offered by the child that Peter's brother, Andrew, had found in the crowd.
And in both stories - despite these small beginnings, the hungry are fed, and there are leftovers - indeed in the story involving Jesus there is an abundance of leftovers - there is more than when the feast first began.
The feeding of the great crowd, as John calls it, is the only miracle that Jesus did that is described in all four gospels. For this reason, if no other, we need to pay close attention to it. We need to ask ourselves - why is this so? What is it about this miracle - unlike all the other miracles performed by Jesus - that so catches the attention of the gospel writers.
I think it has to do with at least three separate things.
The first is the fact that this story tells us that Jesus is used of God - that like Elisha he has God's favour and is able to feed the hungry - much as the people of Israel were fed by God in the wilderness with Manna.
In fact John goes on after the telling of this story to speak of Jesus as the bread of heaven come down to earth - the one who is not only able to satisfy the physical hunger of his people - but their spiritual hunger as well.
Jesus has, and is able to use, the power of God to feed the hungry.
The second thing is that the story shows us not only God's power at work in Jesus, but also God's care. God reaches out through Jesus to meet the needs of those who are following him - much as God reached out through Elisha to meet the needs of the men who had followed him into the wilderness.
Jesus cares for those who seek him out. He wants to meet their needs, and he wants to see their needs met.
The third thing is that the story shows us is that Jesus is able to take what is offered to him and to multiply it - so that where there first seemed not enough ends up being more than enough.
It is this latter point that I want to focus on for the remainder of the sermon.
It has been talked about a lot, this miracle of feeding the great crowd of people, and perhaps more than any other miracle, people have tried to figure out how Jesus did it.
Most people more readily accept the healing stories, they understand that the mind has a strong effect on health, that faith can in fact bring about healing.
But multiplying loaves and fish? This seems more incredible, more difficult, and so theories have arisen to explain how it was done.
The most notable theory is that when the boy who had the loaves and fish shared them with others his example inspired others to bring out what they had brought with them and share as well.
I can't say how it the loaves and the fish multiplied nor do I want to try.
But I do want to stress to you the fact that they do, much as does the offering made to Elisha by the man from Baal Shalishah.
I think that we really need to meditate on that fact. We really need to consider how too little becomes more than enough when it is offered to God.
Recall once again the context of the stories we heard this morning.
Think of the story about Elisha.
A man comes to bring the prophet an offering during a famine in Gilgal - some bread made from the first ripe grain of the season. It was a faith offering, the type recommended by Moses in the Torah.
And Elisha, after receiving the offering, says to his servant "give it to the people to eat". Give it to the hungry ones here with me, feed them, for they need it.
And what does he get in return - what is said to him?
He is told that it is not possible, that there will not be enough to go around.
Let us not doubt that assertion. There was not enough to go round.
In the four gospel stories about the feeding of the great crowd we hear something similar.
Jesus is teaching on a hillside - there are over 5000 people there, and when evening approaches the disciples become concerned, they fear that the crowd will go hungry, and their solution is to ask Jesus to send the crowd away.
But Jesus says to them - you feed them, and he asks Philip - who was from the region in which the story takes place, "where shall we buy bread for these people to eat?"
Philip replies "eight months wages would not buy enough bread to for each one to have a single bite"
Immediately afterwards Andrew, who has found a boy with 5 loaves and two fish among the crowd, pipes up about his discovery - and then adds - "BUT how far will they go among so many."
How far indeed.
The scene is set then for us and for our meditation upon it. There is a great need. And there are not enough resources to meet that need.
It all sounds so familiar doesn't it?
You can hear words like this just about anytime, especially when there are social or political problems that require an infusion of resources.
- How can we help with what little we have? We don't even know how we will
make do ourselves.
- How can we feed so many? How can we fund so many. We have so little and
the need is so great.
- What we can do is only a drop in a bucket. We don't have enough money to
help out. We don't have what it takes.
And we can also hear the same tune about our emotional and spiritual resources when confronted with problems of caring for those who are lost and alone, those caught up in guilt and despair, in doubt and confusion. The chorus goes something like this, doesn't it?
We don't have enough time.
We don't have enough energy.
We aren't smart enough.
We aren't wise enough.
We haven't the training we require.
We aren't professionals.
There aren't enough of us to make a real difference,
there aren't enough of us to get the job done.
But Jesus, like Elisha, didn't listen to this from his disciples, rather, like the prophet, he took that which was offered to him in faith, blessed it, and handed it back to his disciples so that they might distribute it.
Just as Elisha commanded his servant to give the twenty loaves of bread that he had received to the people anyway, saying, "They will eat and have some left over", so Jesus, after giving thanks to God, divided the five loaves and the two fish, and begins to feed the crowd.
And there was enough to go around.
And there were leftovers -
so many that there was more than there was to start with.
What voice do we listen to in these stories?
The voices of the disciples - the servants - who say, when told to feed the crowd - there is not enough - it is impossible.
Or the voice of the one who tells us "feed the people" and who takes what we have to offer and makes it enough?
Mark, Matthew, and Luke all begin their account of the feeding of the great crowd by saying when Jesus saw the crowd he had compassion for them, that he cared for them.
Jesus aks us to do the same - he asks us to care, to have compassion, and to go out into the world, and teach, and heal, and feed the people.
That is part of the great commissioning found at the end of the gospel of Matthew - that portion we so often quote in our baptismal services which says "Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you", and that is part of the commissioning Jesus imparts to Peter just before his ascension saying "Do you love me Peter?" and when Peter says "Yes Lord, you know that I love you.", he says to him "Feed my sheep".
We are called to be like Jesus - - we are called to feed those in need, to feed them with both the bread of heaven and the bread worked upon by human hands.
And we are not left alone in the doing of it. God's power is promised us in it. All we need to do is to do is bring what we have, as did the man of Baal Shalishah to Elisha and as did the boy on the hillside to Jesus.
To bring it with thanksgiving - as Moses commanded. To bring it with joy - as the boy must surely have brought Jesus his meagre offering. To bring it - not with regard to what it might or might not be able to do - but with regard to the one to whom we present it, with regard to God and God's love.
The story of the loaves and the fish show us that Jesus is used of God, that he has the power of God and it shows us too that God cares.
It also shows us that what is small and insignificant in the face of this world's need can, when offered to God, be multiplied and provide for the world what is needed.
Miracles all have beginnings, and almost always those beginnings are to be found within us.
Several years ago I heard the story of a man named Paul.
Paul had received a special pre-Christmas gift from his brother. It was a beautiful new car - fully loaded and ready to go. On Christmas Eve, when Paul came out of his office, a street kid was walking around the shiny new car, admiring it. "Is this your car, mister?", the kid asked. When he replied that it was., and that his brother had given it to him for Christmas, the boy said, "You mean your brother gave it to you, and it didn't cost you anything? Free? For Nothing? Gosh, I wish..."
The boy hesitated, and Paul knew what he was about to say. He had heard it many times over the past few days. He was going to wish he had a brother like that. But what the boy said shocked Paul.
"I wish", the boy said, "I wish I could be a brother like that."
We can be a brother like that. Or a sister like that. All it takes is that we offer ourselves and what we have to God. All it takes is that we cease to worry about how little we have and begin instead to think about what it is that we can offer.
Praise be to God who multiplies that which is given to him, day by day. Amen.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment