Sunday 08/03/14 Freeville/Homer Ave
UMC’s
Sermon Title: “Five loaves and two fish”
Old Testament Scripture Lesson: Psalm 17:1-7, 15
New Testament Scripture Lesson: Romans 9:1-5
Gospel Lesson: Mathew 14:13-21
Today is the Eighth Sunday after the
Feast of Pentecost. Pentecost was the day that the Holy Spirit moved liked a
mighty wind so many years ago. That the Apostles and the early Christians spoke
in tongues, and that the Christian Church was officially born.
This morning though, we are going to
talk about a miracle that Mathew recorded in his gospel. This miracle was that
Jesus Christ, took five barley loaves of bread, and two fish, and from those he
fed five-thousand people. It is important to remember though, that the “five-thousand”
that Mathew accounts for in his gospel, includes only the five-thousand men
that were present, as these five-thousand men also had their families with
them.
Due to this, this miracle that Jesus
performed was probably more like feeding twenty-thousand, or thirty-thousand,
or perhaps much more. It is estimated that the population of Palestine at this
time was about five-hundred thousand people. As a result of this, Jesus could
have feed as much as one-tenth of the population of Palestine with this single
miracle. This miracle is also known as “Feeding the multitude.” In addition to
this, this is the only miracle other than Jesus Christ’s resurrection narrative
itself that is listed in all four of the Gospels. So if Mathew, Mark, Luke, and
John, all wrote about the resurrection, and all wrote about the feeding of the
five-thousand, then they both must be important.
Within this then, what makes Jesus
more than just a mere prophet, like the ones in the Old Testament, was his
ability through God the Father, to do miraculous things. Often times though,
Jesus performed his miracles, to show us compassion and love, but he also performed
them so that we would believe in who he was, and who he still is. When Jesus
raised Lazarus from the dead, he said in John’s gospel 11:41-42 “Father, I thank you for having heard
me. I knew
that you always hear me, but I have said this for the sake of the crowd
standing here, so that they may believe that you sent me.” Then in John 11:43
is says, “When he had said this,
he cried with a loud voice, “Lazarus, come out!” Lazarus then came out
of his tomb alive.
While Jesus Christ took great joy in
healing, feeding, and serving, really what he wanted from his followers then, was
faith. In this story of raising Lazarus from the dead, he wanted the people to
have faith. For Jesus so often in the gospels said to those who were sick or
troubled, “Go, your faith has made you well.” In all these ways, Jesus was no
mere Isaiah, or Jeremiah, or Ezekiel, rather he was much more than a prophet
from the Old Testament. Jesus was and is the Messiah. Jesus was the living God
on earth, and he is now seated at the right hand of almighty God.
In this way, Jesus doesn’t just
perform a miracle of feeding many, simply because they are hungry. He does it
because they are hungry, and because he wants them to believe in who he is. You
see miracles grow faith, and Jesus Christ wanted to grow the faith of his
disciples and his followers that night. In addition to this, Jesus tried to embolden
his followers, telling them to feed the crowd themselves. Yet they felt that
they were not able to do so.
So today we look at something very
simple, five-barley loaves of bread and two fish. Not exactly a culinary meal
that you would watch being prepared on the “Food Network,” or on television
show “Iron Chef.” In this way, on this night so long ago, what Jesus used to
feed everyone, was common food. Perhaps it was the peanut butter and jelly of
the day, or the hotdogs of the day.
You see so often Jesus took something
common like loaves of bread and fish, and did something miraculous. Did
something that no one thought was possible, and Jesus challenges all of us who
may feel common to take the normalness we have and do the extraordinary for
Him.
So while I believe that what happened
that night was miracle, some say, “Well Paul it is certainly an inspiring story
anyway.”
When I used to work as a social
worker and then a tutor in Ithaca, I had many interactions with the Episcopal
Church’s ministry, of “Loaves and Fishes.” In fact, one day I remember talking
to a man about how I believed what Jesus did that night was a great miracle,
yet he believed it was only inspiring story, with no miracle. I then told him, “Well
whatever we believe it to be, it has moved us enough to feed these people here
today.”
For when we “break bread” together,
we are united. In many cultures one of the highest honors one can receive is to
be invited to dine with a family in their home, at their table. Jesus wanted to
take these total strangers, and be united with them. In the same way this
morning, we will take the common things of bread and juice, and we will call upon
the Lord to unite us together, and to spiritually feed us.
So whether we say the loaves and fish
was a real miracle or just a story, can we deny that it was and still is
transformative? While I believe that this miracle literally happened, the man I
talked to Ithaca did not believe that this story actually happened. Yet the
story still changed him, and it still changed me.
So if we took five loaves of bread
and two fish today, and if we lifted those loaves and fish to God, would God
transform that into a great feast? While I believe God can do all things, part
of what Jesus was showing us that night I think, is that while God can perform
miracles, often God uses us to be the miracles. Sometimes when things are dark
and gloomy, God sends you to help, or me to help, or you to help.
I have heard so many stories of
grandmas seeing virtually empty kitchen cupboards with a large family in the
house, yet with the little that they had, they found a way to “whip up” a
miraculous feast.
You see part of what Jesus was
showing us that night, is that if we trust him, and if we come together, he can
use us to do miraculous things. We can feed the multitude, we can transform the
world, and we don’t have to wait for the five loaves and fish to multiply in
front of us to do it! We can do it right now!
We have everything we need in the
here and now to feed the hungry, to cloth the poor, and we as God’s people can
come together, and we collectively can feed millions. I would like to think
that Jesus would smile and say to us, “Well, I only fed a small crowd, as I wanted
to show you what you can do through me.”
So Jesus tells us, through me you can
do all things. Sometimes the miracle will come to you, but often the miracle
occurs amongst us, and through us. It never ceases to amaze me what food pantries
do weekly, bi-weekly, or monthly. Now if we asked one person to cover all the
costs and needed food items for a food pantry, they would likely not be able to
afford it. Together though, when we pool our resources, when we get a little
here, and a little there, and we often have more than enough. Sometimes we even
have “twelve baskets full” left over don’t we?
So to me, I think Jesus wants to know
here this morning, do we have faith? Do we believe we can “make disciples of
Jesus Christ, for the transformation of the world?” As our resident Bishop Mark
Webb of our Upper New York Annual Conference said at our recent annual
conference in May, “We serve a God of Good News, not a God of Bad News.” In
Jesus Christ, we can have forgiveness, transformation, renewal, and together we
can transform the world. Do we truly believe that?
In the Apostle Paul’s Epistle or
Letter to the church in Rome this morning, the Apostle Paul says, I have “unceasing
anguish in my heart.” He says this, because much of his friends and family in
Israel do not believe in Jesus. Likewise, it is possible that many of our friends
and family don’t believe in Jesus. Yet for those of us who have been
transformed by Jesus Christ, by the Holy Spirit, we know who he is. When we have
friends and family whom we know don’t we believe that are angry, depressed, or
feel hopeless, don’t we just want to tell them that there is hope? In this way
our faith is about much more than just the cross and the empty tomb. While
these are the cornerstones of what we believe, there is so much more to our
Christian faith.
In looking at the gospel reading from
this morning, Mathew writes, that Jesus withdrew in a boat to a deserted place
by himself. How many of you have had days that you wish that you withdraw in a
boat to a deserted place by yourself?
Yet the crowds followed and waited.
When Jesus saw the masses, “he had compassion for them and cured their sick.” The
evening comes, and the disciples are concerned about all of these people
needing to eat dinner. They recommend that Jesus send the people away to find
food, but Jesus tells his disciples, “”They need not go away; you give them
something to eat.” The disciples then did not have confidence in what Jesus
said, for their faith right then was very thin. Jesus then took the five barley
loaves of bread and the two fish they had, and she showed them what his gospel was
all about. Showed them what real faith is. Then he had his disciples feed the
people themselves, with twelve baskets. Twelve disciples, twelve baskets, and
at the end, twelve full baskets were left over.
I would hope that the disciples and
the rest of the people that day, had a little more faith after they had eaten
dinner that night.
I would like to close this message this
morning with a story. This story is called “Mr. Jones’ Missed Blessings.” Here
is how it goes: “Have you heard the story about Mr. Jones, who dies and goes to
heaven? When he arrives, St. Peter is waiting at the Pearly Gates and takes Mr.
Jones on a tour of heaven. Mr. Jones is awestruck. The streets are paved with
gold, beautiful mansions glisten in the sunshine, choirs of angels sing the
most beautiful songs.”
“Partway through his tour of heaven
Mr. Jones’ eye is drawn to an odd looking building, an enormous warehouse with
no windows and just one door. What an odd structure for heaven! “You don’t
really want to see what’s in there” says St. Peter.”
“But I do, I do” says Mr. Jones. He
races across the lawn and pushes open the door to discover rows and rows of
shelves, floor to ceiling. Stacked on the shelves are thousands of white boxes.
The boxes all have names on them.”
“Is there one with my name on it?”
asks Mr. Jones as he rushes to the J aisle. He finds the box with his name on
it and opens it up. His mouth drops, his pulse quickens, and finally he says to
Peter, “What are all these wonderful things inside my box? Are they the good
things in store for me now I’ve reached heaven?”
“No” replies St. Peter. “They’re all
the blessings God wanted to give you while you were alive on earth, but which
you never received.”
“A sad look came over Mr. Jones. He
looked into the box, to St. Peter and then back to the box. “Why?” he asked St.
Peter. “Why did I miss out on all these blessings?” “Well, that’s a long
story…” replied St. Peter.”
So brothers and sisters, what is the
measure of our faith in Jesus Christ? Is it simply just believing to see heaven
one day, or do we trust that God can take the ordinary things in our lives, our
own loaves and fish, and use them to change the world? Brothers and sisters,
this day allow the Lord to use you to change the world, one person at a time.
Amen and hallelujah!
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