What is the one thing that all 4 gospels record the most? Other than the crucifixion of Jesus. There is the one part of Jesus’ ministry that is emphasised in Matthew, Mark, Luke and John. It's the feeding of the 5,000. While they each emphasize different aspects of Jesus ministry, His teaching and miracles and so on, they all emphasize this one episode. So, what can we draw from this? Clearly, it's important for it to be repeated four times. Interestingly its am part of Jesus ministry where the disciples must help. Jesus deliberately instructs the disciples to participate. The implication is we need to play our part too.

When Jesus looked up and saw a great crowd coming toward him, he said to Philip, “Where shall we buy bread for these people to eat?” He asked this only to test him, for he already had in mind what he was going to do. Philip answered him, “It would take more than half a year’s wages to buy enough bread for each one to have a bite!”

John 6:5-7

Notice that Jesus asks one of the disciples, namely Philip. The gospels tell us that there are 5000 and this is counting the men. So, logically if we assume there are women and children present too there could easily be 10,000 or more people present on this occasion. How would anyone begin to approach this mammoth task? Jesus’ question implies that Philip has to do something about this, he must help with providing a solution. Now, Jesus only asked this to test Philip, so remember God doesn't need information from us. Rather, he is looking for our response. Philip's answer is perfectly logical, he quickly does the math and realises that it will be a huge expense. Now it's a perfectly reasonable answer, but do you think that this is what Jesus was asking? We are exactly the same as Philip, if God asks something of us, we respond with logic.

Another of his disciples, Andrew, Simon Peter’s brother, spoke up, “Here is a boy with five small barley loaves and two small fish, but how far will they go among so many?”

John 6:8-9

Clearly the question was open ended, as others can also answer it. Andrew’s answer is to give a little contribution. It's positive but practically useless, he even admits that this small offering won't go far. Perhaps he feels pressured to be positive but doesn't have the answer. We often feel this way too with God asking things of us. We respond with a token gesture, 'here is my little bit'.

The initial two responses are the one who sees the big picture and doesn't really know how they will meet the need and another disciple who understands he can't meet the need but is willing to give his little bit.

As evening approached, the disciples came to him and said, “This is a remote place, and it’s already getting late. Send the crowds away, so they can go to the villages and buy themselves some food.” Matt. 14:15

Here we see the disciples as a group urging Jesus to send the people away. Yet another logically sound answer, ‘why feed them’? Why bother trying to do something that they obviously can't do. There are thousands of people here, it's too hard so we won't even try to meet this need. Many people come to church to get something for themselves, not to give something to those who can help themselves. In essence, the disciples say, get rid of the problem. But the problem is the people. What's the biggest problem in a school? the kids! What's the biggest problem in a hospital? Sick people! So, let’s get rid of the kids from the school and the sick from the hospital, just send them home, problem solved? The school would be easy for the teachers to manage with no children and the hospital less stressful for nurses with no patients. Likewise, in church we could have the response of preaching to people but then just leaving them to their own devices. Jesus wants to look after these people and the disciples want them to go away and tend to their own needs. They don't want the hassle of meeting the needs of people. What does God want us to do? Does He want us to reach the multitude? What do we do about the massive needs of so many? More need than we can even begin to handle.

The disciples didn't lie, they didn't say anything untrue. Jesus is looking for the disciple’s response, and it's lacking. Do you know that we can actually say no to God by being logical and honest? God will only ever ask us to do things we cannot do. Otherwise, we would not need faith. We need faith when we cannot do it, when we have to trust in God. God asks us to forgive people who don't deserve forgiveness, if we do it by faith we will give God the glory. God only gets glory when we honestly say, we don't know how it happened other than by God. In this way God gets the glory.

Jesus replied, “They do not need to go away. You give them something to eat.” Matt. 14:16

Jesus reply to these genuine reasons from the disciples is to say, ‘you sort it’. Jesus doesn't accept the answer that it is not our responsibility. In contrast, Jesus makes the disciples responsible for this impossible problem. We tend to structure our lives according to our priorities and we choose what we are willing to do for God and what we are not willing to do. God continually breaks into our lives and asks us to do impossible things, and He asks us to commit ourselves in impossible ways. Much like the disciples we tend to respond in the above ways. Like Andrew we can do our little bit but no more. Or like Philip we think I'll be half a year's wages in debt. At some point in our lives Jesus comes to tell us to do something we cannot do. The book of acts is continually asking the impossible of the disciples. A Christian cannot save another person. We know if we even try, they will look at us as if we have 4 heads. Yet by faith God works the miracle in us when we obey.

Jesus gives a command, in essence the command is, 'you are going to do it'. Despite their logical ideas, Jesus ignores their valid excuses and proceeds with his plan anyway.

“Bring them here to me,” he said. Matt. 14:18

The first part of doing anything for God is to come to Jesus. Any act of service, any action, anything God had told you to do starts with coming to God. Firstly, we will probably not understand Jesus' command to us. Secondly, if we do understand it, we have no idea how. Thirdly, we will most likely not do it even if we do hear God, the command will simply seem too great for us.

And he directed the people to sit down on the grass. Taking the five loaves and the two fish and looking up to heaven, he gave thanks and broke the loaves. Then he gave them to the disciples, and the disciples gave them to the people. Matt. 14:19

What does Jesus do, He gives thanks for the problem. One of our biggest problems in our lives, is we want to get rid of the problem. We rarely come to God and thank Him in the midst of the problem. When a problem arises, thank God for the situation that has arisen. James says consider it pure joy when you face trials of many kinds. The testing of our faith produces perseverance. Are we ever happy, ecstatically happy, about any problem that arises, not at all! We read the Bible and consider how profound it is but then ignore these kinds of seemingly impossible commands.

After giving thanks, Jesus gives it to the disciples. After we explain the problem to Jesus, He then prays and gives it straight back to the disciples. We don't want this do we? We want Jesus to take it away. They are back at square one, the disciples are still facing an impossible problem. We want to throw things at Jesus and run off. When Jesus gives it back to them, they must have felt overwhelmed again. Jesus always does this, He gives the problem back to the disciples, to us.

The Bible tells us that this multitude were sat in groups of 50. Jesus now needs the disciples to divide this small loaf between each group of 50. Imagine you’re a disciple with the first group of 50 in front of you. As you are going towards this first group what are you thinking? Are your eyes open or closed? Do you actually think that this is going to work? I don’t think they were looking at the tiny morsel of bread. Did they break of a big piece or a tiny crumb? At what number person did they start to realise Jesus was right. Consider this; after feeding 50 people, you still have to go to the next group of 50 people with the same small piece of bread. Does it get easier when we start walking towards the next group. At what point do we realise God is working? These were ordinary people, they no doubt said things like 'his piece is bigger than mine', 'why did she get more than me', or, 'why did they get it before me'. Don’t forget that the disciples are giving away their own food. Each time the disciples gave it out they were surely thinking, this is less for me, this is less for me, this is less for me etc. Another question might have been ‘at what point do we stop’? At what point have we done enough? With this many people each disciple may have had a thousand people to feed. Imagine how long this would have taken. Let’s apply this to ourselves. What is God leading us into, and what will our response be? How long will we postpone, how long will we say ‘no’ to God. Will our ‘no’ to God be based on a perfectly reasonable assertion? At what point will we obey the impossible command we have been given. Do we even want to obey God? This isn’t easy but nonetheless god asks the impossible of us.

They all ate and were satisfied, and the disciples picked up twelve basketfuls of broken pieces that were left over. Matt. 14:20

God did it, the impossible task was completed. If we will obey God, if we will say ‘yes’ God will do it in us. God is never asked for our reasoned analysis of His command; He is looking for our willingness to obey. And, for those who obey, there will be more leftover at the end that at the beginning.

13/11/24 - Adapted from Pastor Dave's sermon.