Jesus made the crowds welcome and talked to them about the kingdom of God,
And he cured those who were in need of healing.
It was late afternoon when the twelve came to him and said,
Send the people away,
And they can go to the villages and farms round about to find lodging and food,
For we are in a lonely place here.
He replied,
Give them something to eat yourselves.
But they said,
We have no more than five loaves and two fish,
Unless we are to go ourselves and buy food for all these people.
For there were about five thousand men.
But he said to his disciples,
Get them to sit down in parties of about fifty.
They did so,
And made them all sit down.
Then he took the five loaves and the two fish,
Raised his eyes to heaven and set the blessing over them.
Then he broke them and handed them to his disciples to distribute among the crowd.
They all ate as much as they wanted,
And when the scraps remaining were collected,
They filled twelve baskets.
The Gospel of the Lord.
Praise to you,
Lord Jesus Christ.
I think this is one of the most well-known tales in the Bible,
Where Jesus feeds the masses and they all had enough to eat.
Isn't that beautiful?
Isn't that so powerful?
They all had enough to eat.
Let us take a journey and just imagine going there.
We are going to hear Christ.
We are going to see the Lord,
The excitement.
Remember,
In this time,
The Jewish nation was very much oppressed by the Romans.
And yet they had this prophecy of this man who was going to come and save them.
And he came.
Can you imagine being a father,
Hoping for only the best for your child?
Maybe this man,
This man who has been prophesied about,
Maybe he is going to bring the freedom that I deserve,
But that my children deserve,
That I wish for my children.
That excitement,
That hope.
So much so that you gather with five thousand people,
We actually see that it was more than five thousand because they saved five thousand men.
They didn't count the women and the children.
And they all come together to listen,
To find healing,
To connect with God,
To connect with the Saviour.
Now suddenly we are out of food.
Oops.
The trust that they put in Christ overrode a lot of what we could say common scenes.
Christ then turns to his disciples and he says to them,
Feed them.
This is a big lesson in this for us.
These disciples didn't really know what to do.
Maybe we should send them back.
Maybe we should send them out.
Or we have to go and buy food.
Christ doesn't do what is expected.
Christ does the unexpected.
They gather the food that was available out of five thousand people,
Bread and fish.
We see that Jesus doesn't make a fuss.
What does Jesus do?
He raises his eyes up to heaven and he thanks God.
He says the blessing.
And here again we see the almighty power of God because he starts breaking and sharing the food with people,
Sending his disciples out to share in this bounty of God.
Everybody had enough to eat.
Massive lesson in there for the disciples.
Trust God.
Massive lesson in there for us.
Trust God.
Sometimes we feel empty.
We feel that we need to deserve heaven.
We need to work towards getting something from Christ,
Getting something from God.
No.
It's like these five thousand came and they put their trust in God so we too can come.
We can trust God to feed us.
Doesn't mean that sometimes we might not have hunger pangs.
Because I'm sure it took a very,
Very long time to feed those five thousand people.
And some stomachs were growling,
But they were fed and they had more than enough to eat.
That's important.
For me it's really important and it's a message that's coming up more and more that giving over myself to God does not mean that I am not going to go through heartache,
I'm not going to go through challenging times.
Nowhere do we see that we are going to have smooth sailing.
It's not what's promised.
What is promised to us is what we see here.
What promises that we will be fed.
Maybe sometimes we have to wait a bit.
Because what happens if I eat something that's not properly done?
It might be dangerous,
But not.
So in the right time I will get my food.
And I know it sounds pie in the sky and it sounds like a cop-out,
Another priestly cop-out.
Yes,
Someday it will happen,
But it's true.
What would have happened to those people if they had not gone to receive the message of Christ,
The blessings of Christ?
I don't know.
But what I do know is that their lives would have been so much poorer for it if they had not trusted in Christ.
Many people these days live lives separated from the divinity of God.
Different reasons.
Many were hurt by their religious institutions.
Many were very hurt.
Many were kicked out for asking questions,
For being different,
For not experiencing God like their community.
And my heart breaks for those who purposefully shut God out of their lives.
Because it is a difficult,
Difficult life not having something to believe in.
We believe in the expression of God of the Christian,
Of Christ who came to teach us unconditional love.
Not that we always live it,
But we try as much as possible.
This week I would like to ask everybody to spend quiet time with God.
Bring your hunger to the Lord.
The hunger of maybe loneliness.
The hunger for healing.
The hunger for peace.
The hunger for gainful employment.
The hunger for forgiveness.
And when we take this hunger to the Lord,
I believe somehow,
Just like these five thousand men,
We will be given enough to satisfy us.
Amen.
Amen.
