“You give them something to eat,” Jesus demands of his disciples when the hour is late and the 5,000 men plus women and children…so around 25,000 people… become hungry.
“You give them something to eat.”
I worked at a hospital as a chaplain for a summer, and I remember a sweltering day when a couple of women came into the office and asked for the chaplain on duty.
“How can I help you?” I asked, noticing that one of the women was barefoot.
“We jumped into the car when we heard our sister was sick and drove right up,” they began their story. “We weren’t thinking. We didn’t grab our purses, and I didn’t even think to grab my shoes. Now we are here, 200 miles from home with no money for gas or food, no money for a hotel, and I can’t even buy a cheap pair of flip flops. Can you help us?”
You have to understand that the hospital had given no money to the chaplaincy department for such things, and what I got paid as a chaplain for the entire summer was in the low hundreds of dollars, not the thousands. Thoughts of how stupid these women could possibly be raced through my head.
“Why is your stupidity my emergency?” I pondered, staring at the bare feet on the invisibly germ infested hospital floor.
“How much intelligence do you need to at least put on a pair of shoes before you embark on a journey of over 200 miles?"
Maybe it was all a scam for some drug cash?” I thought.
Yet, the command from Jesus echoed through my head, “You give them something to eat.”
Here’s the thing: about 25,000 people were so enamored by and in need of Jesus that they followed him far into a deserted place without even considering bringing what they would need once they got there. There were 25,000 stupid people.
And, on top of that, if you consider that 2.5 percent on average of a population has a prison history, that means that 625 of those people are probably criminals of some sort.
.5 percent, or 125 of those people are probably just plain old beggars who do not even want to try to work.
And, 1 percent, so 125 of those people, are most likely immoral prostitutes who have simply hitched a ride to make a profit off of the crowd.
So, there is all of that to consider before any help should be given. Maybe, the disciples needed an intake form to sort it all out. Forget that. You know hat would be easiest? How about the disciples just send them all into town to buy some food for themselves? That way they are not morally culpable for helping sinners.
Yet, even with all of that, Jesus demands, “You give them something to eat.”
That sounds great and noble Jesus, but there is the simple reality that we are just not enough. The world is huge. The hurt and need is huge. And, we are just little.
I only had a few hundred dollars to live on for the entire summer, the disciples only had 5 loaves and 2 fish, and we just are not enough to even make a dent in all the pain in the world. We simply are not.
It is not out of a sense of cruelty that we turn them away, it is just plain logic. The 5 loaves of bread and 2 fish (that we wisely packed for ourselves I should note) just is not enough. So, why even try?
Yet, Jesus demands, “You give them something to eat.”
Here’s the thing: none of these excuses matter. When Jesus looks at someone, he does not see a stupid idiot, or a criminal, or a societal leach, or a prostitute. He sees a brother or sister who God molded and shaped, as if from soft clay, with God’s very hands. When Jesus looks at the crowds, he sees siblings in need.
Speaking of siblings, my younger brother could be an idiot sometimes. Once we went on a trip out west on vacation, but before we went my parents gave us a list of things to pack that definitely included underwear. It was listed three separate times, just in case we might have missed it. But, as we traveled and the inevitable stomach cramps hit my younger brother, guess what he did not have. His underwear of course!
Now you tell me; when he had nothing to change into after the underwear blowout, did our parents just say to him, “You were supposed to pack them. Tough luck kid!”? Of course, not!
After the required scolding, they had compassion and bought the underwear, not because he deserved it, but because he needed it.
That is the way God is. Jesus has compassion on us, not because we deserve it, but because we need it.
We need Jesus’ grace. We need Jesus’ mercy. We need to be saved from ourselves. We need the new life that comes after crosses and death. We need second chances. And, sometimes we simply need something to eat.
“You give them something to eat.”
There is still the notion that we do not have enough and that we are not enough.
“Jesus, I hear you. I am the one who has been given the job to feed. I hear you. But, that still does not help the fact that I only have 5 loaves and two fish. It does not help the fact that I am only me and we together here are only we. I am not enough. We are not enough.”
To that notion, Jesus said, "’Give the little bit that you have to me.’ Then he ordered the crowds to sit down on the grass. Taking the five loaves and the two fish, he looked up to heaven, and blessed and broke the loaves, and gave them to the disciples, and the disciples gave them to the crowds. And all ate and were filled; and they took up what was left over of the broken pieces, twelve baskets full. And those who ate were about five thousand men, besides women and children.”
“Give the little bit that you have to me,” Jesus says to us.
And, so I did. I reached in my wallet metaphorically, gave the two women a meal in the cafeteria, paid for their gas, and even gave a few dollars for some cheap flip-flops. It was not much, but it was enough. And, minutes later I got a call from a friend that he wanted to take a group of us out to lunch. His treat.
I am not saying that the phone call was a miracle just for me. It was probably just a coincidence that would have happened anyway. But, I am saying that Jesus provides enough.
We may not trust that we…our lowly selves…can make a difference, but Jesus provides enough. We may not think that our little churches…our little Christian communities...can make an impact on anything, but Jesus provides enough.
When we give it over to Jesus to bless and share, there will be enough.
I know, that trust thing is hard. I am certain that the disciples felt inadequate and a little crazy as they took their baskets of bread and fish scraps around to the people. But, they did because Jesus said they should. And, with Jesus, there was enough.
You see, where we and the disciples see limitations, Jesus sees possibilities. Jesus takes what there is, gives thanks, and then trusts that God will make it enough. His compassion allows him to never lose hope for anyone.
So, you too should not lose hope because Jesus will take what you have, give thanks for it, and make it more than enough. You are more than enough because of God.
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