SPEAKER_00: Well, our gospel reading today comes from Matthew chapter 14, verses thirteen to twenty one.
SPEAKER_00: And I invite you to hear now the word of the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: Now, when Jesus heard this, he withdrew from there in a boat to a deserted place by himself.
SPEAKER_00: But when the crowds heard it, they followed him on foot from the towns.
SPEAKER_00: When he went ashore, he saw a great crowd, and he had compassion for them and cured their sick.
SPEAKER_00: When it was evening, the disciples came to him and said, This is a deserted place, and the hour is now late.
SPEAKER_00: Send the crowds away so that they may go into the villages and buy food for themselves.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus said to them, They need not go away.
SPEAKER_00: You give them something to eat.
SPEAKER_00: They replied, We have nothing here but five loaves and two fish.
SPEAKER_00: And he said, Bring them here to me.
SPEAKER_00: Then he ordered the crowds to sit down on the grass.
SPEAKER_00: 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.
SPEAKER_00: And the disciples gave them to the crowds, and all ate and were filled.
SPEAKER_00: And they took up what was left over of the broken pieces, twelve baskets full.
SPEAKER_00: And those who ate were about five thousand men, besides women and children.
SPEAKER_00: This is the word of God for us, the people of God.
SPEAKER_00: Let us pray.
SPEAKER_00: Oh Lord, we ask that you would speak to us through these scriptures, that you would encourage us and challenge us and inspire us to offer the little we have that you might work your wonders in the world around us.
SPEAKER_00: In Christ's name we pray.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.
SPEAKER_00: In college, I worshiped and volunteered at an inner city church in Tallahassee, Florida, that was particularly focused on caring for the poor and the marginalized within the city.
SPEAKER_00: And as someone who grew up in a stable home with ample food and security, those years were eye-opening for me.
SPEAKER_00: It wasn't just the shock of seeing food and security up close, of seeing how difficult life can be for the working poor.
SPEAKER_00: It was also eye-opening to me to see the depths of their faith and generosity.
SPEAKER_00: There was a woman in the church who we'll just call Mama Z.
SPEAKER_00: And Mama Z was a faith leader in that church.
SPEAKER_00: She sang in the praise band.
SPEAKER_00: She would talk to the people after service.
SPEAKER_00: She listened to their struggles.
SPEAKER_00: She just shone with the light of Christ.
SPEAKER_00: She was a single mom of two, working hard to provide food and safety and stability for her daughters.
SPEAKER_00: And I admired her immensely for all of these reasons.
SPEAKER_00: And then I learned about what she did in her free time.
SPEAKER_00: Because twice a week, Mama Z would make as much chili or soup as her budget would afford in as many crock pots as she could borrow.
SPEAKER_00: And she'd make giant platters of homemade cornbread, and she'd towed it all to a park where many of the hungry in the city congregated, and she'd set it up at the same picnic pavilion.
SPEAKER_00: And everyone knew that if you showed up hungry, Mama Z would hand you a bowl of something delicious.
SPEAKER_00: No questions asked.
SPEAKER_00: I was so intrigued when I heard of this ministry she did.
SPEAKER_00: So I visited once to see how it all worked, and I was amazed at how many people she could feed.
SPEAKER_00: The food did not run out.
SPEAKER_00: There was always miraculously enough.
SPEAKER_00: But I watched in awe as I realized she was doing so much more than just providing a nutritious meal because she knew them all by name.
SPEAKER_00: She knew their stories.
SPEAKER_00: She would listen to them.
SPEAKER_00: She would pray for them.
SPEAKER_00: She cared about them.
SPEAKER_00: Now, Mama Z had a lot stacked against her.
SPEAKER_00: There was a lot going on in her life that she could have complained about, that she could have been bitter about.
SPEAKER_00: There was a lot that could have made her feel so helpless.
SPEAKER_00: No one would falter if she just threw up her hands in despair.
SPEAKER_00: But instead, being the saint of God that she was, Mama Z approached the world like a caring shepherd to a wandering, weary flock.
SPEAKER_00: One might describe Jesus as a caring shepherd before a wandering flock in this story from Matthew, the feeding of the 5,000.
SPEAKER_00: If you listen closely, you can hear echoes of Psalm 23 in the account of the feeding of the 5,000.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus makes them sit in green pastures.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus restores their souls.
SPEAKER_00: He feeds them and nourishes them and cares for them as a shepherd cares for sheep.
SPEAKER_00: This miracle, the feeding of the multitudes, is the only miracle that is recorded in all four Gospels.
SPEAKER_00: It was a pivotal moment in Jesus' ministry, and I could preach four separate sermons about this story, but today I want to begin by focusing on something you may not have considered, and that is the context of this miracle recorded in Matthew.
SPEAKER_00: Because immediately preceding this story is the story narrating the death of John the Baptist.
SPEAKER_00: Now, John the Baptist was a beloved and popular teacher among the Jewish folks of that day.
SPEAKER_00: He was beloved to Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: John the Baptist baptized Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: And what happened was John was imprisoned by Herod, who was the ruler Rome had put in place over that region.
SPEAKER_00: And Herod was throwing a big banquet, a big feast.
SPEAKER_00: And one of the guests at that banquet connived and schemed until Herod had to promise to kill John the Baptist.
SPEAKER_00: And so John is unceremoniously beheaded, and grief settles across the land at his unexpected death.
SPEAKER_00: Upon hearing the news, Jesus set out by himself into a wilderness place, as he often did when he wanted to be alone.
SPEAKER_00: He set out for prayer and solitude, probably to grieve in his own way.
SPEAKER_00: But the crowds of people who heard so much about Jesus, who were so distraught over the death of their beloved John the Baptist, they followed Jesus into the wilderness and sought him out.
SPEAKER_00: The multitudes gathered around Jesus, and this was a gathering of grief and helplessness.
SPEAKER_00: What were they to do now?
SPEAKER_00: Who would teach them?
SPEAKER_00: Who would lead them now?
SPEAKER_00: And surely there was also anger in the crowd at the at the violence that was that was um fell upon John the Baptist.
SPEAKER_00: There was also probably this fear of the violence that could be imposed upon any of them.
SPEAKER_00: And so they were there looking to Jesus for what?
SPEAKER_00: For comfort?
SPEAKER_00: For direction?
SPEAKER_00: Should they revolt?
SPEAKER_00: Maybe they were looking to Jesus to lead them through this valley of the shadow of death.
SPEAKER_00: And like Mama Z, Jesus looked out upon this multitude of people with compassion as a shepherd looks upon a beleaguered flock.
SPEAKER_00: And notice that Jesus didn't stir them up for revolt.
SPEAKER_00: Rather, Jesus healed the sick and he blessed the suffering and he cared for hurting bodies and souls.
SPEAKER_00: And then when evening came, Jesus was still caring for the masses of hurting people when the disciples pulled him to the side and tried to convince him to dismiss the people, to let them go and find dinner for themselves.
SPEAKER_00: And when you think about this story from the perspective of disciples, you can understand why they would want to dismiss the people as night fell.
SPEAKER_00: These disciples were likely heartbroken over John's death as well.
SPEAKER_00: Some of them had been John's disciples before they were Jesus's disciples.
SPEAKER_00: Some of them might have hoped that Jesus would use this moment to garner support to overthrow their Roman occupiers once and for all.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, Jesus had an army of 5,000 men in front of him who were hurting and angry, but the day slipped away.
SPEAKER_00: And all Jesus did was comfort and heal and pray.
SPEAKER_00: Surely to some of the disciples, this wasn't enough.
SPEAKER_00: Surely this wasn't the big statement they wanted Jesus to make in light of the injustice of John's death.
SPEAKER_00: And then when they tried to tell Jesus to send the people away so they could all figure out dinner, Jesus did something even more surprising.
SPEAKER_00: He turned to his disciples and he said, They don't need to go away.
SPEAKER_00: You feed them.
SPEAKER_00: All day long the disciples had been bystanders watching Jesus work his miracles, and now Jesus gives them an impossible task.
SPEAKER_00: You feed them.
SPEAKER_00: How are they supposed to do that?
SPEAKER_00: There were no supermarkets in those days.
SPEAKER_00: There were no Costco platters or$5 rotisserie chickens.
SPEAKER_00: They were in the desert.
SPEAKER_00: They were surrounded by nothing, and all they had was a measly amount of food that wouldn't even satisfy Jesus and his 12 disciples.
SPEAKER_00: They said, We have nothing but five loaves and two fish.
SPEAKER_00: And they knew that that was it.
SPEAKER_00: If they gave this away, they would all be hungry that night.
SPEAKER_00: And surely none of this sat well with the disciples, but Jesus wasn't swayed.
SPEAKER_00: He meant what he said.
SPEAKER_00: You feed them.
SPEAKER_00: You know that feeling of overwhelm you get when you are staring at a problem that seems too big to solve.
SPEAKER_00: I remember the first time I experienced this feeling, I was a child, and my parents told me to clean my room.
SPEAKER_00: Any parents out there can understand this feeling.
SPEAKER_00: It was so messy, and as a child, I tried to like stuff it in the closet before, but they always caught that.
SPEAKER_00: And so I remember sitting in this room and just feeling so overwhelmed and not knowing where to begin.
SPEAKER_00: And so I just sat there and fought them and pouted until my mom told me to just start somewhere.
SPEAKER_00: The start somewhere in this miracle is the five loaves and the two fish.
SPEAKER_00: And I can imagine the disciples felt so overwhelmed.
SPEAKER_00: I imagine they felt how we feel when we consider a weighty problem that just feels out of our control.
SPEAKER_00: Or when we catch up on the news and read about wars and wildfires and suffering beyond our reach.
SPEAKER_00: Have you ever considered that we are probably the most informed people ever, with 24-7 news that tells us everything happening across the globe?
SPEAKER_00: But we also might feel more helpless than ever because so much feels so far out of our grasp.
SPEAKER_00: That's how I imagine the disciples felt as they scanned the multitudes and took stock of their meager loaves and fish.
SPEAKER_00: But Jesus had compassion on them too.
SPEAKER_00: He helped them out by giving them their somewhere to start.
SPEAKER_00: He said, Bring the food to me.
SPEAKER_00: And then he had the crowds sit down, and he took the food and he blessed it, and he broke the bread and he gave it to the disciples, who then turned around and distributed it to the crowds.
SPEAKER_00: And like Mama Z's pot of chili, it never ran out.
SPEAKER_00: Now there are two details in this story that I want to make sure you notice.
SPEAKER_00: The first is that Jesus used the disciples' food to feed the multitudes.
SPEAKER_00: He didn't make bread appear out of nowhere.
SPEAKER_00: He didn't snap his fingers and produce two perfectly filleted fish.
SPEAKER_00: He used the small amount of food that the disciples possessed, and he miraculously stretched it and expanded it so that it was enough for everyone gathered.
SPEAKER_00: And the second detail to notice is like the first: Jesus didn't feed the people himself, he fed the disciples, who then fed the crowds.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus was the power source for the miracle, but the disciples were the ones who executed it.
SPEAKER_00: They are the ones who actually passed bread from hand to hand and never ran out.
SPEAKER_00: As Jesus' disciples, we must remember these two important details of the story.
SPEAKER_00: For no matter how wealthy or poor we are, no matter how successful or not we are, no matter how confident or uneasy we are, we will run into situations that we feel ill-equipped to handle.
SPEAKER_00: There will be times when we doubt that we are enough, that we have enough to offer to make any kind of a difference.
SPEAKER_00: And likewise, there are times when we just want God to fix something.
SPEAKER_00: And all we want is for God to fix it and for us to have no part of the miracle.
SPEAKER_00: We want God to intervene to solve that problem or to change that person's heart or to fix that global crisis.
SPEAKER_00: So we go to God in prayer and we say, God, such and such is really on my heart.
SPEAKER_00: Will you please fix it?
SPEAKER_00: But rarely do we listen for God's response that probably sounds something like, you give them something to eat.
SPEAKER_00: And like the disciples, when we hear that commandment, we balk.
SPEAKER_00: Who am I?
SPEAKER_00: I don't have the skills or the power or the money or the influence to do anything about this.
SPEAKER_00: I only have five loaves and two fish.
SPEAKER_00: What's that compared to a problem so big?
SPEAKER_00: And perhaps God's response might be just start somewhere.
SPEAKER_00: A couple of summers ago, I traveled to Kenya with a program called Zoe Empowers.
SPEAKER_00: And you may be familiar with this program because North Raleigh UMC has been a supporter of Zoe for a while.
SPEAKER_00: Zoe is an empowerment model of ministry that goes into the poorest of the poor regions in places like Kenya, and it finds teenage orphans who are responsible for their younger siblings.
SPEAKER_00: These families usually have only one meal a day, if that, and it's nothing really nutritious.
SPEAKER_00: Sometimes they have a place to stay that their parents left behind in their death, but sometimes they don't.
SPEAKER_00: The kids and these families have no hope, no future to plan for.
SPEAKER_00: But when they enroll in the Zoe program, they begin this three-year process of learning how to become self-sustaining, how to pull themselves out of poverty.
SPEAKER_00: The Zoe teens first start by learning farming techniques so they can farm their land.
SPEAKER_00: They learn about their governmental rights, and then they get to select a business in which they are a trained, a profession.
SPEAKER_00: And after they are trained, they are giving startup money and coaching support so that they can start their own business.
SPEAKER_00: I could talk for hours about Zoe, so if you want to talk more about this, let me know and I'd be happy to talk with you.
SPEAKER_00: But for now, let me summarize by saying: after three years, the majority of Zoe teenagers are running successful businesses.
SPEAKER_00: They're living in stable housing.
SPEAKER_00: They're eating three meals a day and feeding their families.
SPEAKER_00: They're even making enough money to pay the required fees they need to put their siblings through school, a luxury they never had themselves.
SPEAKER_00: It was remarkable to hear their stories, to see their homes, to visit their businesses, to see remarkable things God was doing in them and through them.
SPEAKER_00: And I'll never forget the moment we were sitting in a church in a small little village with a group of Zoe teens who were about to finish their third and final year of the program.
SPEAKER_00: Most of them were absolutely thriving.
SPEAKER_00: They selected a representative to tell us his story.
SPEAKER_00: And so he stood up in front of us, and with the translator's help, he told us a tale of heartbreak and loss and hunger and housing insecurity, a tale that broke our hearts.
SPEAKER_00: And then he told us about the journey that got him to where he was then, the starting small, with just the small plot of land his parents left them.
SPEAKER_00: That small farm produced enough to then buy chickens, which produced enough to buy goats, which produced enough to expand his business into a market, which produced enough to expand his house, and so on and so on.
SPEAKER_00: And then he talked about how he employs other orphans in the village.
SPEAKER_00: Kids who were in the same position he was in just a couple of years before.
SPEAKER_00: How he was paying whatever little amount he could from his prophet to give them a good wage so that they could share in the resources and he would share with them the little knowledge that he had gained through the Zoe program.
SPEAKER_00: And all of us American visitors were so touched by his paying it forward approach, and we applauded his efforts and thought, what a special guy, what a unique way for him to offer love to the world.
SPEAKER_00: But the translator looked at us and smiled a knowing smile and turned to the 24 other Zoe teens who had not stood up to speak and asked, how many of them employ or house or feed orphans in their village?
SPEAKER_00: All of them raised their hands.
SPEAKER_00: All of them.
SPEAKER_00: All of them were sharing the five loaves and the two fish they had, and the collective impact was breathtaking.
SPEAKER_00: When I thought of the thousands of Zoe graduates across Kenya, across the world, and the thousands of lives that had been transformed by these kids, five loaves and two fish, I was humbled.
SPEAKER_00: Because making big changes doesn't require big acts.
SPEAKER_00: The Zoe kids made this parable or this story, this miracle come alive for me.
SPEAKER_00: It made the lesson of this feeding of the five thousand come alive for me.
SPEAKER_00: Because big miracles begin with small gifts that are offered in faith and compassion for Jesus to put to use.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.