Central Lutheran Church - Elk River

Where Should We Buy the Bread? with Pastor Ryan Braley

• Central Lutheran Church

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Hungry crowds, tired disciples, and one audacious question: where should we buy bread? We walk through John’s vivid retelling of the loaves and fish to see how Jesus moves a community from cost-counting to courageous offering. The setup is familiar—scarcity, pressure, and a crowd too big to feed—yet John’s details shift the lens: Passover timing, barley loaves fit for peasants, and a child who steps forward while adults do the math. Whether you hear this as supernatural multiplication or a cascade of shared generosity, the outcome is the same: everyone eats, and there is more than enough.

We talk about how Jesus stretches Philip’s paradigm, not by shaming doubt but by inviting participation. The question isn’t how much, but where—to whom will we entrust our resources, our fear, our hope? Taken, blessed, broken, given: these Eucharistic verbs frame a kingdom that converts hoarded wealth into shared provision, and faceless crowds into neighbors seen with compassion. Along the way, we contrast John with the synoptics, explore the social pressures of heavy taxation and hunger, and ask what it means for modern people to trade perfectionism for small, faithful action.

This conversation lands in the practical. What’s your five loaves and two fish today—time, skills, money, a network, a simple yes? We make room for community voices that name real takeaways: Jesus is enough, faith grows by doing, and miracles often start with the courage to offer what feels inadequate. If you’re weary of scarcity talk and ready for a deeper imagination of abundance, pull up a seat at the table. Subscribe, share this episode with a friend who needs encouragement, and tell us: what small offering will you bring this week?

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SPEAKER_00:

See, let's pray. God give you thanks this morning for your presence here with us, and we ask that you would come and uh yeah, inspire us and awaken us this morning in all the ways we need it so badly. And do ask God that as we explore this story that maybe many of us have heard a few times, I pray that you'd give us fresh eyes and uh fresh ears. And Holy Spirit, would you come and yeah, would you make yourself real to us this morning? Would you stretch us and stretch and grow our faith in all the ways that we could use it? And uh we give you thanks for this baptism of Isaiah and Maya, and pray you bless them this morning as well. And may you stretch their faith. And uh may you give all of us this morning a sense of awe and wonder at this incredible story. And bless us in Jesus' name. Amen.

unknown:

Amen.

SPEAKER_00:

You can be seated. Good morning, everyone. How are we doing? Good. Hey, we're in the middle of our sermon series that is called it's not this is not rhetorical. This isn't rhetorical, and we're looking at the questions of Jesus. Jesus asked over 300 questions uh during his time in the gospels. Uh, by the gospels are the the first four books of what we call the New Testament, Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, and they tell the stories of Jesus. That's why it's called gospel gospel means good news. And so he asked over 300 questions. So we're gonna unpack one each Sunday and just sort of see like what would it mean if we were asked the same question today? What would our response be? Or how would we wrestle with this question? How would we understand it and that kind of thing? So this morning, the question is, uh, where should we buy bread? Which is actually quite a profound question that Jesus asks to Philip. But I love this idea of worship. In other words, he's sort of asking after all these people show up, hey, uh, what's for dinner? You know? And this is a deeply profound, but also a stressful question for like me. That question comes up almost all the time, every day around three, four o'clock. My wife will sometimes call me from my office, you know, five five doors down. Hey, Ryan, uh, what do you want to do for dinner? And like both of us, we both of us love to eat, we love food, and we like we like cooking just fine. But man, you know, four or five o'clock, six o'clock rolls around, you're getting home after a long day of work, and like the last thing I often want to do is spend like three more hours making some dinner for six of us or whatever the case might be. And she's kind of the same way. And so it's like this question like, what are we gonna do for dinner? Maybe you're like us. I don't know if that's like any of you out there, but uh, one of my favorite answers is we do this on occasion where I call it like the let's pick night. Like we just say, hey, tonight, every man for himself. Everyone do whatever find food however you can, wherever you can, or just pick around. I say pick around in the cupboards and just find whatever you can eat and just eat it, everyone for themselves. It's like a modern world version of like hunter-gatherer, you know. My kids, my kids come running out of the room with their war paint on, a loincloth and a bow and arrow, you know. Scarlet goes running by with a dead scroll in her hand. I got dinner! Let's go. There's a fire going in the bathroom. What the heck happened? What have we? I love it though. It's like, yeah, let's just hey, five, fend for yourself tonight, because I don't feel like cooking. She doesn't want to cook. And that's basically what happens in this story. I love it. There's a story that Jesus is on the Sea of Galilee. And here's the problem. The problem right away is that a large crowd, a really large crowd, gathers. And eventually, like somebody does when a large crowd gathers, someone like finally says, Hey, uh, what's what are we doing for dinner? You know, what's the plan? I mean, this is like the very first ever church potluck. But nobody brought anything to share. Like, no one brought anything. It's like, what are we gonna do for dinner? Now, here's how we got here, because that's the problem. Like, how can we feed thousands of people? And uh, here's how we got here. They're on the Sea of Galilee, up in northern Israel. It's also called the Sea of Tiberias. There's lots of names for it so if you ever see in the scriptures in the gospels, most like the sea or the sea of Galilee, the Sea of Tiberias, these are all the same, it's a really large lake, and they're hanging out on the side of it. And by the way, one quick thing, too. Um, we're in the book of John. John's the fourth book of the Gospels, Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. And if you didn't know this about the Gospels, three of them are very similar: Matthew, Mark, and Luke. When you lay them out side by side, they're very similar. There's lots of reasons why you can Google it later. But Matthew, Mark, and Luke are very similar, a lot of the same stories, a lot of the same things. John, though, comes rolling in, kicking the door down, you know, a few decades later, like with a whole brand new gospel, not new, but like a wildly different take on things. It's different. It's a radically different gospel. One of the biggest reasons is that by then, he really wants to paint a picture of Jesus as the divine son of God. Just read John chapter one. You'll get an image, like, oh my gosh, he is like really portraying Jesus as the embodiment of God in the flesh. So, whatever John does, that's unique and different, usually will tell us something about Jesus as God. So when you read it, a lot of John's gospel stories, ask yourself, what is John trying to teach us about Jesus? And what might that teach us about God? And maybe broadly, the kingdom of God or how the world operates according to God and his sort of way of doing things. Does that make sense? So here's what I want to do on this Reformation Sunday. I want to involve you in the sermon this morning. And here's how we're gonna do it. We're gonna, I'm gonna, I'm gonna tell the story as John tells it, and I want you to notice the differences between John's version and Matthew, Mark, and Luke's version. And I'll point them out to you so you can kind of understand. And like, and then ask yourself, what is John trying to teach us about Jesus as the divine Son of God, God in the flesh, God incarnate, and how God wants to run the world? Does that make sense? So at the end, I'm gonna have you raise your hands. You're gonna have a couple of you speak out loud in front of everybody. It's gonna be okay, we'll be okay. And I want to hear what you think. How how might this teach us what Jesus is like and what God is like and what the kingdom of God is up to, or what it looks like, the way that God wants to operate or uh run the world. Okay, so be ready for that. So put your thinking caps on or get your notebooks out or whatever. Uh, there will be a test at the end, too. So I'm just kidding. Okay, they're on the Sea of Tiberias, the Sea of Galilee. And in Mark's gospel, here's the first difference. Mark's gospel says, Hey, the disciples and Jesus were tired. They had a whole day of ministering and they're like exhausted. Maybe you've been there. And they're like, let's just go, he goes, Hey, let's go over to the other side here and we're gonna find some solitude and relax and rest. And the disciples are like, Yes, spa day for us. Let's go over there. And they on the way over there, a bunch of crowds who have been attracted to Jesus for a long time because he's doing all kinds of incredible things, and they're like, we want to be with that guy. They see him and they're like, let's go get him. And they all rally to the spot where they're going, and like thousands of people show up on this rest day for the disciples. And they're like, You've got to be kidding me. Like, we were hoping for a nice rest and relaxation day. Maybe play around on golf, and now suddenly we're at Costco on free sample day. There's people everywhere, it's like madness, you know. And um, I love it though, because Jesus says uh he sees the crowds who need something. The disciples see their need, like all these needy people always asking for stuff. They're hungry, they're this, they're and Jesus sees them and their neediness, and he says he has compassion on them. How do you see the crowds? How do you see them on your social media feeds? How do you see the other side of the aisle from you? How do you look at them? I'm just asking. I asked myself the same thing. He sees he sees them and has compassion because they're like sheep without a shepherd. Meanwhile, the disciples were like, what are we gonna do? This is crazy. There's thousands of people, we gotta feed them. What are we gonna do? So the ones of galley, and it says 5,000 men showed up, which means there were probably way more than that in terms of overall people. There were women, children involved. Some scholars believe that there were actually probably four times that amount. So math majors or non-math majors, it's about 20,000 people show up on their rest and relaxation day. They're trying to hang out and chill. And now you got 20,000 people who show up, and all of them show up and they're hungry. It's a very large crowd. And uh, like, what are we gonna do for food? It's dinner time. How can we feed all these people? The disciples, though, ever the smart, sharp guys, they have an idea, like, hey, uh, let's do an every man for himself kind of night. Like, hey, here's what they say they say, why don't we send them away and uh let them go to the villages and they can find their own dinner? Yes, they're like, we love this idea. It's every man for himself. You pick five forage, whatever you gotta do. And they pull out their own war paint and their loincloths, they put them on and they get the bone hair out. Send them away. Let them figure it out on their own. We're not here to you know feed everybody. Now, by the way, on the Sea of Galilee, there were all kinds of villages around, and all these villages had like little markets you could go and buy food. The problem was this, though, there were 20,000 people probably around that number. And in the biggest village around the Sea of Galilee was about 30,000 people. So can you imagine 20,000 folks descending on one single village with a market that only the biggest one only had 3,000 people? It's like when you go to Chick-fil-A on those days and like a school full of like a like 10 buses on a field trip show up in front of you, and you're like, no, I'm not going to Chick-fil-A anymore, you know? Like, how can they ever feed all these? There's 20,000 people there. There's no way this is gonna be possible to feed any of these, any of these folks. But they uh they're hungry. And here's why they're hungry. Most of the people in this day and age were peasants, they were poor. And there's lots of reasons for that. One of which is that they were taxed exorbitant like levels of taxation. Some scholars believe they were up to 80% taxation in this time and place. 80%. That's illegal now. It's so high. So if you were a peasant, you had like zero money, not a lot of food, not a lot of means or resources. Meanwhile, the wealthiest in this area, including the religious elite, they weren't immune to it, they hoarded and they kept all their stuff for themselves. So I wonder, maybe, I don't know, maybe John's trying to paint a picture of how the kingdom of God operates versus how the kingdom of the world operates. What do we do when we collect vast amounts of resources? What do we, what should we do? I don't know. Maybe the story will help us understand that a bit more. But I know that the kingdom of the world of this day and age, even the religious folks, they sort of hoarded all their stuff and kept it for themselves. Meanwhile, taxing the poorest of the poor. 80%, some historians believe they're poor, peasants. And they show up and they're hungry on the edge of famine. And they're hungry. And then Jesus asks the question. He says, Hey Philip, and poor Philip, he's probably the first one standing there. You know, like, yeah, Jesus. Hey, where should we buy bread for all these people to eat? To which Philip responds, uh Jesus, um, who's this we you speak of? I don't know what we're gonna do. I have not I have nothing. I don't know. And Philip, I can imagine, I can feel, I can sense, like he starts to panic a little bit. Like, there's 20,000 people here. Like he answers the question. Here's how he answers it. He's like, hey, uh, 200 denarii or six months' wages would not be enough bread to buy for each of them to get a little bit. So we could spend half a year's wage, Jesus, on these people. It would not even be enough for everyone to get a little bit. By the way, did you notice that that wasn't what he asked him? He didn't ask him how much it costs. Philip's counting the costs already. Jesus said, Where? Where are we gonna get the food from? Philip answers with uh uh how? Well, we can't. Philip already is counting the cost. Jesus never asks him this. And by the way, in the Gospel of John, and alone in John's Gospel, it says that he asks him this, Jesus does, in order to test him. Because he already knew what he was gonna do. So somehow in John's gospel, Jesus poses this question. He initiates it to Philip to test Philip and everyone around. Uh immediately, Philip's like, yo, man, this wasn't on the syllabus, Jesus. What are we doing? What are we is this a multiple choice question? Essay question, what are we doing? Jesus is like, but don't worry, it's an open scroll. You'll be fine. Just don't worry about it, man. You're right. We're gonna all grade it on the curve, it's fine, it's fine. No chat GPT, though the answer. Eugene Peterson, this great theologian and pastor who since died, he wrote uh his own translation of the of the Bible. He calls it the message. In the message, he writes it like this. I love it. He says it's like this. Uh, Jesus says this to stretch Philip's faith. Yeah. He wants to stretch him. Jesus initiates the question with a purpose. He's got an idea. He wants to take them somewhere and show him something maybe brand new. Because all Philip can see at this moment is the impossibility of the situation. He's counted the cost. Look, there are here ten reasons why this won't work, Jesus. That's all he can see is the impossibility of this situation. And he has no idea. He has no idea. He he can't he doesn't know where this money will come from. That's how he answers. He answers, that's why he's talking about money. But Philip can't see. He can't quite see what Jesus wants to do, what Jesus has in mind. Nor can he see what might happen when this bread, which will come up later in the story, so but when this bread passes through Jesus, the Messiah, the the creator of the cosmic, the whole cosmos, once that bread passes through his hands, Philip can't even imagine what might happen when that when that happens. So Jesus, it says he wants to stretch him. See, Philip has this paradigm, a worldview, how he sees the world. It's a very specific way. And Jesus wants to change it. Because what he will witness, what's about to happen, it will change everything for Philip. How he thought about the world before that moment will change after the moment. What will happen in just a second with Jesus and this fish and these loaves, it will change, reframe, reshape everything and how Philip sees the whole world. When I was younger, I went to this church in Denver. I was this young, nerdy, skinny white boy. I know it's hard to imagine, but the white part not so much. But uh and went to a pretty diverse youth group. And it was like I was one of the only handful of white kids in this youth group. Um, and one night we were there, I was in middle school, sixth grade, and uh we used to do altar calls. You maybe know this in some traditions to do altar calls where you go up and you pray to give your life to Jesus, and they had all these folks come forward to give their life to Jesus. And they thought, Ryan, come pray for this guy. And I walked up there to pray for this guy, and I like looked up at him. He was like towering over me. I was a little guy. He towered over me like this ginormous dude who was scary and uh had a bunch of red on. I'm like, what was this? We had a lot of gang members that went to our church, by the way, back then. And uh my youth pastor since then was like, oh right, I'm convinced a lot of guys were like packing heat back then, carrying weapons, you know, back then. I was like, what? So I prayed for this. I don't know what I prayed, but I prayed for this guy and it scared the heck out of me. I was like, I don't know what's going on. And then later the youth group leader came and he's like, Hey Ryan, do you know who that was? I go, No, I don't, but he was scary. Like, oh, he was one of the leaders of the gang called the Bloods in Denver, you know, with the Crips and the Bloods. He was one of the like predominant leaders in the Bloods in Denver. And I was like, what? And you let me pray for that guy? How could you do that? But I remember thinking this, I'm like, why would that guy want anything to do with Jesus? That guy's doing his thing out there, you know, he's a tough guy. I'm like, oh, Jesus somehow has made an impact in that guy's life. Why would why would why would he want anything to do this old story? And everything, like, oh, if if Jesus means something to that guy, maybe Jesus means something to other people that I would never have guessed. Maybe there's lots of folks out there who want something that Jesus has to offer that. I would have never thought. And of course, as I've grown older, I've seen how maybe it's the whole world that really could use Jesus. Even folks that you think they would never be interested, or they would never, that would never make sense for them. And it changed how I saw everything. Yeah, that's what happens, it's gonna happen to Philip. Before this moment, Philip has a certain way of seeing the world. And how he sees the world doesn't allow for possibility. He can't, it doesn't allow for it. It's like it's all I can see. It doesn't allow, he doesn't have the capacity to imagine what Jesus might do next. Because the box he's inherited or the box he's living in is just a bit too small. Now, I know all of you are not this way, all of you are mature people of faith, and you know what Reformation Day is. You already knew that before I gave you the answers. You know about John and all the gospels, but but maybe you today might need to have your faith stretched a little bit. Maybe you could hear this question. Hey, where will we buy the fruit from? May you hear it asked of you. Maybe the box you're in that you've inherited or that you've been given or you live in, or that you built yourself, maybe it's just a little bit too small. And Jesus might want to just maybe just a tiny bit stretch you. Here's the deal: Philip didn't know that he didn't know. He didn't know. How could he? He didn't know. You know, you and I are not that different. We don't know what we don't know. And how could you know? You often don't know what you don't know because you didn't need to know what you needed to know until you needed to know it. You know? How do you know? Many of us don't know anything until we have these experiences or we learn it. We have this cognitive dissonance. This is why, for God's sake, please read people you don't agree with, okay? I'm just telling you. Find a book you don't agree with and read it and just see. You don't never know. How would you know? You don't know, you don't know until you need to know it. And Philip didn't know. And Jesus asks him this question in order to help him know what he needs to know now to change his life. I love this Emerson quote. Ralph Waldo Emerson said this. Uh he said, Life is a succession of lessons which must be lived to be understood. I'm sure Jesus told him these things a number of times, and Philip just didn't get it because they're goobers. You know these guys, I love it. He had to show them. I give lots of, I think, decent sermons. Maybe you just, maybe though, you need to practice it on your own in order to have your paradigm blown open. Maybe you need to step out in faith, not just hear what I'm saying or your friends, or read a devotion. Great, but maybe you need to try something on your own and see what you don't know and live into it. Remember the first week I gave this great quote by Rilka, this great poet. It was longer, but at the end he says, live the questions now, and perhaps you will then gradually, without noticing it, live along some distant day into the answer. Which is funny because for Philip, that day is today. We're living into it now, buddy. And what will happen in just a moment will stretch his faith, blow open his box, and change his paradigm. And to boot, this is hilarious, and this is only in John's gospel, to boot, he uses a little boy to do it. Come on now. There's 20,000 people there. And the hero of the story is a little boy in a culture that didn't value kids at all. In the Greek language, the word for little boy, it's like the diminutive form. It's like the tiny little small little lad, is what it says. He's a lad. Little guy just comes out of the woodwork. Where did you come from, little guy? They couldn't even see me so small, probably. And he rolls in there with his five barley loaves and he's two fish. I love it. I love it. It's like if you some little kid walked in here, like, I got some food, pulls out his little ziploc bag, you have a smashed peanut butter jelly sandwich, you know? Dude, put that away. That's gross, man. Maybe a warm string cheese he's had in his pocket all day, you know? No, those are too expensive. Maybe like an off-brand granola bar. The ones that crumble all over the place when you eat them. What are you doing, guy? Get out of here. And he brings five barley loaves. By the way, barley, this is John's gospel, all meat. It says it's barley. Uh, barley uh came to fruition. It was harvested at this time of Passover. By the way, this story takes place at Passover, John tells us. Passover, of course, is the old Jewish festival and celebration when God rescues them from slavery and saves them from death. So maybe John's using this story as like a retelling of the Passover story that maybe in this story, Jesus is saving people from death or from slavery. And maybe this picture he's painting will like save them. And barley, of course, was harvested at this time. So like the archaeology and it fits perfectly. So, of course, like it's another sign. This is probably when it happened and that it was true. Barley also is a really affordable grain. It was really uh the poor people ate it. And it was so uh readily available they gave it to animals. So it was like it was like the like the the most like you know, uh like the smallest, tiniest little meal you could find that was affordable in every way. It's a very modest meal. This little boy, this lad, this tiny little diminutive boy shows up with barley loaves. And of course, he brings out two fish. Again, the Greek diminutive form of this word for fish is used. It's tiny little fish, not trophy fish. And that little boy holds up his fish, and he knows the camera trick, so he holds the fish like this, you know, make the fish look bigger. And the disciples are, I'm sure, like, oh great. You've got to be kidding me. We are doomed. Hey, hey, buddy, get out of here. That's sweet. Get munchie move. Where are your parents? In fact, they say, this is what they say to him. They say to Jesus after Jesus uh is talking about this. If I can get my slides to work there, and they say, hey, what is this amongst so many people? There's 20,000 people here. Not five. 20,000. In Eugene Peterson's the message, he says it this way uh this is barely a drop in the bucket. This is not gonna help anybody. What are you doing? This is not gonna help. In any way. I love it. Jesus, this is his response. Oh, Jesus, Jesus, this is his response. I'll show you a picture of his response. I love this. This is his thank you. Nobody laugh at the 8:30. Nobody. I go, Olivia, they're not gonna get it. Oh, they might get it. I don't think they will. They did not get it. This is a very popular meme. Goes back to the last dance. If you haven't seen that, it's great. Jordan, who is the greatest of all time, I'm just telling you. Uh Michael Jordan. Uh, but the memes are hilarious, so I gotta show you a couple if I can, you know, if you can indulge me. I love this one right here. The grass grows, dad's instead of him. I took that personally. Dad's gonna go, Mo. Here's another meme that this became, this grew into a meme. Water flows through a river, beavers. I took that personally. In the original, the last dance, Jordan, like somebody was he was playing against him, and someone talked trash to him, which you should never do to the king, right? And Jordan's like, oh, I took that personally. And then he went out and like just you know, tore the guy to shreds the next game they played him. And that's Jordan. Oh, I'll have another one. It became a meme. Squirrels exist, dogs took that personally. Yeah, yeah, yeah. This is my favorite one. Olivia found this one. My friend told me that I take everything personally. I took that personally. Okay, thank you for indulging me. Yeah, there's lots of responses that would I've probably heard that day. I love it. Maybe someone said, Hey, this won't help at all. Let's just not do anything. Maybe you've said that. Maybe you've been on the precipice or the cliff of a miracle, and you've said, hey, this probably won't help, though. Let's just not do anything. What if the boy said that? Maybe you heard this one. Hey, this won't be perfect. So let's just forget about it. Any perfectionists in the house this morning? It's confession time. This won't be perfect. I'm not gonna even bother. Let's just forget about it. Yeah, his meal was not perfect. Five barley loaves, a smashed peanut butter and jelly sandwich. Warm string cheese. This is what are we doing? Maybe you said that. Maybe you said this one. Hey, uh, I don't know, but um, I can't see that any this is a possibility. So I'm not gonna worry about it. I could never do that. My boss would never allow My kids would never go. Um I don't have enough of what other things you say. Meanwhile, this diminutive little boy, this little lad shows up and he says this. Hey, I don't know what will happen if I give these to Jesus. I don't know. But I do know what will happen if I don't give them to Jesus. I don't know what'll happen if I do this, I don't know. But I definitely know what will happen if I don't give them to Jesus. Nothing will happen. Nothing. Nothing. And this lad had all kinds of reasons to not give them up. One, they were his. It was his food. It was his lunch. Also, uh, he's hungry, I'm sure. This peasant boy's hungry. Also, there is this. Uh, he's poor. Undoubtedly, this little lad is poor. He's a peasant. He's a kid. He's got a lot of money. Also, it's not enough. This will never be the solution. It can't be the sol why bother? What are you doing? This won't be the right this will never feed everybody, you idiot. Maybe it's because he's not in charge. He's not an adult. Where are his parents? Where are the adults in the room? By the way, uh, watch the news. There are no adults in the room. Or I could say it this way. You're the adults in the room. Okay. This kid doesn't. He's not what are you doing, man? You're barely 10 years old. I'm just guessing. I don't know how old he is. Uh no one will listen. They can't see him, they can't hear him, he's quiet. I don't know, they don't know. 20,000 people, man. Well, you don't need to do this, dude. How about this one? Just fill in the blank. This kid is not blank enough, not tall enough, not smart enough, not good enough, doesn't have the proper solution, he's not proper theology, the proper this, the proper that. He's not blank enough. Fill in the blank. This will never work, dude. See, kids, though, they have this gift. They can see things adults don't see. Philip is already literally counting the cost. Not this lad. He doesn't know how to do that. It's a bit naive if you ask me. But I'll be 20,000 people ate that day. Yeah. Where did we go wrong, adults? What happened to us? We got old and we lost our passion along the way. And our paradigm shrunk. Oh, I could never do that. I don't know. I love I was a youth minister for a long time. I loved it. The one thing I love the most is that you tell a kid something crazy, and they're like, okay. Like, hey, Jesus said to sell all your things, give to the kid, give it to the poor. Kids are like, okay, we could try that. Okay, Ryan Monahan. I had Ryan Monahan and Maria too, and as when they were little, little kids, and uh not little young adults in my youth ministry. You tell them, hey, uh, you know, Mother Teresa went to India and had a ministry in Calcutta serving the most poor people in almost the whole world. God, maybe I could do that. I didn't, maybe I could try that. You tell a kid, hey, God wants to use you to do miracles. Well, okay, I'll pray about that. You ever talk to a kid about yeah, that's what they say. They just kind of are naive enough to think it's true. Tell an adult that, well, I could never move to India. To play ticket alone costs thousands of dollars. I could never do that. Wow, what would I do with my dog? Or what would I do with my clothes? I don't. What do they eat over there? And these are things I've said. You tell an adult, hey, maybe uh maybe God would have you pray for and love your enemies. Oh, I could never do that. I don't. Jesus didn't really mean that. He just was saying that. It's a rhetorical. You tell an adult, hey, maybe God has a thing, something for you to give and share with the world. No, not me. I'm a nobody. I don't know. But kids, man. Now, there's two ways to think about this miracle, and I want to hear your responses. One way is this some folks think that Jesus literally takes the bread, by the way, he takes the bread and he gives thanks, and he breaks it, and he gives it out. And everybody eats. Does that sound familiar? Taking it, breaking it, giving thanks, and gives it to all to eat. Yeah, John is framing this as a Eucharist. It's a Eucharist meal where everyone's welcome. There's enough for everyone to go around. In fact, there was plenty of basketfuls left over. In Roman culture, when you would eat a meal, you would have more than you needed to show off your wealth. Jesus, like there's more than enough. There's basketfuls left over. And uh, it's a miracle. Everybody ate, they're all welcome. Everyone had enough. Now, some scholars think, oh, Jesus somehow literally takes the bread and multiplies it, like miraculously. Which is awesome. I love that idea. I don't know what it looked like or what it sounded like. Maybe it sounded like that. You know, I don't know. He recreates the atoms of the bread. I mean, whatever, whatever, you know. Others think that what happened was that Jesus takes this bread, and everyone sees this little kid who's generous when nobody else would be. And like, okay, actually, I've got some bread I can share. And they share their bread. And then this wealthy, the one wealthy guy where he's like, oh, I've got 12 loaves. I've been hoarding them. I'll share those. And they all start to share, they're all inspired by this little lad, and they all start to share their food around. And everybody eats. And there's debate, and one side's maybe more conservative, one side's more liberal. I don't care. I don't even care what they I love both of them, actually. They're both incredible, you know, ways to think about it. I love it. I don't care because here's what I know Jesus took the bread, he gave thanks. And he broke it and then gave it for everybody to eat. That's all I care about. Everybody ate. Now, I need your help. What might this tell us about Jesus? And what he's doing, what he's up to, and what might that tell us about God? And what God is like. And what might that tell us about how God wants to run the world, the kingdom of God that we're a part of to this day? And what might it say about us here today, in this time and in this place? So I'm gonna have you raise your hand and just I'll call, I'll point to you. And then I want to hear what you have to say. Hang on, Nick, keep your hand up. I'm going to summon the courage of this little tiny boy in the story who walked forward in front of 20,000 people to give this little bread and fish. And I'm gonna have you kind of do something sort of similar. Okay, Nick, what do you what do you think? I think that we need to utilize the God-given challenge within us to make the world a better place and inspire others one day at a time. Yeah. So Nick said that this God-given challenge within us that we can use to bless the world, make the world better, is what you said. Yeah, make the world a better place. And uh to and what was that in the last thing you said was one day? Yeah, these gifts, yeah. To use these gifts within us to bless the world, to make the world a better place, one day at a time. I love that. Awesome. What else does it tell us about Jesus? About God, about the kingdom of God, about our role in it. Yeah. No matter what, Jesus is always enough. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Dude, that's good. No matter what, he said, Jesus is always enough. Yeah. I love it. Couple more. I don't mind awkward silences. I worked with you from a yeah, he provides a way. Say again.

unknown:

Have faith, he provides a way.

SPEAKER_00:

Yes, have faith, he provides a way. There was no way they're gonna feed 20,000 people. No one could see it. I don't actually the little boy saw it. He just thought, I'll give it a try. Kids are, you know, yeah, Jeremy. Oh yeah, oh yeah. God might want you to be a part of a miracle. To participate in the ongoing creation of the world, to participate in blessing the world. Sure, pray for starving kids over wherever they are. Also, maybe you should go over there and feed some. I don't know. Yes. Trusting God. Yeah. Yeah, trust in God.

unknown:

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00:

God is never gonna challenge you any more than what you can handle. Okay. God won't challenge you more than what you can handle. I might say, uh more than you well, I might say He will challenge you more than you think you can handle. That's what's the stretching. It's sometimes it's uncomfortable because you don't know until you know. Then you know. Castle. There's no crowds overdating or spibers that's another thing. Yeah. Man, that's good. Like I think that when Jesus saw those crowds, he saw them as individuals, which is hard to do. It's just hard. He had compassion on them. And he cares for each of them individually. He wants to feed them. What does it mean to be fed? Or to help feed others. Anybody else? I'm not trying to fish, I just want to leave room if anyone else wants to have something for us to do. By the way, at the 8:30, it was a little girl raised her hand very first. It was so great. I'm like, you guys, bunch, you I loved it. It was awesome. Alright. Keep asking this question. Here's what we're gonna do. I got a couple baskets. And uh if you're here today and you're like, man, I would love to have my faith stretched. And maybe it's only like 10%, maybe like 90% or like 90%. Like, I don't want to have my faith stretched but like maybe 10% like I do. I would love to have you during this song, we're gonna sing a song, I'm gonna pray, and we'll get you out of here. But as an act of faith and as a prayer, just dig in your pockets. I don't need money. I mean, like, but anything like maybe you have like a piece of pocket lint or a pen cap, or maybe it's like the you know, the the envelope. Whatever you have on you. And as a prayer, come down if you want to and put it in the baskets and invite Jesus. I'm here. I want to just offer up whatever I've got, this little thing I got, and maybe it's again, whatever you got. And maybe you're like kind of embarrassed. Oh, I got pocket lamp, I don't know what to, you know, it's fine. Summon the courage of that little boy and bring it forward as a way of like sort of living out this prayer of asking Jesus to stretch you. So here's what we're gonna do. Central Lutheran Church, may you know uh in the deepest parts of your soul that the kingdom of God is a generous place of abundance. There's plenty to go around. May you hear the invitation of Jesus as he asks you, where should we buy bread from today? And may you, as an act of faith, bring your little thing. Even though you're not good enough, you don't have enough education, you're not smart enough, you don't have enough money, you don't have enough of the doesn't matter. Bring it to Jesus and let him help others. Amen.

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Ryan Braley

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