Faith Presbyterian Church - Birmingham
At Faith Presbyterian Church we are seeking to exalt Jesus Christ the King and to exhibit and extend his Kingdom through worship, community, and mission.
Faith Presbyterian Church - Birmingham
Luke 9:10-17; Jesus Feeds the Five Thousand
Martin Wagner January 19, 2025 Faith Presbyterian Church Birmingham, AL
Bulletin
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The following message is from Faith Presbyterian Church in Birmingham, Alabama. Join us on Sundays for our 8, 15, and 11 am worship services. For more information, visit us online at faith-pcaorg or download the Faith PCA app. Thank you for tuning in to Faith's podcast ministry.
Speaker 2:We're in a series over the last few weeks about the meals of Jesus. We're looking at the Gospel of Luke and the instances in this Gospel when Jesus is around the table. We've looked at perhaps two lesser-known passages in the last two weeks Luke 5 and Luke 7. These meals were intimate gatherings in homes. 5 and Luke 7, these meals were intimate gatherings and homes. But today we look at Luke 9 and what is one of the most recognizable passages in all of Scripture, but also one in which thousands are fed.
Speaker 2:It's interesting about this miracle. It is the only miracle of Jesus that appears in all four Gospels Matthew, mark, luke and John. They had different personalities. You can see that when you read their Gospels. They had different purposes in writing, different audiences, but all four of them this was the only miracle that they thought, across the board, should appear in their Gospel, because there's something that we see in the story that is so vivid and so compelling about how it is that we relate to Jesus. But before we read the text, I want to set the context a little bit.
Speaker 2:At the beginning of Luke 9, jesus sends His disciples out. He tells them to pack light, to go and to proclaim the kingdom of God and to heal diseases and to take nothing for their journey, to not take a staff or a bag, don't take any bread or any money and only pack one tunic. And they are at the beginning of our passage this morning. They're coming back and they're going to give a report to Jesus about what all happened on their short-term mission trip they went out on. So let's read the text Luke 9, verses 10 to 17. Here are God's word to us this morning. On their return, the apostles told him all that they had done when he took them and withdrew apart to a town called Bethsaida. And when the crowds learned it, they followed him and he welcomed them and spoke to them of the kingdom of God and cured those who had need of healing. Now the day began to wear away and the twelve came and said to him Send the crowd away to go into the surrounding villages and countryside to find lodging and to get provisions, for we are here in a desolate place. But he said to them you give them something to eat. They said we have no more than five loaves and two fish, unless we are to go out and buy food for all these people. He said to them had them all sit down and, taking the five loaves and the two fish, he looked up to heaven and said a blessing over them. Then he broke the loaves and gave them to the disciples to set before the crowd, and they all ate and were satisfied, and what was left over was picked up twelve baskets of broken pieces.
Speaker 2:Let's pray Our Lord. You are the one to whom all hearts are open. You are the one who knows all of our longings and our desires, our fears and our worries. In your presence, before you, there are no secrets. Nothing is hidden from your sight. And, lord, we confess that you know us better than we know ourselves, and so we pray that you would come now by your spirit, through the power of your word, and that you would show us our need, and that, again, you would show us the great provision that we have in Jesus, and it's in his name we pray, amen. This meal with Jesus shows us three things we're going to look at our need. Secondly, we're going to look at Jesus's provision. And thirdly, we're going to look at the abundance of his kingdom. So first, this passage shows us our need.
Speaker 2:As the disciples are returning from their trip, jesus decides that it's time for a break. They need to take a retreat, and so they go into this desolate town on the Sea of Galilee named Bethsaida. They go in the wilderness. They're going to get away from the world. They head to the lake for some time away, but the crowds of people didn't like this idea. They heard Jesus was leaving by boat to another side of the sea and they followed after Him. They didn't have Twitter back then, they didn't have TikTok, and it doesn't look like we're going to have TikTok for any longer either. So we don't know exactly how everyone got the news of where Jesus was headed, but somehow they figured it out and they arrive where Jesus was retreating to, and they came in droves. The disciples pulled up on the shore. They were tired from a long season of ministry. They were drained emotionally and spiritually and physically, and this great crowd shows up Now.
Speaker 2:I want you to read verse 11 and think about what it would have been like for you if you would have been Jesus or the disciples. When the crowd learned it, they followed him and he blank. What would you have done if you were Jesus? I think I would have gotten back in the boat and turned around and gone and found a more desolate place to hide out for a while. I may have asked them to check back on Monday with me. I may have scolded them for their insensitivity and their rudeness and told them that I was too busy for their problems. I might have rolled my eyes and begrudgingly healed a few people and just thought inside, got angry and said why can't these people take care of their own problems? I may have been frustrated with the disciples. Can't you guys do anything? This is what I've been training you to do. Am I the one that has to do everything around here? What would your response have been to the crowd? Would it have been one of anger and resentment and bitterness? Self-righteousness, but not Jesus. That's not the response we get from Him.
Speaker 2:It says he began to speak of the kingdom and to cure those who needed healing. We're going to talk more about Jesus' response in our next point, but I want us to think about the disciples for a minute. You can just sense from the text that they are at the end of their rope when you read this in conjunction with the other accounts of this. Evening was coming and they got together and they decided that Jesus may need a little help on this one. It was great that Jesus was filled with compassion, but it was getting late, it was dinnertime and they were in no place to host a picnic for 5,000. The text notes that there were 5,000 men. We would assume that there were at least 15,000 or so. When you want to count women and children together with them, that is an enormous number. To put that into perspective, 15,000 people would fill up a good, respectable college basketball stadium. If it were like 9,000 people or so, it would fill up a much less respectable little league college basketball stadium, but this is a big-time stadium that they're going to fill up.
Speaker 2:Some of you get that joke and I'm afraid I may regret it in a few weeks, but I took it while I could. How do you feed 15,000 people in the wilderness? The disciples would say you don't feed 15,000 people. You tell them to go home. We don't have food here. The budget is looking a little tight right now. I have planned a few big dinners in my life and I tend to side with the disciples on this. There's no serving plan. We don't know if we have enough space for everyone. No one was assigned to clean up. They don't have money for it. We don't know if the fish were sustainably caught, we don't know if there's a gluten-free option for people.
Speaker 2:And so, after the disciples give Jesus a very reasonable, logical plan, jesus tells them you go, feed them. You give them something to eat, and you can almost hear the sarcasm in the disciples' response we have no more than five loaves and two fish, unless we are to go and to buy food for all these people. They reply. It's almost like they're saying remember, you are the one, jesus, who told us that we are to travel with nothing. You're the one, jesus, who told us that we are to not take any money or bread with us. You told us to travel light, and so of course, we don't have anything for these people. But it's not just the disciples who are needy. It's easy to miss the fact that there are 15,000 people who came to follow a guy into the wilderness, who have nothing to eat and have nowhere to sleep. There is need everywhere when we look at this passage.
Speaker 2:But the thing that hit me between the eyes this week was asking that great interpretive question as you look at a text of Scripture, who is it that you are identifying with? Who are you in the story? I have taught this passage, I've preached on this passage before and I must admit that every time I've done so, I've been asked to do it, I've identified, I've thought that I was the disciples in the passage. Not once have I considered that perhaps I'm one of the 5,000. That perhaps I'm not the one feeding, perhaps I'm the one that needs to be fed. That perhaps I'm not the one who needs, who is going around healing. Perhaps I'm the one who needs to be healed, that all I have to offer Jesus is my sin and my need. It's interesting.
Speaker 2:I've had a few people over the last few years ask you know, it seems like at faith you guys and they're trying to be encouraging with this you guys talk about sin a lot. Why is that? You seem to talk about that we need Jesus a lot. There was actually a guy that came up to me last week after the service and in a very encouraging way he says you know, martin, I feel like it's your job every week to tell me that I'm a sinner and I need Jesus. And I said, yes, that's it. It was the greatest compliment anyone has ever given me.
Speaker 2:We talk about our sin and our need because, unless you and I see that we need something. Jesus will not make sense to us. There is something about the human condition that is just allergic to feeling like we ever need anything, and so can you and I admit that we are in the crowd today. We are one of the 5,000. And if we can admit our need, if we can admit that we have nothing to offer Jesus but our lack, then the second point will make sense that Jesus provides for us.
Speaker 2:Jesus meets the needs of these needy people first by healing them. You and I would have been very quick to dismiss them, to find the exit and to come back later when they left. But we find none of that with Jesus. He saw a great crowd, he welcomed them and he healed their sick. Jesus was filled with compassion for hurting people. He didn't dismiss them. Jesus didn't say once you get your life together, then come back, and maybe I can work with that.
Speaker 2:The Gospel of Mark says that Jesus saw these people as a sheep without a shepherd. For those of us this morning who are grieving for those who are sick, for those who are weary, for those who feel like they are just getting beaten up by a broken, fallen world, for those who are trapped in addiction, for those who are suffering at the hands of injustice, for those who feel like sheep without a shepherd, for those who feel unloved and lonely and hurting. Hear that Jesus has compassion for you, that Jesus is moved by your suffering. Some of you might feel that your need and your suffering, your hurting, that they are actually annoying to God, that Jesus feels about you the same way that you feel about yourself, that you think Jesus' response to you is the same response you would have had to the people in this crowd. You believe that Jesus is too busy, jesus is too important, jesus is too indifferent towards your hurting. But let this passage remind you that you are not an annoyance to Jesus, you are not a pain to him. Jesus does not roll his eyes when he hears you pray to him. He doesn't just wish you would get your problems together, that you would just get over it. Jesus has compassion on you. But jesus doesn't just heal the sick, he feeds the hungry.
Speaker 2:In this passage there's there's one way of reading this passage and and the takeaway or the point of the passage is saying well, yes, sure, we are kind of needy people, we can admit that. But the point of the story is that you and I are to give Jesus whatever we have and then, when we give Him what we have, great things will happen. That what Jesus is urging us in this passage is for a partnership, a cooperative spirit with Jesus, that you do your part, jesus does his part and you'll make a great team. I don't think that is what the passage is teaching us at all, because the point of this passage is that Jesus is the one who does everything. The disciples are not the co-stars of these miracles. Frankly, the disciples didn't even want to be there. The point of the five loaves and the two fish is not in its abundance but in its insignificance. The point is its meagerness. The point is that it wasn't anything at all. It's so minuscule as to not even register. That wasn't enough food for 12 men, much less enough food for the crowds.
Speaker 2:We can often think that Jesus wants us to do our part before he will work and provide for us. We think that Jesus says well, here's this ladder of spiritual maturity, and once you climb up the ladder, once you get to a certain point, then you can be used by me. That's not the case at all. Rather, what Jesus says is that I'm going to be the one that comes down to you, that I'm actually going to be the one who comes to you who are weak and wounded and sick and sore. And when we are fearful, when it is that we are insecure, when we are faithless, when we know that we're not enough, when we know fearful, when it is that we are insecure, when we are faithless, when we know that we're not enough, when we know all of these things, when we know our lack, we bring them to Jesus and he doesn't turn away, but rather he says, yeah, I can work with that, I can work with your paltry two fish and five loaves. And when we do this, he doesn't turn away. He doesn't turn away and say you actually need to bring me something better than that. No, actually, he blesses it and he works through it.
Speaker 2:We often believe the lie that God doesn't work in us until we live up to some standard Usually at some standard you and I have created in our own mind. It's not a standard that's found anywhere in the Bible, but we think God won't show up unless I'm on fire for Jesus. God won't work through me until I get my life together. What you were saying in your heart when you say that is, I've got to be strong, that God only uses spiritually strong people, that God wants the few and the proud. If what you think about Christianity is that God only likes five-star, blue-chip recruits, then you've missed the point of Christianity altogether.
Speaker 2:I read a story this week about a church that's not in this country and this church hosted what they called extreme fight nights. And at these fight nights what they would do is they would gather for worship and in the sanctuary they would set up these makeshift wrestling rings and as people gathered for worship, the beginning of the service was fights. They would just fight each other and that was kind of the entertainment before. But my favorite part was reading that the pastors joined in on the fighting. And the story that I read said that the biggest cheer of the night came when the lead pastor in his match. He pinned the guy in only 10 seconds with an arm lock and after this short match the pastor gets up victorious, I think it said he had his shirt off and he gets up, he takes the microphone and he begins to preach. And after reading the article I spent a few minutes thinking, getting the blueprints out for the new building, thinking where is it that we could put a wrestling ring in our new building? And I also spent a few minutes creating WWE-type personalities for our staff, thinking about what that might be, but that's another sermon. Type personalities for our staff, thinking about what that might be, but that's another sermon. And even more on, who would be the betting favorite between Jamie and Bully in a wrestling match After the early service, early money is on Jamie to win that wrestling match, I heard.
Speaker 2:But I tell that story because it illustrates a belief that we all have, that we have to bring our strength to Jesus and we have to fight our way in that. In Christianity it's only the strong that survive. That it's our job as Christians to gain victory through strength. That being a Christian is about success and victory and achievement and power and dominance. Is that really what Jesus wants from us Our strength and our power, or is it actually something that's completely different? The disciples are not spiritually strong in this passage the crowd, they're not spiritually strong. The point is not what they have, but what they don't have. The point is not what they have to offer, but who they offer it to.
Speaker 2:Jesus says bring me your lack, bring me your need and I will bless it and I'll go to work through it. Jesus says bring me your depression and I'm actually going to work through it. I'm not going to relieve it, I'm actually going to work through it, not apart from your pain. Jesus says bring me your anxiety and your fear and your worry. And he says I'm actually going to work through that. I'm not going to work apart from it. He says bring me your painful, shameful past and I can work with that.
Speaker 2:He says bring me your inadequacies and feelings of not being good enough. He says I will work through those feelings, not apart from them. Where is it that you feel weak and inadequate this morning? Where is it that you feel like you are not enough? Where is it that you feel like you don't have the resources that you need? Bring that to Jesus, because it is in our weakness that his strength is made perfect in us. That doesn't happen when you and I try to pin our problems to the mat, but that happens when we bring them to Jesus. So Jesus provides for us in the midst of our need, but how and to what extent that he's provided? That brings us to our final point. Jesus shows us the abundance of our need, but how and to what extent that he's provided. That brings us to our final point. Jesus shows us the abundance of His kingdom. Jesus tells them to bring the fish, bring the loaves to Him and from the five and the two, everyone ate and everyone was satisfied. This is a profound and incredible miracle of Jesus. From just five and two, everyone eight.
Speaker 2:And we can think of the miracles of Jesus that they were primarily. The purpose of miracles was to show His power and His authority. They were like magic tricks to show that he meant business. If you doubted that Jesus was the Son of God, well, look here, this guy can walk on water, he can turn water into wine, he can heal people. So that's proof right there Jesus is the Son of God. But I think that misses the primary point of the miracles. If Jesus wanted to show his raw power and strength, if he really wanted to demonstrate this to this crowd, would this have been the way that you would want to show that power? Wouldn't it have been better to have food magically drop out of the heavens, or to lift his hand and fish just pop out of the sea and they come and they feed the people. This was not the most spectacular way you could have done it. This miracle doesn't seem flashy and you think could 5,000 people have even seen what was going on in the conversation? The baskets and the fish seem almost like a sidebar conversation. And so this miracle is not for Jesus to show us that he's some type of superhero or magician.
Speaker 2:His miracles are previews of his kingdom. Remember the text says that Jesus came and was talking about His kingdom, and in these miracles Jesus is showing them what His kingdom is like. His kingdom is a place with no sickness and no hunger and no disease and no death. The miracles point us to the world that was, point us back to the Garden of Eden, where God created a world that was free of sickness and disease and hunger. A reminder to us that sin is an invader in God's world. It's not native. The miracles are not a sideshow act, but they were a preview of a world that is to come and a reminder of a world that was. Jesus is pulling back the curtain a bit and he's showing us this is where we are headed to a renewed and a remade world. These miracles are not a suspension of the natural order, but rather they are a restoration of the natural order. Sin and death and suffering and injustice and cancer. They are not native and natural to God's good earth. The miracles, in one sense, are the most natural thing that you and I could imagine. Sin is not natural, death is unnatural, hunger is unnatural. Jesus is showing us that hunger will not be a part of His new world.
Speaker 2:Notice the passage says that there were leftovers. There were 12 baskets full of leftovers. The astounding thing is that there is more left over than there was at the beginning. Jesus doesn't just meet the need of the crowd, he provides an abundance. This abundance points us to the very nature of God's kingdom. God's kingdom is not one of scarcity, it is a kingdom of super abundance. Throughout the gospels, jesus speaks of the kingdom of god in lavish terms, things like lavish feast and overflowing grace. That's the picture when we look at luke's gospel, the picture he's painting for us in these meals of jesus, that the kingdom of god is a place where there is no lack, where everything, every need we have, is met in fullness and where the grace of God overflows to us in abundance. And as you study this passage, you will see that this passage is not just pointing to an abundance for a group of people gathered on one particular day, but Jesus is actually pointing us to another meal, another meal that would not just feed us for a day but would feed us until he comes again. If you travel to Israel today, you can go to the very place, you can go to the very field where scholars believe that this miracle took place.
Speaker 2:It's a town in the northwest corner of the Sea of Galilee and in that small town there's a church called the Church of the Multiplication. It was built in the fourth century to remember this event. And if you go in the small church, there's an altar at the front and beneath the altar, on the floor, there is this mosaic of beautiful tile and on the tile, if you look, you'll see two fish on the side and in the middle there's this basket and in the basket there are four loaves. And you look at it and you kind of cringe because you think well, did they not read the Bible? There were five loaves. Why are there only four loaves in the basket? Did they not read the Bible? Did they run out of space or run out of materials? But the artist said that he only put four loaves in the basket because the fifth loaf was on the table above it. The fifth loaf is the body of our Lord, the body of our Lord, who still feeds us today by His Word and at His table.
Speaker 2:If you look at the verbs that Luke uses in verses 15 and 16, it's very similar to passages, to verbs that we read a lot of times around here. We read about Jesus taking and breaking, and blessing and giving. These are the same verbs that Jesus used with another portion of bread On the night that he was betrayed. Jesus took bread and he blessed it and he broke it. He gave it to His disciples and he said this is my body, which is for you. This passage points us to the cross, the cross where the body of Christ was broken for us. How was God going to remake this broken world, to make it the place where he created it to be? He will do it because His Son will be broken.
Speaker 2:What good is a loaf of bread if it's not broken? An unbroken piece of bread is no good to you and me. For it to bring life to us, it must be broken. The bread must be torn apart if it's going to bring any nourishment to our bodies For Jesus, the bread of life. To bring life to you, to bring wholeness to you, he must be broken For the brokenness of the world. He will be broken, and so it is at this table that we will gather at in a few moments that we remember that Jesus was broken for you, that we will see the extent of his compassion for us, because Jesus offers himself to us at this table.
Speaker 2:If you don't know Jesus by faith, this table is a visible representation to you of his love. Consider how much it is that Jesus really loves you, because in the end, there are only two options that any of us will have in life. It is that we can be broken for our sins or by faith we can believe that Jesus was broken for us. But in this table was also a reminder to us that Jesus is the one who provides an abundance, that he gives everything. Jesus provides an abundance for people who can bring Him nothing.
Speaker 2:This passage and this table that we will gather at will point us again to a far greater meal that is coming, a meal that we will have at the end of time. There's going to be a lot more than 15,000 people gathered, but some from every tribe and tongue and nation, throughout all of time will be gathered and, just like this meal, jesus will be the one who welcomes us. Jesus will be the host of that meal. But that is a feast that you and I will never need to leave. Isaiah says in Isaiah 25 that it will be a feast of rich food and well-aged wine. That death itself is going to be on the menu at that feast, because God Himself will swallow up death forever. This will be a feast where there's going to be more food at the end than there was at the beginning, a feast that will go on forever. And as we gather at the table this morning, we get a tiny glimpse of that meal that is coming, just like a group of hungry, needy people gathered in Luke 9 in the wilderness.
Speaker 2:A group of hungry, needy people gather this morning on Valleydale Road, and Jesus is the host and the provider of our meal today, where we, just as they, will get a glimpse of a coming kingdom this morning. Our eating together is a preview of what you and I will be doing forever. We're at that table. On that day, we will proclaim with a loud voice together worthy is the lamb who was slain to receive power and wealth and wisdom and might and honor and glory and blessing. Amen. Let's pray, lord. We pray that, by the power of your Spirit, that you would take these words and that you would use them to convince us again that we are loved by Jesus, that in Him we have provision and abundance. And so, lord, help us where we doubt, help us where we fear, help us where we lack, and we pray that we would bring what we don't have to you and that in your hands we would see that you are a gracious and merciful God to us. We pray that in Jesus' name, amen.