Experiencing God In His Kingdom

"Experiencing God In His Kingdom"
Luke 9:10-17


This is the last sermon in the long “Experiencing God” series.  I have appreciated how many of you have read the book, have been a part of one of the small groups, and how you stuck with this long, seven month study.  Although we are done reading the book and you will have your final small group sessions this week, it doesn’t end here.  As Alan said in the Minute for Mission, we have been listening to God and because of that we are starting to THINK BIGGER.  With God, we are challenged to THINK BIGGER.

That’s what this last message is about, as we look at the story of the feeding of the 5000.  We want to be a part of something that is way bigger than we ever thought was possible.


There's a certain progression, or factors, that make up this feeding of the 5000 incident.  Let's go through them, in order, so we can pick out the differences between "thinking small" vs "thinking bigger".

First is the lateness of the day.  Luke tells us that it was "late in the afternoon."  Time is a resource.  Sometimes it feels like time is going so slowly.  While at others it feels like time is racing by.  But the way we have divided up time, it goes by at the same rate, 24/7:  one tick of the second hand at a time.  Click, click, click, click.  Every day it's the same.

As the day goes by, we have this sense in the back of our minds that time is a limited resource.  Not for the history of all things.  Time has been "marching on" for possibly millions of years.  But for us, time is a limited resource.  Each of us only has so much.  How much that is, none of us knows.  As we get older we begin to sense that there is less of it ahead of us, than there is behind us.  Time, for us, is running out.

We can feel that same way with each day.  We only have 24 hours in a day.  The later into the day we get, the more we realize we just might not have enough hours in this day to get done what we wanted or needed to get done.  When you're getting to the end of your day, do you look back and see how much you did or didn't get done?  Or do you look ahead to the time you have left and what you can do with that amount of time, no matter how small it seems?

Time has slipped away from the disciples in their dealing with this large crowd of people.  They didn't know how much time Jesus was going to spend with the people, or how long Jesus was going to teach them about how to deal with all their concerns.  Jesus had been talking about God's Kingdom for most of the day.  The resource of time was almost used up.  The day had gotten away from them.  Now it was nearing the end of the afternoon.  Evening was upon them.  What do they do now, thinking they had so little time left?

The next factor is the location.  The disciples told Jesus, "There is nothing in this place.  It is like a desert."  The place itself, apparently had no resources.  It wasn't that there were meager resources in which to take care of the crowd's needs.  There were NO resources.  "Nothing."  They were all in a place where there was nothing available for the people, at a time in the day where the shadows on the sundial were getting long.

I've had people ask me why I'm living in a small town.  "There's nothing to do there!" is the exclamation that I've heard a number of times.  So I reply, "OK, I've lived in several big cities.  You live in a big city.  You have all these resources for entertainment and self-fulfillment.  So what do you do with your free time?  What, of all those resources the city has to offer, have you accessed?  Have you gone to a play?  A concert?  A book signing?  Listened to a lecture or speaker?  Gone to a museum?  A professional sporting event?  What all have you done, of all the things you have available?"  Their response:  "Hardly anything.  We just sit home and watch TV."  Then I say, "There you have it."

The next factor in this story of the feeding of the 5000 is the need.  This is what drives the tension in the story.  The disciples recognize that people need to eat, and they are a long ways from nowhere.  The place "like a desert" will provide no food, nor any kind of lodging.

At least the disciples recognize the people have needs.  But evidently the people hadn't planned ahead.  They didn't bring any resources for the things they needed.  None brought a tent or some kind of make-shift shelter for the night.  None had apparently planned ahead and brought some food with them.  The attitude behind the disciples statement is that these people just weren't thinking and didn't come prepared.  It's not the disciples fault--according to them--that the people came so ill-prepared.  Nor is it the disciples responsibility to make up for the people's unpreparedness.

So send them back to some place where there were resources they could access.  It's their own fault, the disciples were saying, for not having anything.  Turn them over, Jesus, to the natural consequences of their meager supplies.

Next comes the retort to the disciples attitude expressed in what they were telling Jesus.  Jesus' reply?  "You give them something to eat."  Evidently the disciples came prepared.  They had food.  They had something.

Rather than agreeing with the disciples and saying the problem was the people's because they didn't have anything to eat, Jesus was telling the disciples, the problem is yours because you have something but aren't willing to share.  The disciples had food.  The resource they were low on was compassion.  Let someone else take care of it.  Or, let them take care of themselves.  They got themselves into this situation; let them get themselves out of it.

The fifth factor in this feeding of the 5000 story is the meager resources.  Jesus quickly throws the responsibility for feeding all these people back on the disciples.  "You give them something to eat."  OK.  Now they start scrounging in their bags.  According to the story they only come up with five small flat loaves of bread and two salt dried fish.

The disciples tell Jesus what they came up with.  Notice their wording to Jesus, "We have only five small loaves of bread and two fish."  Notice the word, "only" in the disciples statement.  They haven't just told Jesus what they have.  They have made a judgement about how much they have:  "only."

We were teasing Rod at breakfast a couple of weeks ago about his poor farmer talk.  We asked him how the wheat was up north around his parents place.  He gave us the characteristic poor farmer talk:  "Oh, I don't know if we'll get much of anything out of this years crop.  Probably just a few bushels here and there.  It's going to be a bad year."
So we questioned further.  "Not much rain up there, then?"
Rod says, "Oh they got a lot of rain.  It's been good that way."
We say, "So even though they got a lot of rain, the crop's not looking good."
"You just don't know," Rod said.  "All the heads could be empty; not much grain."
"'Could be,' you say," we ask.  "So it could be good, too?"
"I suppose," Rod says.  "You just never know.  If it's like last year, we just may get nothing at all."

We shook our heads and teased him, saying even if he got 100 bushels an acre, it would still be a bad crop.  I've sat in enough small town coffee shops, shooting the breeze with farmers to know they hold their truths pretty close to the chest, and won't admit to any abundance, or good fortune.  I was told one time that farmers don't like bragging about an abundant crop, so they all just talk the "poor farmer" talk, so no one feels bad.  I don't know if that's true or not.  I do know the disciples were talking the poor farmer talk:  All we have here are five small loaves, and two old dried fish.

The next factor in this story, after telling us about their meager resources, is the size of the need:  5000 men.  5000!  And that's just the men.  If there were women and children along, they weren't significant enough to add to the count.  There could have been upwards of 10,000 people there.  And the women may have not been counted, nor gotten anything to eat because of their low status.  So there were probably more there than 5000.  But at least the men were counted.

So the story's tension is set with those two opposing facts:  five loaves and two fish vs. 5000 men to feed.  Low resources.  Big need.  Little available.  Huge possibility.

Between those two opposing facts are the disciples.  The disciples who are feeling inadequate.  It's not just that they don't think they have enough to meet the great need in terms of feeding all those people.  The disciples were feeling another kind of inadequacy.  An inadequacy of faith.  Jesus was challenging them to exercise their faith.  To have confidence in their faith.  To think bigger than themselves and their assessment of their meager resources.  The disciples were not only saying, "We just don't have enough stuff here to take care of all the people."  They were also saying, "We don't have enough faith to make something amazing happen.  We're just a bunch of guys trying to get by with what little we have."

My friend Alan Luttrell has asked me, and himself, the question, "If you knew you couldn't fail, what would you do?"  It's an intriguing question about confidence and assurances.  I want to turn that question into a faith question:  "If you had such a strong faith, what would you do?"  What would you accomplish?  Looking at the, possibly, meager resources you are holding in your hands--at least by your evaluation--in the hands of a faith-full person, what would you be able to do?  What would be your limits?

You see, when Jesus gave the disciples his challenge (You give them something to eat.) he was, in my mind, going against a lot of what Blackaby has been saying in this book.  Blackaby has been saying you sit back and wait for God to act, for God to do something and then you get on board with that.  But Jesus is saying here, "You do something.  Don't look at me.  You've got food.  Supposedly you've got faith.  Take care of it.  Feed these people.  Take care of their need.  Take the initiative.  See what happens."

The disciples stood there stuttering and stammering, "But, but, but, but..."  All those buts were a result of thinking too small.  Or small thinking.  Small faith.  Low evaluation not only of God but of themselves.  But, but, but...  "But what?" Jesus is challenging.  "Give me the dang bread and fish," he finally tells them.  "Tell everyone to sit down; groups would work good," Jesus says.  At least the disciples can do that.  Jesus shakes his head in frustration at them--at us.

Jesus "looked up toward heaven..."  That's the next factor in this story.  God.  Looking to God as the one who thinks big, and sees big opportunities for witness about our big God.  God--the one who can multiply something meager into something massive.  All God needs are people with the kind of resources of faith, so that our big God can do big things through people who have big faith.

How does that happen in this story?  Jesus breaks the bread and fish and hands it to the disciples.  That's what most of the translations say happens.  That Jesus broke the bread and fish and handed it to the disciples.  But what the Greek says is that Jesus "...broke the bread and fish and kept handing them to his disciples..."  In other words, Jesus kept breaking off pieces of bread and fish, and kept breaking and kept breaking, and kept handing and kept handing the pieces off to the disciples.  The more he broke off, the more he kept having to break off.  The more he had to give.

And that's the final factor in this story--the surprising abundance of 5 small loaves of bread and 2 dried fish.  So much so, that everyone was filled, and there was some left over--12 small baskets full of leftovers.  These would have been small baskets, about the size of a large grapefruit.  But still.   And not just 5 loaves and two fish, but 5 loaves and 2 fish in the hands of Jesus.  Who just told the disciples--you feed the people.  Which means they could have done what he did:  breaking bread and giving bread until all were filled with extra to spare.

So here's the point, I think, of this story.  It's only two words, so it's easy to remember.  Here they are.  Ready?  Think Bigger.  Jesus was talking to the people most of the day about God's Kingdom.  And by the sign of this miracle, the main motto of the Kingdom of God is, Think Bigger.

The disciples were victims of their own small thinking.  Small resources.  Limited possibilities.  Too little for too much need.  Too many rationalizations that avoid taking compassionate action and responsibility:  it's too late in the day; we're out in the middle of no where.  You can't expect so much of us.  We've got faith, to a certain point.

But Jesus is demonstrating that there is so much more.  If only we would Think Bigger, or maybe, Faith Bigger.  Jesus says, in the Gospel of John, "I tell you for certain that if you have faith in me, you will do the same things that I am doing.  You will do even greater things..." (John 14:12).  Whoa!!  It's amazing that Jesus just says we will do the same things he does, if we have faith.  That is mind blowing enough.  But then to hear him say that we will do even greater things than he has done, is enough to knock us off our feet.

The only qualification is, "...if you have faith in me..."   In other words, if we would only Faith Bigger.  If only we wouldn't succumb so easily to small faith thinking, as the disciples did in this story.  If only we wouldn't just look at what we think are meager resources, and think it's just too late, and think our situation is like being in a desert.  If only we would take Jesus at his word, and Faith Bigger, and do unbelievably amazing things that Jesus says we can do.

That, I think, is the main point of this book, that we've been reading for seven months.  If Experiencing God is about anything, it is about Faith Bigger.  It's about giving ourselves over to God fully in faith, and Think Bigger.  Paul wrote to the Corinthian church:
What God has planned,
for people who love him
is more than eyes have seen
or ears have heard.
It has never even
entered our minds.  (1 Corinthians 2:9)

In other words, we cannot even begin to comprehend what we are capable of if we Faith Bigger.  God is ready to make it happen with us.  God, as Jesus did with the disciples, is simply saying, "You do it.  Take charge.  DO your faith; just don't sit around and think about your faith.  Find out what God and you can do, when you abandon yourself into Faith Bigger.  Don't think small.  Think Bigger.  Make it happen.  Faith Bigger.