What Does God Have to Work With? -
Matthew 15:29-39, NIV - Jesus left there and went along the Sea of
Galilee. Then he went up on a mountainside and sat down. Great crowds came to him, bringing the lame,
the blind, the crippled, the mute and many others, and laid them at his feet;
and he healed them. The people were
amazed when they saw the mute speaking, the crippled made well, the lame
walking and the blind seeing. And they praised the God of Israel.
Jesus called his disciples to him and said, “I have
compassion for these people; they have already been with me three days and have
nothing to eat. I do not want to send them away hungry, or they may collapse on
the way.”
His disciples answered, “Where could we get enough bread
in this remote place to feed such a crowd?”
“How many loaves do you have?” Jesus asked.
“Seven,” they replied, “and a few small fish.”
He told the crowd to sit down on the ground. Then he took the seven loaves and the fish,
and when he had given thanks, he broke them and gave them to the disciples, and
they in turn to the people. They all ate
and were satisfied. Afterward the disciples picked up seven basketfuls of
broken pieces that were left over. The
number of those who ate was four thousand men, besides women and children. After Jesus had sent the crowd away, he got
into the boat and went to the vicinity of Magadan.
Only
one chapter ago, we read the account of Jesus feeding a crowd of five thousand
men with women and children besides. Now
we read an eerily similar account of Jesus doing the same with a somewhat crowd
– only four thousand men with women and children. The minute details (number of people, numbers
of fish and loaves available, etc) are a
bit different, but the two stories teach us remarkably similar truths about Jesus:
·
Jesus performs the miracles out of compassion
for those that have sacrificed in order to follow Him. The crowds stayed with and followed Jesus
away from food. In fact, even though
they had to be seriously hungry, they continued to praise God for the miracles
that were beign done in their midst. Following
Jesus is not always easy, but there is confidence that we will be cared for
when we do.
·
Though Jesus is fully capable of producing food
our of thin air, He asks his followers to give Him what they have to work
with. We might miss that the people who DID
have food in that crowd were asked to give it up to Jesus trusting that they
would be fed. They were asked to relinquish
self-reliance for reliance on Jesus to feed not just them, but everyone.
·
With Jesus, there are always leftovers. Jesus not only provides enough; He provides
abundance. This challenges our tendency
to see the world with a scarcity mentality (there is not enough for everyone,
so I gotta hold on to what I have or even compete with others for what’s
available.
Jesus takes
care of those who follow and trust Him with however meager resources they have
and there is always more than is needed.
These are simple truths to hear and understand, but very difficult to
live out for they require us to stake our hearts and resources on what Jesus
can do with what we have instead of what we can do with what we have. The sad truth about humans is that we often
trust ourselves and our resources more than we trust God. The continuing call of God is live a
different way – to place all that we are and all we have in Jesus’s hands. Then and only then can we see the full extent
of what God can do with us. So this begs
an essential question that each of us need to answer.
Question: With
respect to me and my resources, what does God have to work with?
Prayer: God, you know
who I am and what I have. Help me to see
how that can be multiplied and expanded when I place it in Your hands. May I trust more of myself to You and what
you can do with me. Amen.
Prayer Focus: Pray
for those who are feeling worn out today that they will find new strength.
Song: I Surrender – Jesus
Culture
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