NEHEMIAH 9:16-20

PSALM 78:14-20,23-25

ROMANS 8:35-39

MATTHEW 14:13-21

Sermon – 8/4/02

Of all the miracles of Jesus recorded in the New Testament, only one is described in all four Gospels. No, not Jesus walking on water, or stilling the storm, or healing the man born blind, or raising Lazarus from the dead: rather, today’s Gospel, the Story of the Feeding of the Five Thousand.

Let’s remember that the four Gospels were written independently (although Matthew and Luke appear to have used Mark as a source) and probably at different places and slightly different times. Each Gospel had a different, equally inspired writer, each had a different initial group of readers and hearers. Nobody got all four of them published together until decades later, so the original authors wrote “complete packages”, believing that their readers or hearers might have only one Gospel from which to have a life-changing encounter with Jesus Christ.

Each Gospel writer wanted to make sure that their readers and hearers had this story, today’s Gospel. A story about – a picnic.

No one’s life was saved. No one could walk or talk or see who couldn’t beforehand – at least because of the picnic itself; St. Matthew makes sure we know that Jesus did, as usual, heal people, and before dinner. Imagine the piles of discarded crutches, bandages and white canes that littered the “picnic grounds” by the time people noticed it was dinnertime. But that’s not described in detail – not this time. No, it’s just a story about a meal, a story about a miracle which meant merely that 5,000 people did not have to descend upon the nearest pizza-and-sub-shop for a meal. That’s all. Sort of. Actually, there’s lots more to the story than that.

Jesus originally intended to go on a mini-retreat. He had just heard of John the Baptist’s execution, a sobering event which must have got him thinking about the grim end he knew was in store for him.

But Jesus’ solitude did not last. “The crowds...followed him on foot.” Rather than shoo them away, Jesus “had compassion on them and healed their sick.” The disciples apparently caught up with Jesus and the crowds in time to urge him to get rid of them, since it was now pushing dinnertime.

Jesus then confronted his disciples: “You give them something to eat.” Abashed, they coughed up five loaves of bread and two fish – adding how inadequate a gift that was.

Jesus said, “Bring them here to me.”

Jesus took the loaves, blessed them, broke them and gave them to the people – actions consciously repeated by the presider at a Eucharist today. I personally make the point also of looking up to heaven when I read the words recalling Jesus’ blessing of the bread.

So the disciples do, in fact, give the people something to eat – their gifts, touched and transformed by Jesus. And what is the greater miracle: the fact that Jesus turned five loaves and two fish into more than enough food for thousands of people – or the fact that there was no riot, and no souvenir hunting, nor any hoarding. “All ate and were filled” – and they returned what they could not eat.

Jesus had not only fed them all, he had even given them a taste of that elusive experience called “having enough” and inspired people, literally, to give back to him what they did not need, in faith that he would share it with those who did.

The disciples began to learn some of the “arithmetic of the Kingdom of God.” Generosity + Jesus = abundance. The gifts of God for the people of God = more than enough for all. Giving to God results not only in still having enough, but also of having so much – or realizing that you have so much – that you give again.

God’s generosity is super-abundant; the feeding of the 5,000 is a token and a type of God’s super-abundant generosity. God generously made us stewards of this bountiful planet earth, gave us each abilities extraordinary in depth and variety, and times to use them for good – or for ill.

Jesus said to his disciples, “You give them something to eat.”

He says something similar to each of us: give of our time, our talents, and our money. If we give, we will have enough – and God will multiply our gifts and do something wonderful with them.

(The Rev.) Francis A. Hubbard

St. Barnabas Episcopal Church