Feeding

The ground of compassion is love and the working of compassion keeps us in love. Compassion is a sweet gracious working in love, mingled with abundant kindness.

Julian of Norwich, Revelation of Divine Love

News of Jesus' ministry was spreading. He had healed people of their diseases and his popularity was becoming enormous. But it was also tragedy time in Israel. According to the Gospel of Matthew, John the Baptist had just been beheaded. John the Baptist was the greatest moral force, the greatest spiritual force, the greatest prophet the land of Israel had experienced for four hundred years. He was the person that everyone looked to for religious inspiration, and he was just beheaded by King Herod.

Everyone was stunned by this tragedy, by this enormous loss, including Jesus, who had been baptized by John. And so it was grieving time in Israel, mourning time. And Jesus wanted to get away by himself to grieve, to pray, to remember. He wanted to get away to a lonely place and so he got into a boat to sail across Lake Galilee to a remote point, some four miles away, in order to get away from the massive crowds who were following him, to be alone and grieve the loss of John the Baptist.

But crowds followed along the shoreline, keeping an eye on his boat, and so when Jesus' boat landed, many of the crowd had already arrived. His reaction to the thousands who had shown up? Irritated? Angry? Imposed upon? No, he looked on the massive crowd with compassion, like they were sheep without a shepherd, like people who were in need of spiritual feeding for their innerspiritual hungers. And so he taught them and he healed them.The day quickly passed. It got to be later, long into the day, and one of the disciples said: "Lord, the hour is late and the people don't have any food and we are a long way from any villages. Maybe you should send them home now."

And Jesus said to Philip, according to John's version of the story, "How are we going to buy bread, so that people can eat?" Jesus said this in order to test Philip. Philip replied, "It would take more than two hundred denarii, more than two hundred days of wages, and even that wouldn't be enough bread to feed all these people." Jesus said, "Look around the crowd and see what you can find."

Andrew found a young boy with five loaves of bread and two fish, and brought the boy, fish and bread to Jesus. Jesus invited everyone to be seated on the green grass. Jesus took the bread...looked up into heaven...gave thanks... broke it...gave it to his disciples...who gave it to the crowds. And they all ate and were all satisfied ...and...there were twelve baskets of bread left over. The number who ate were five thousand men, plus women and children.

That story was told over and over again in the gospels, but it continued. A few days later, Jesus was again out in the wilderness, again with a large crowd of fourthousand men plus women and children, and the same story happens again. This time, seven loaves and a few fish were found. And once again, Jesus took the bread...looked up into heaven...gave thanks...broke it...give it to his disciples...who shared it with everyone. And everyone ate and everyone was satisfied, ... there were seven baskets of bread left over after the feeding of the four thousand plus.

And then we read the Gospel of John's version of this story, and we discover that the feeding of the five thousand is prelude to Jesus' teaching that "I am the Bread of life."

Jesus can work miracles with five loaves and two fish. And God will do the same with us when we bring our meager gifts to God, our five loaves and two fish, our and ordinary talents and gifts.

Food for the Journey

Galatians 4:8-20 (focus verse 19), Labor until Christ is formed in you

John 6, Jesus had compassion (also Matthew 9:35-37)

Journey Questions

1. Implied in the story is this question: Have you surrendered your five loaves and two fish to Christ? Have you surrendered the meagerness of who you are to Christ? Why or why not?
2. How does Jesus' feeding of the 5000 help us to understand communion?
3. Jesus was grieving his cousin's death, yet he had compassion on the crowd. Can you think of a time when you were in deep personal need, yet God called you first to have compassion on others before caring for yourself?

Journey Practice: Communion 

Prayer for the Journey

Incomplete applications or those postmarked or received at the Mission Center after August 15, 2013, will not be considered.   

These grants are made possible by table offerings at presbytery meetings and gatherings and direct contributions from our congregations and individuals throughout our presbytery, who have discerned a call to respond to the growing number of children and adults in our communities who are hungry because they do not have reliable access to affordable, nutritious food.

For more information, contact Paula at 330-339-5515 or by email, Paula@MVPJourney.org