Today we spend time with a well-loved gospel story known by a number of names: the feeding of the 5000, the feeding of the multitude, the miracle of the loaves and fishes. Curiously, this is one of only two miracle stories contained in all four gospels - the resurrection of Jesus from the dead, being the other one. Clearly, each of the gospel writers thought this was a story of importance … so what is it that needed and needs to be heard?
Honouring today’s table
setting of the Theological Banquet, I’m going to reframe that question just a
bit: what is it that we need to hear, not just as individual disciples of
Jesus, but as the gathered Ekklesia, the community of the faithful? What
does this say to us as Church?
It might be good to
take a half step back before answering that question, to consider the nature of
the miracle stories in the gospels. I
have heard miracles described as “enacted parables”, symbolic, visual
presentations of the Kin-Dom of God made manifest in daily life. Within the
United Church of Canada, I think this description works well, as we wonder how
to take these stories amidst the tests of science and skepticism. While I’m not closed to the idea of miracles
actually happening as presented, I like the idea that they are an in-breaking
of the Kin-dom of God into daily life, a story illustrating in tangible ways
the force of God’s transformative and everlasting love.
With this in mind, four
points present themselves from today’s gospel reading:
1. the power of breaking bread with Jesus.
2. the abundance we experience in God.
3. the power of giving ALL.
4. the importance of children in the Kin-dom of God.
First, this is a story about breaking
bread with Jesus.
I put this first, not because it’s the most important point to me, but because
this was such a key thrust of the writings of the early Church. Every time in
which bread is broken, throughout the New Testament, the gospel writers want us
to connect it to communion. Furthermore,
if we read the 6th chapter of John to its end, the whole thing is
about Jesus as the bread of life, which was a scandalous idea at the time. As
followers of Jesus, as the enduring Body of Christ in the world, whenever we
are at table with one another, at the sacred table of communion and when we
share conversation and nourishment at a dinner table, the welcoming love of
Christ is shared. It is not a coincidence
that some of Jesus’ strongest statements about inclusion were made, not in his
preaching, but by who joined him at his dining table.
When first elected as
Moderator of the United Church in 2018, the Very Rev Richard Bott preached on
this scripture, and he made the point that in the presence of Jesus, many of
our hungers – hunger of the body, soul and spirit - are addressed: “the crowd
that was there” he said, “were people who were oppressed under the weighty rule
of empire, in this case the Romans.
These were people who were hungry in so many ways: hungry for freedom,
for deeper connection with one another and with God. And of course, hungry for lunch.” As Church, we do well to remember that the
Jesus who walked the shores of Galilee, and the risen Christ who walks with us
now, engaged and engages all of these human hungers – all the emptiness, all
the hopefulness, all the yearnings, all the worries. All of these are part of our relationship
with the Christ and those who pledge to keep doing his work in the world.
Second, in the feeding of the multitude there we experience the abundance that is so evident in God, in contrast to fears of scarcity that can shut us down… especially as
Church. Perhaps the most obvious lesson from
this miracle is that a lack of material resources, while anxiety-producing,
does not make a situation impossible, not even for us as Church.
The task at hand for
Jesus and the disciples was daunting. There were thousands of people to feed, meal
time was approaching, and there were no plans to feed them. Not only were there no plans, even
if they had planned for it, as Phillip stated to Jesus (John 6:7), ““It would take more than half a year’s
wages to buy enough bread for each one to have a bite!” When viewed from a purely human standpoint,
the situation was impossible, and yet in the hands of Jesus, the pittance available to them – five rough
breadsticks no larger than your fist, along with two sardines – was received
with gratitude, blessed, and shared, and there was abundance.
These days Churches are
rightly concerned about their sustainability. On the income side of the ledger, the list of
givers is not generally increasing, nor are we getting younger, and on the
expense side salaries creep upward and
the utility bills in a Church building go up at the same rate as our utilities
at home. Yet, quoting again from Richard
Bott, “In this story, Jesus didn’t start with nothing…[he] took a gift freely
offered from a child of the world and multiplied it, and multiplied it, and
multiplied it, until everyone, including that child, was satisfied”. Other interpreters have suggested that
perhaps when the child presented his gift, others reached inside their cloaks
and shared what they had brought, too, the gift of one inspiring the gifts of
many.
Broad-based solutions
are not easily found and I don’t want to make glib statements here. But I do need to say, we must not be defeated
by our own sense of scarcity and say no before giving God a chance to say yes. If this miracle story is indeed a parable
enacted, perhaps the message is this: in
God’s Kin-dom there is no scarcity, and when assets at hand are wisely, unselfishly,
creatively and prayerfully used, we make room for Spirit and her hidden holy abundance
to emerge.
Third, the miracle demonstrates the power of
giving ALL. By all reasonable
standards, the task facing Jesus and the disciples was impossible, but the
first step toward the nourishment of all who had gathered came forward, not
from a lightning bolt from heaven, but in the form of one child with a basic
peasant’s lunch. As far as we know, the
child offered all that they had brought that day, and risked personal hunger
for the sake of the common good. As it
turns out, the child was fed, and abundantly so, but that was unknown to them when
the gift was offered.
This is the moment when
many preachers – including me at times over the years – would make a push for
“sacrificial giving”, the giving of this child’s loaves and fishes an example
for each of us to “give ‘til it hurts.” Let’s
not go there. Rather than taking this
miracle story as a person-by-person guilt producer, I invite us to take one
step back and ask, “what does it mean for this community of faith – the
Ekklesia - to ‘give all’ in response to the call of Jesus Christ?” Again, in my brief time with you I have seen
some very positive signs, such as the way you have utilized a portion of the funds
from the sale of the manse for missional purposes, and knowing you are already
so inclined I leave this with you open questions. What are the things we are holding on to, as
Church, out of comfort or fear or entitlement, that will need to be released
for broader benefit? What ways of being will
need to be given up, for our neighbours to be drawn to the gifts of love,
justice and welcome offered by Jesus?
Fourth and finally, the feeding of the multitude embodies the
importance of children in the Kin-dom of God. All four accounts of this
miracle involve a child presenting their food, “a child of the crowd, a child
of the world” as Richard Bott put it. In his book, Jesus: A Biography from a Believer, historian Paul Johnson emphasizes
how radical it was that Jesus spoke with, to and about women and children. Even in our time and place, the likelihood
of a child having their thoughts and desires taken seriously is not guaranteed
yet Jesus, time and again, says that in the Kin-dom of Heaven, children are the
model of how we relate to one another. The
Lord’s Prayer begins with an infant’s name for God, Papa or Mama. Jesus sternly
rebukes the disciples when they try to keep children from him, baptism is
described as re-emergence from the womb into the unedited, absolute trust of
infancy, believers are directed to become like children in order to really
embrace the wonders of the Kingdom. And
here, it is the selfless act of a child that saves the day. That it is a child who makes this sacrifice
is no small detail – the inherent spirituality, curiosity and generosity of
children is a gift within every family of faith. I hope and trust that this congregation and
all Churches, in setting priorities for the resources and needs at hand, will
never forget this.
At the Ecclesial table
setting of the Theological Banquet, our responses to God’s calling are shaped
by and exercised within the life and work of the Church, in the things we do
here at the Church and in those things we do in the community as Church. Together, we know the power of breaking bread with Jesus, we know the abundance we
experience in God, we know what it is to give everything we have, and we are
reminded time and again of the full importance of children in the Kin-dom of
God. As Church, as the body of Christ, may this story from two thousand
years ago inform, inspire, and guide our life.
In Jesus’ name, Amen.
References cited:
Bott, Richard.
Sermon preached at General Council 43, July 27, 2018: https://youtu.be/A5ETRmaRAcc?t=3192
Gear, Janet. Undivided
Love. Altona, MB: Friesen, 2022.
Gospel parallels:
Matthew 14:13–21; Mark 6:31–44; Luke 9:12–17; John 6:1–14.
Johnson, Paul. Jesus: A Biography from a Believer. Blackstone Audio, 2010. Chapter 6.
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