Pentecost X (Proper 12 B) [John 6:1-21] (29-Jul-2018)

This sermon was preached at St Matthew's Lutheran Church, Maryborough, 8.15am, Biggenden Lutheran Preaching Place, St John's Anglican Church, Biggenden, 2pm, and Woodgate Lutheran Preaching Place, Woodgate Community Hall, Woodgate, 5pm.

Grace, mercy and peace be to you from God our Father, and from our Lord Jesus Christ.

There is a boy here who has five barley loaves and two fish, but what are they for so many?

Prayer: May the words of my mouth, and the meditations of our hearts be acceptable in your sight, O Lord, our Rock and our Redeemer. Amen.

Today in our sermon, we’re reading from John chapter 6, which we’re going to be reading from for the next few weeks. At the beginning of this chapter, we have our reading for today, where we read about Jesus feeding the 5000, and walking on the water, and then for the rest of the chapter, we read about where Jesus goes to Capernaum and teaches the people there that he is the bread of life.

So let’s read the beginning of our reading where it says: After this Jesus went away to the other side of the Sea of Galilee, which is the Sea of Tiberias. And a large crowd was following him, because they saw the signs that he was doing on the sick. Jesus went up on the mountain, and there he sat down with his disciples. Now the Passover, the feast of the Jews, was at hand.

Last week, we were reading the account from the Gospel of Mark, where we read that Jesus took his apostles on a little retreat, after they had been very busy going about in pairs, preaching all over the place, preaching repentance, casting out demons and anointing the sick. At the same time, we also read that John the Baptist had been beheaded, and so Jesus and his apostles received some very sad news, which had an emotional effect on Jesus. Also, in John’s Gospel, we read that this event happened not long after Jesus had been preaching to the Jews, who were trying to kill him. What he had said to them would have angered them more.

And so, as all these events come together, Jesus calls his apostles to come across the lake with him so that they can have a rest, and recuperate, and prepare themselves for the next part of their work and ministry.

However, once Jesus and his apostles had crossed the lake, they didn’t seem to have a moment’s rest, because the crowd had followed them there. Jesus spends many hours there, healing the sick and teaching them many things.

And so we read: Lifting up his eyes, then, and seeing that a large crowd was coming toward him, Jesus said to Philip, “Where are we to buy bread, so that these people may eat?” He said this to test him, for he himself knew what he would do. Philip answered him, “Two hundred denarii worth of bread would not be enough for each of them to get a little.” One of his disciples, Andrew, Simon Peter’s brother, said to him, “There is a boy here who has five barley loaves and two fish, but what are they for so many?”

We see here how Jesus says to Philip, “Where are we to buy bread, so that these people may eat?” He said this to test him, for he himself knew what he would do. Philip is an apostle that isn’t often mentioned, but he is mentioned quite a lot in the Gospel of John. We read at the beginning of the Gospel of John, that Philip brought Nathanael to come and meet Jesus. We read also that some Greeks came up to Philip later and said to him: Sir, we want to see Jesus. And then, later on, on Maundy Thursday, on the night when Jesus was betrayed, Philip says to Jesus: Lord, show us the Father, and it is enough for us. We read: Jesus said to him, “Have I been with you so long, and you still do not know me, Philip? Whoever has seen me has seen the Father. How can you say, ‘Show us the Father’? Do you not believe that I am in the Father and the Father is in me? This is a very significant conversation that Jesus has with Philip here, where Jesus gently reprimands Philip for not recognising that Jesus and his Father were one. In our reading today, Jesus manifests his divine power by feeding these 5000 people, and walking on the water. And the fact that Philip is mentioned here is important, because he should have learnt from this event that Jesus was true God, together with the Father.

So we read that Jesus says to Philip: Where are we to buy bread, so that these people may eat? It’s funny here—Jesus is almost playing a little game with Philip. Jesus lifted up his eyes and saw the crowd. And now, Jesus wants Philip to have a look around and examine the situation. Where are we to buy bread, so that these people eat? Have a look, Philip, and tell me just how much bread there is around here! Not much! Have a look, Philip, and tell me just how close the shops are! They’re a long way away! Have a look, Philip, and tell me just how many people there are! There are thousands of people here!

This passage is a wonderful encouragement for us, especially when we find ourselves in a time of life where everything is at a crossroads—and Jesus has this wonderful way of pushing you to notice just how desperate you are at a particular time in your life. And it’s strange that when Jesus is about to work an amazing and wonderful comfort, he first sends us off to count our own provisions, and shows us just how few resources we really have. We might look at our world or our country and wonder where it’s heading—and we look at our own resources, and we see just how little we have, and we realise just how powerless we seem to be. We might look at how things are going in our own town. We might look at how things are going in our own family, or our church, or whatever. We might look at our bank account, and we wonder if we’re going to be able to survive financially if this or that happens. And it seems very much, sometimes as if Jesus says to us, “What are you going to do?” “How are you going to feed your family?” “How are you going to pay your mortgage?” “How are you going to make ends meet?” “How are you going to keep up with the cost of living?” Many young people are particularly worried about these kinds of questions today, as they begin to realise that after going to school, and getting good grades, and going to TAFE or trade school or university, or whatever they do, they are guaranteed absolutely nothing. But it’s not just money matters where people are like this—wealthy people also find themselves in desperate situations, situations which money just can’t solve. Sometimes we find ourselves in a very desperate time of our lives, where we just don’t know how things are going to work out. But Jesus has brought this information to our attention, just as he said to Philip and said: Where are we to buy bread, so that these people may eat? And nevertheless, as Philip starts to panic and to worry and to become anxious, trying to answer in his head the questions, “What on earth are we going to do? How are we going to fix this insurmountable problem?”—it’s almost as if there is a little smile on Jesus’ face, as John tells us, [Jesus] said this to test him, for he himself knew what he would do. The same goes for us, whenever we find ourselves in a particularly desperate situation in our life—Jesus knows what he will do.

Something that we often forget when we read the feeding of the 5000, is that in the Old Testament, a very similar miracle was performed by the prophet Elisha, but it was on a much smaller scale. Elisha fed 100 men with 20 barley loaves. Now Philip looks out and starts to count the number of people, and he says: Two hundred denarii worth of bread would not be enough for each of them to get a little. A denarius was the amount that a labourer would get paid in a day. So if you can imagine that Philip is talking something in the realm of two-thirds of a labourer’s yearly income. In Australian money today, that’s somewhere around $30,000. Philip is basically saying that $30,000 worth of bread would not be enough for each of them to eat a little. Now, we are told that there are 5000 men there, and that’s not counting the women and the children. So let’s say that every man who was there has a wife and at an average of 2 children: that makes at least 20,000 people, if not more, which means that each person would have less than $1.50 worth of food. We all know that $1.50 in Australia today doesn’t buy much food! A person would hardly get half a sandwich for that price.

But then along comes Andrew, and he presents the reality of the situation. Philip has tried to work out the sums, but then of course, nobody has a spare 200 denarii lying around! Philip’s arithmetic doesn’t solve the problem at all. Andrew says: There is a boy here who has five barley loaves and two fish, but what are they for so many?

There are two things that strike me about these five barley loaves and the two fish. The first is this question that Andrew says: But what are they for so many? Andrew recognises just how insignificant these things are. They are just a drop in the ocean, and from a human point of view, it just looks useless. But the second thing is that these loaves and fishes belonged to a little boy. It was not mayor, or some important person, a prominent figure, who had this food. It was just a little boy. Maybe his mum had sent him off at the beginning of the day with a packed lunch, or maybe the little boy had caught the fish himself.

But in all of this, Jesus doesn’t just show to Philip and Andrew and the disciples how little they all have, but he also shows them the great weakness of their faith. Sure, there’s thousands of people here—sure, it would take over 200 denarii to feed them all—sure, we only have 5 loaves and 2 fish, which is a meagre amount of food to feed so many people… but, there’s something they haven’t mentioned: Jesus is there. And he makes all the difference.

We read: Jesus said, “Have the people sit down.” Now there was much greass in the place. So the men sat down, about five thousand in number. Jesus then took the loaves, and when he had given thanks, he distributed them to those who were seated. So also the fish, as much as they wanted. And when they had eaten their fill, he told his disciples, “Gather up the leftover fragments, that nothing may be lost.” So they gathered them up and filled twelve baskets with fragments from the five barley loaves left by those who had eaten.

In the Gospel here, it mentions that there were 5000 men. Now, sometimes of course, when we use the word “man” it can mean either a member of the human race (like when we say, “mankind”) or a member of the male sex. Here, the evangelist is speaking of 5000 men, as in members of the male sex. In Matthew’s Gospel, he says: And those who ate were about five thousand men, besides women and children.

Now, I’ve often thought it to be a little bit odd that the evangelists should record it like this. Why does the evangelist count 5000 men? Why not say, 20,000 or 30,000 people, and count all the men, women and children together? Well, there are a couple of clues to this in our reading. One is that is says that there was much green grass in the place. There was green grass because it was springtime. How do we know that? Because a few verses beforehand, it said that it was the time of the Passover, which was held in springtime, around March or April in the Northern Hemisphere.

Now, there’s a connection between this event and the Passover, because in the book of Exodus, when the people of Israel were about the leave Egypt, God says that every man must go out and get a lamb for his household. Each man has to do this, for each household, for each family. And so, in the same way, when the evangelists count the men, it is simply an old-fashioned way of counting the households, or the families. So just as at the time of the Exodus, each Jewish family in Egypt had a lamb roast dinner with bread and herbs, and painted the lamb’s blood on their doorpost, here in the reading, Jesus himself is feeding 5000 families who have come to meet him at Passover time. He is their Passover lamb, and one day he will be killed on Good Friday, at Passover time. So what we learn from all this, is that Jesus doesn’t just provide here for 5000 people, but for 5000 families. Jesus shares not just our individual concerns for ourselves, but he also shares our concerns for our families who we might worry about. In 1 Peter 5, we read that we should cast all your anxieties on him, because he cares for you. Here in our reading, we read that we should cast on him not just our anxieties about ourselves, but the anxieties that we have about our families, because he cares for us, not just individually, but also for our families and loved ones.

You might also remember that the first temptation that Satan attacked Jesus was to turn stones into bread. Here, Jesus does something similar—he doesn’t turn stones into bread, but he multiplies the bread and the fish so that there everyone who is there is fed sufficiently. He performs this amazing miracle, not because he wants to feed himself or because the devil asked him to show off, but because he wants to have compassion on this crowd. He shows to us his great love and care not just for us as individual people, but also for us as part of families and crowds, when we share our sufferings and our problems with other people. Jesus is able to help us altogether, just as he is able to help us individually.

Then we read: When the people saw the sign that he had done, they said, “This is indeed the Prophet who is to come into the world!” Perceiving then that they were about to come and take him by force to make him king, Jesus withdrew again to the mountain by himself.

Here we see the great power of Jesus, but also the great weakness of sinful people again. Isn’t it strange? Jesus had performed many, many miracles. Sometimes they had accused Jesus of breaking the Sabbath, and all sorts. But now, when he performs a miracle which effects a large crowd of people, and a miracle where he feeds them and makes them nice and full and fat with food, then all of a sudden they are greatly impressed, and say: This is indeed the Prophet! And they want to come and take him by force.

You might remember in the Old Testament when Pharaoh appoints Joseph to be second-in-charge over Egypt, because Joseph interprets the Pharaoh’s dreams and comes up with a plan to save up grain so that there will be plenty in the coming time of famine. But what would have happened if Joseph had performed a miracle like the one Jesus performs here? Jesus did not propose to the people a plan to save up for the famine, but he showed to them his great power to overcome famine, and so they thought that if Jesus were their king, they would always have plenty. But then this is not why Jesus came. He did not come to this earth simply to make our bellies fat, and to give us an easy life here on this earth with no troubles. And so he escapes, and goes to a mountain by himself.

And so we must also remember this: when we find ourselves in a difficult time in life, and what we have looks so insignificant, we should commend the little we do have to Jesus, and trust in him to provide for us and for those in our care. But also, we should remember that Jesus will provide for us only as it serves to benefit his kingdom and our souls. He wants to encourage us, but he is not an earthly king. He is not simply the person we turn to for our earthly needs, when all the other earthly means let us down. He is our God: he is a Passover lamb, and then he shows us in our reading too, that he is the Lord of heaven earth, who is even able to walk across to sea to meet us in our needs. But as soon as we want to snatch him, and just have him as our earthly king, who just gives us stuff and food and things that we want so that we can be comfortable in this life, he will run away and hide, and let us fend for ourselves for a while. We are not the gods that he worships, but it is the other way around. He is the Lord of heaven and earth, and he even plants his footsteps on the sea. He is our Good Shepherd, who leads his sheep, and provides for their every need, who has died on the cross, and laid down his life. And he has risen from the dead, and gives the forgiveness of sins, and promises the wonderful gift of eternal life. And so we commend ourselves to him, and all the little that we have, and all the great needs that seem to be in front of us that we just don’t know how to solve by ourselves.

But this is Jesus—and he knows exactly what he will do. Amen.

Dear Jesus, we thank you for providing us with all the daily bread that we need, and you have never let us be in want. We commend our worries and our anxieties to you, knowing that you care for us, and our loved ones, and we ask that you would encourage us and lead us along the path to our heavenly home with you. Amen.