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+ + + In Nomine Jesu + + +
Please join me in prayer: May the words of my mouth and the meditations of our hearts be pleasing in your sight, O Lord, our Rock and our Redeemer. Amen.
Dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ,
Grace to you and peace from God our Father and from the Lord Jesus Christ.
If we are not too busy to eat, have a way to get there, and have means to buy something, we can usually get something to eat. Here in Kilgore, for example, we have Brookshire’s and also Walmart, which is pretty much open all of the time. Those who have livestock or gardens do not even need to go to the store, and I appreciate their sharing their produce with me. As our time of Catechesis before the Divine Service has reminded us the last few weeks that we have considered both Asking a Blessing and Returning Thanks, and as was repeated in the Introit for today (Psalm 147:7-11; antiphon: Psalm 156:16), the Lord gives food at the proper time; He opens His hand and satisfies the desires of every living thing (Psalm 145:15-16).
In today’s Gospel Reading, then, we might be surprised both at the apostles’ command to Jesus regarding the people’s buying themselves something to eat and at their reaction to Jesus’s command to them to give the people something to eat. Two Sundays ago we heard how Jesus sent out the apostles two by two with authority over unclean spirits and how they went out and proclaimed that people should repent, cast out many demons, and anointed with oil many who were sick and healed them (Mark 6:7-13). Last Sunday we heard how even King Herod heard and reacted to the apostles’ so making Jesus’s Name known (Mark 6:14-29). And, today we heard how the apostles returned to Jesus and told Him all that they had done and taught. Surely the apostles should have realized Who would give the thousands of people something to eat.
Instead, in a desolate place, when the hour was late and when any marketplaces around were not open all of the time, the apostles told Jesus to send the thousands of people away to the surrounding countryside and villages to buy themselves something to eat. And, when Jesus told the apostles to give the thousands of people something to eat, the apostles apparently incredulously asked Him if they, having gone, were supposed to buy more than half of a year’s wages worth of bread and give them something to eat. Jesus asked them how many loaves of bread they had and told them to go and see, and, after they found five loaves and two fish, He miraculously multiplied what was insufficient even for the Twelve in order for all the people to eat and be satisfied, and for there still to be more left over than what they started with.
Whether bread and fish, cereal and milk, pizza and beer, or any other combination of food and drink, whether clothing and shoes, house and home, land and animals, or any other combination of anything else that has to do with the support and needs of the body, God our Father gives us and everyone else such “daily bread”, even without our or their prayers (Small Catechism III:14). The Maker of heaven of earth richly and daily provides us with all that we need to support this body and life, and He does so out of fatherly, divine goodness and mercy, without any merit or worthiness in us (Small Catechism II:2). For, what we, by nature and on account of our sins, merit and are worth is nothing but death in time and torment in hell for eternity. Like the apostles, we who believe have seen and been a part of God’s gracious miracles and provisions, and yet we do not realize that God gives daily bread to everyone, even evil people, and we do not receive our daily bread with thanksgiving (Small Catechism III:14). For all that He does, we do not thank and praise, serve and obey Him (Small Catechism II:2). We do not fear, love, and trust in Him above all things (Small Catechism I:2). Instead, we might trust in ourselves, as if we have to get everything for ourselves, and then we might selfishly hang on to all of what we get, instead of either generously giving of it for God to use in His Church or appropriately sharing of it with those in need who are willing but cannot earn their own “daily bread” (2 Thessalonians 3:10-12; 1 John 3:17-18).
One might wonder whether the marketplaces in the surrounding countryside and villages even would have had enough food for the thousands of people to have had something to eat. (Would even our decently‑sized Walmart have enough food all at one time for half of Kilgore’s population or more to eat and be satisfied?) Before the disciples came to Jesus and told Him to send the people away, Jesus was teaching them many things, no doubt giving them what they needed most, namely the forgiveness of sins, life, and salvation. Originally Jesus had wanted some time alone with His disciples to rest a while, but nevertheless had compassion on the great crowd, because they were like sheep without a shepherd. As we heard in today’s Old Testament Reading (Jeremiah 23:1-6), the people’s religious leaders had destroyed and scattered the sheep, driven them away and not attended to them; so, the Lord God Himself in the person of the man Jesus shepherded the people, saving them as He had done through both Moses and Jesus’s namesake Joshua before Him (Numbers 27:17). Jesus’s compassion is not like some politician’s saying, “I feel your pain” (Mars, CPR 25:3, 28), but Jesus’s compassion is the mercy of God that acts to save His people—saves them by teaching them many things and by miraculously feeding them, but ultimately and most‑especially by dying on the cross for their sins, as for my sins and for your sins. Jesus’s compassionately and miraculously multiplying food for thousands of people showed Him to be true God, but the greater compassionate miracle is, as we heard in today’s Epistle Reading (Ephesians 2:11-22), His reconciling us to God by His blood shed on the cross. When we repent of our sin and trust God the Father to forgive our sin, then God truly does forgives our sin. God forgives our sin of failing to realize He gives all people their daily bread. God forgives our sin of not receiving our daily bread with thanksgiving. God forgives our sin of not fearing, loving, and trusting in Him above all things. God forgives all our sin, whatever it might be, including our sinful nature, for the sake of His Son Jesus Christ. And God forgives our sin in the specific ways that He has given for us to receive that forgiveness.
If we judge by appearances, the specific ways that God gives for us to receive His forgiveness are far too ordinary, just as the five loaves and two fish even when multiplied seem to be far less than the “rich food full of marrow” and “aged wine well refined” the promised Christ would give (Isaiah 25:6). Holy Baptism’s water and the word seem far too ordinary but nevertheless work forgiveness of sins, rescue from death and the devil, and give eternal salvation to you as you believe that whoever believes and is baptized will be saved. Individual Holy Absolution’s words from a pastor after private confession seem far too ordinary but nevertheless forgives your sin as validly and certainly as if Christ our dear Lord dealt with you Himself, for so He does. The Sacrament of the Altar’s bread and wine seem far too ordinary but nevertheless are Christ’s body and blood and so give forgiveness of sins and so also life and salvation. Foreshadowed by His feeding miracles such as that in today’s Gospel Reading, this Sacrament is the greatest feeding miracle, giving us not just “some‑thing” to eat but the greatest “things” to eat, meeting our most vital needs, strengthening and preserving us in body and soul to life everlasting. Through God’s Word and all His Sacraments we are, as the Epistle Reading said, built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus Himself being the cornerstone.
So joined and being built together, we generously give of what God gives us for use in His Church and appropriately share of it with those in need who are willing but cannot earn their own daily bread, that they, too, might have something to eat. At times we will still fail and sin, but we who repent and believe live daily in the forgiveness of sins, both from God and to and from one another. God the Father, Who did not spare His own Son but gave Him up for us all, will also with Him graciously give us all things (Romans 8:31). The Lord is our Shepherd, Who has prepared a table for us in the presence of our enemies; we shall not be in want or lack anything we need; surely goodness and mercy shall follow us all the days of our lives, and we shall dwell in the house of the Lord forever (Psalm 23).
Amen.
The peace of God, which passes all understanding, keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. Amen.
+ + + Soli Deo Gloria + + +