The 28th birthday of the world-wide web is next week. I sort of remember first hearing about modems and thinking what is this hoodoo voodoo? I even remember the time before cell phones and resisting the move from MySpace to Facebook because I didn’t want to be like everyone else. Before there was Twitter, before watercooler talk and even before newspapers there was… well, I’m not sure what people and Jesus’ day used actually. But whether it was papyrus, the buzz about the synagogueor girl talk at the well, the word was out. That’s right Jesus of Nazareth had gone viral.
Here’s the point of today’s devotional: We regularly underestimate what God can and will do. I dig this story of Jesus multiplying the loaves and the fishes. My grandma used to read me the story of the little boy who gave up his lunch for Jesus. And it’s one of the few stories that is retold in all four of the gospels. Cool, right? No doubt, the miracles that Jesus was performing were life changing for a lot of people. He was healing the sick everywhere he went. It wasn’t like today when you can take a pill and feel better. Not only that, the social stigma of being crippled or diseased was incredibly isolating. In. Walks.Jesus. Making the blind see, telling the lame to walk and pretty much turning the whole work upside down. If you’ve been reading through the Chronological Bible with me you’re probably coming up on the end of Numbers. You would have read stories of how God delivered his people from Egypt. No sooner were they out from under Pharaoh’s heavy hand then did they start complaining, “Oh God! You’ve brought us out here to die!” For real, they complained a lot. Now here’s Israel and their approval rating for the Roman government is basically in the toilet. And the people are longing for God’s deliverance. There had been revolutionary uprisings, but none successful. They hoped against all odds that God would send someone, maybe someone like Moses to deliver them. Enter Jesus. John’s mention of the Jewish Passover Festival in verse 4 is no accident. And the bread, you’re supposed to remember the manna from Heaven that Israel ate in the desert (after complaining). It’s like a gigantic neon sign that says, “THE PASSOVER AND EXODUS ARE HAPPENING RIGHT IN FRONT OF YOU!” And all the sudden the crowd decides, this guy is going to be our king whether he likes it or not. Are you starting to see something of who Jesus is and what he’s up to? It’s a little bigger than their political situation, bigger than their generation. God was about to change the world for all of time, for every generation. If you think multiplying the loaves and fishes was big, good. Oh but there is so much more! John 6.1-15 (NIV) Jesus Feeds the Five Thousand 6 Some time after this, Jesus crossed to the far shore of the Sea of Galilee (that is, the Sea of Tiberias), 2 and a great crowd of people followed him because they saw the signs he had performed by healing the sick. 3 Then Jesus went up on a mountainside and sat down with his disciples. 4 The Jewish Passover Festival was near. 5 When Jesus looked up and saw a great crowd coming toward him, he said to Philip, “Where shall we buy bread for these people to eat?” 6 He asked this only to test him, for he already had in mind what he was going to do. 7 Philip answered him, “It would take more than half a year’s wages[a] to buy enough bread for each one to have a bite!” 8 Another of his disciples, Andrew, Simon Peter’s brother, spoke up, 9 “Here is a boy with five small barley loaves and two small fish, but how far will they go among so many?” 10 Jesus said, “Have the people sit down.” There was plenty of grass in that place, and they sat down (about five thousand men were there). 11 Jesus then took the loaves, gave thanks, and distributed to those who were seated as much as they wanted. He did the same with the fish. 12 When they had all had enough to eat, he said to his disciples, “Gather the pieces that are left over. Let nothing be wasted.” 13 So they gathered them and filled twelve baskets with the pieces of the five barley loaves left over by those who had eaten. 14 After the people saw the sign Jesus performed, they began to say, “Surely this is the Prophet who is to come into the world.” 15 Jesus, knowing that they intended to come and make him king by force, withdrew again to a mountain by himself.
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AuthorThe Pastors of Cornerstone Wesleyan Church Archives
July 2017
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