(Note: I put a large piece of Matzah bread on the communion table for a physical illustration later in the sermon)
OPEN: (We put a “McDonald’s sign” – without the word McDonalds – up on the screen)
Does anybody recognize this? That’s right, it’s the symbol for McDonalds. The first McDonalds opened in 1940. But, in 1961a different restaurant opened up here in Logansport, IN and it was such a popular eating place that, when McDonald’s tried to open their restaurant on the East side of town, it almost did NOT survive. Do you know the name of that local Restaurant? It’s called “Happy Burger”. One of Happy Burger’s ads once said their “cows weren’t mad… they were happy” (get it? "Happy Burger" had "Happy cows"). They opened in 1961 and ever since McDonalds opened up years later, they have been going toe to toe. Bob Shanks (the founder of the restaurant) has four restaurants in a 15 mile circle, and McDonald’s only has two.
But, I’m pretty sure McDonalds doesn’t have anything to worry about. I did some research online and I discovered that McDonalds is the largest owner of retail property in the world with a little over 14,000 restaurants in the US and over 36,000 in the entire world. McDonald’s is also the nation’s largest purchaser of beef, pork, and potatoes and it is the 2nd largest purchaser of chicken (I think churches buy more than they do).
One site I visited asked: “Is there anything more universal than McDonald's?" Their answer: "No. The golden arches are the most recognized symbol in the world. The restaurant provides food for people in 119 countries.” (http://www.businessinsider.com/amazing-facts-mcdonalds-2010-12)
Everywhere you go the Golden Arches are unmistakable. The moment you see them - you know what they stand for. One of their advertising schemes from the past was to put up a sign that said over 1 million served… Now it’s more like 100 billion served.
APPLY: But one of the most famous eating places in the world actually served only one meal. It’s said that they served 5000 men (not counting the women and children) in one setting. It took place on an isolated hillside just off the shores of the Sea of Galilee and it didn’t cost those families one penny to eat in the presence of Jesus.
As I researched the story we read this morning - I was kind of surprised by one statistic: There are only 2 miracles recorded in ALL FOUR GOSPELS. This one - where Jesus fed the 5000 with 5 loaves and 2 fish. And the other one – the Resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead.
My first thought when I read this statistic was… this miracle must have made a deep impression on the disciples for them to have included it in all 4 Gospels. And that’s true.
But there’s something even MORE true…
You see, the Gospels were written down by mortal men (Matt, Mark, Luke, John) but they were authored by the Holy Spirit. That means that God felt these 2 miracles were the most important miracles Jesus did while on earth. If these were the ONLY TWO miracles in ALL 4 Gospels … there’s got be a reason.
So, let’s start by examining what’s taking place here in our story.
Matthew tells us that “the crowds followed (Jesus) on foot from the towns. When Jesus … saw (the) crowd, he had compassion on them and healed their sick.”
Mark tells us “(Jesus) had compassion on them, because they were like sheep without a shepherd.”
So Jesus spends the day teaching and healing… and before long it began to get late. And so Jesus asks Philip “Where are we to buy bread, so that these people may eat?”
One preacher I read had an interesting take on the conversation that followed:
Philip was a bean counter, a numbers man. According to Phil's calculator there wasn’t enough money to buy ll the food these folks could eat (400 denarii – more than a year’s wages). And while Phil is doing the math, Andy was out hunting down a solution. But Andy’s contribution was fairly pathetic (a child’s lunch of 5 loaves of bread – 2 fish).
But as I read this take on that discussion I noticed something: Jesus didn’t laugh or make fun of either of these disciples. These were practical men who came up with “practical” solutions. They lived in small worlds hemmed in by their limited imaginations.
Do you think Jesus realized that? Of course He did. Jesus fully understood the kind of men that He was teaching, and that’s precisely why He asks Philip: “Where are we to buy bread, so that these people may eat?” John 6:5
And He asks it so all the others can hear, because everyone knows Philip’s got a solid head on his shoulders. They all know his answer is sensible. So Jesus DELIBERATELY asks Philip… because He wants all of them to THINK! He wants them to understand the impossibility of what He’s about to do.
He draws their attention the problem… and then He sets them up. He gives them an impossible problem and asks how THEY would solve it. Then He not only solves the problem but gets them involved in the solution
1. He has the disciples order the multitude to sit down in companies of 50s…
2. Then He has the disciples hand out the food to the crowd.
3. Then when everyone has eaten their fill… He has the disciples pick up the leftovers.
Now - how many baskets are left over? (12)
Twelve baskets! Why that’s a basket for each of the disciples. It’s kind of like a souvenir – something they can take home and put on the mantle. Something to remember this miracle by.
APPLY: Now what does this story mean for us?
Well, 1st this was a test. John 6:6 tells us “(Jesus) said this to TEST (Philip)...”
Once in a while God is going to put your thru a test. Now this isn’t like being back at school where you receive a grade for answering right. This is the kind of test where God kinda “sets you up”. He puts you in a position where you have to make decisions, make choices.
Now, what I find interesting about this “test” is that Philip didn’t give a great answer. It wasn’t an answer of great faith. Jesus asks WHERE are we going to get the food and Philip answers saying HOW MUCH that food would cost.
Now what is the right answer to Jesus question. Where were they going to get that much food? That’s right – Jesus!
QUOTE: Someone has said that “Christ does not want nibblers of the possible, but grabbers of the impossible." C. T. Studd
I understand the sentiment. I really like that quote. I can identify with what that man was trying to say: we should be people of great vision. Grabbers of the impossible. People of a mighty faith.
But NOT everybody’s ready for that. Sometimes – just like Philip – we just don’t GET it.
My point is: God works with the “nibblers”. Because God doesn’t want them to remain nibblers. He wants to show His power. God wants to break into our world of “possibilities” and make us people of impossibilities.
ILLUS: When I was younger I went to Purdue University for a couple of years. My brother thought I needed to get the chance to sing in their men’s Glee Club and dad was willing to pay the freight. So I figured – why not? But I still wanted to go to Bible college so, when I saw a class listed in the syllabus called “Religions of the West” (dealing with Judaism, Christianity and Islam) I thought – “This will be great! I can take this class and get a leg up on my studies to be a preacher.” I figured they’d teach me all about these religions so I’d at least know something worthwhile to prepare for Bible College.
That’s what I had in mind. Unfortunately, that’s not what the instructor of this class had in mind. The first day I walked into class it was apparent that this professor’s objective was to destroy people’s faith in Scripture. He started out attacking the Old Testament. He stated that Moses didn’t write the first 5 books of the Bible and started talking about a JEDP theory I’d never heard about before.
Now, bear in mind, my entire theological education was what I had learned in Sunday School, but I raised my hand anyway. He called on me and I stated that this wasn’t what I’d been taught, and he just gave me a patronizing smile and said that “the majority of scholars agree with me.”
Then he went on to the next attack and I raised my hand again “that’s not what I’d been taught” and again he’d say “the majority of scholars agree with me.”
Do you remember the movie “God’s Not Dead”? Remember that college student who was so intelligent and skilled in challenging his professor? Well… that wasn’t me. I wasn’t nearly that smart. In fact, I was a bit on the slow side. But eventually I began to realize that if he attacked the Old Testament when dealing with Judaism, he’d do the same thing to the New Testament when he got to Christianity. So I went to the Campus House and got materials I thought would help me stand up against him.
Sure enough, when he got done trashing the Old Testament he moved on to attack the New. He started out by saying that Matthew didn’t write Matthew and Mark didn’t write Mark and Luke didn’t write Luke and John didn’t write John. They’d all borrowed from something called the “Q Source”. This time I was ready. I raised my hand. He said “What?” And then I explained he was wrong because this scholar and this expert said this that and the other thing that debunked his statement (to be honest, I couldn’t tell you what I said that day, I just remember thinking it sounded good).
The prof paused for a couple moments and then said “Well, the majority of scholars agree with me”… and we were off and running. Every time he’d attack the Bible I had a ready response.
Then it came time for mid-terms and I sat down to take the test. At the bottom of the test I wrote that I was sorry to have challenged him so much in class, but he’d been attacking something that was important to me. I promised I’d never interrupt his lessons again. He was going into Islam and I frankly didn’t care about Islam. I was done with the professor… but God wasn’t.
I swear, in the next class, this is roughly what he said: Islam got him to black Muslims. Black Muslims got him to racial prejudice and racial prejudice got him to WWII. And then he said the reason we dropped the bomb on the Japanese and not the Germans was because the Germans were white and the Japanese weren’t.
Now I’m kind of history buff… and that didn’t sound quite right. But I’d made a promise I wouldn’t cause any more trouble in his class so I just kept my mouth shut. But people tell me that when I’m frustrated – I sigh. And I must have sighed at that point because the teacher looked right at me and said “Alright Strite. What’s wrong now?”
I hadn’t said anything! But since he asked I responded that from everything I’d ever heard we didn’t have the bomb when Germany surrendered. He responded: “We did too. We had it in 1942!”
You need to understand, this was in the era of the war in Vietnam… and the government lied about all kinds of things back then. I figured – well, maybe they lied about this too! And I just slumped at my desk – defeated again.
And that’s when God nailed him. One row back, and about 4 seats over, a young woman raised her hand. She said “I’m sorry sir, but you’re wrong. My father worked on that project and we didn’t have the bomb when Germany surrendered.”
Now, I had no expectation of God doing anything that day. I was just nibbling at the possible with what little I knew. I don’t even think that – during that entire time – I had prayed for God to intercede in this matter. It had just never crossed my mind. I was just fighting this fight for God ALL ON MY OWN. And when I’d been defeated, God basically stepped up and said:
“Ok son. Now, just stand back and watch what I can do.”
That is good news for all of us. God will set you up once in a while. And if you come up short on your answer, God won’t laugh at you/make fun of you. What He’ll do is WORK with you because His goal is not to slap you down, but to lift you up.
God uses these “tests” to shape our faith… to put a fire under us and make us grow. And when we miss that lesson, sometimes He’ll remind us of the lesson so we’ll remember what He’s done in our lives.
That’s what happened with this miracle of the feeding of the 5000. In the book of Matthew we read this:
When they went across the lake, the disciples forgot to take bread.
"Be careful," Jesus said to them. "Be on your guard against the yeast of the Pharisees and Sadducees."
They discussed this among themselves and said, "It is because we didn’t bring any bread." Aware of their discussion, Jesus asked, "You of little faith, why are you talking among yourselves about having no bread? Do you not yet perceive? Do you not remember the five loaves for the five thousand, and how many baskets you gathered? Or the seven loaves for the four thousand, and how many baskets you gathered?” Matthew 16:5-10
Jesus expected the disciples to connect the dots, and when they failed to connect those dots He reminded them of what He’d done.
You see, when God wants you to grow in your faith, once in a while He’ll do stuff in our lives. He’ll do that to set a fire under you so that you’ll realize you serve a God who can DO some pretty cool stuff.
But there’s a danger in this. The danger is: if you DON’T have something cool happen in your life you can be fooled into thinking that you can’t really be useful to God.
You see, there’s people out there that God HAS DONE earthshaking things in their lives. They’ve overcome alcohol or drug addiction, or God has restored their marriages or rebuilt their lives in dramatic ways. And you’ll be tempted to look at your life and your experiences and say… I don’t have much to talk about!
But that’s not true, and here’s the reason.
Consider this story here: Jesus feeds the 5000. It’s a powerful and wondrous miracle!!! But the next day the crowd searches for Him. Do you remember why? They want more bread… but they don’t really want Jesus. Jesus talks to them for a while and tells them things that are for them to accept… and they just walk away
John 6:66 (note the 666) tells us that “After this many of his disciples turned back and no longer walked with him.”
As long as Jesus would feed them physical bread they were content to ignore the real bread of life… Jesus. He’d done a powerful miracle in their presence and it didn’t make a bit of difference, because miracles have a limited effect on folks.
The trap for us is when we think that – in order to save the lost – we need more and more exciting stories. If we ever run out of exciting stories (the thinking goes) the crowds will walk away. But that’s not true.
What will draw and keep people isn’t more excitement, and miracles and more fireworks… and more bread. What will draw and keep people is when we make them hungry and thirsty for Jesus.
ILLUS: Years ago, there I read the true story of a woman who put this ad in the local paper: "Lost 50 pounds! Selling my fat clothes - good condition, sizes 18-20."
She was bombarded with phone calls, but nobody wanted to buy the clothes - they all wanted to know how she had lost the 50 pounds. Without realizing what she’d done… that woman made people HUNGRY for what worked for her. That’s what we need to focus on. We need to focus on why Jesus works for us. Why He’s made a difference in our lives. It’s all about making people hungry for what we have in Jesus.
Jesus said “I am the bread of life; whoever comes to me shall not hunger, and whoever believes in me shall never thirst.” John 6:35
And making people hungry for Jesus is less about dramatic and powerful stories as it is about simply telling people what you know about Jesus. There’s a powerful passage out of I John that has always encouraged me. John writes:
“That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we looked upon and have touched with our hands, concerning the word of life—the life was made manifest, and we have seen it, and testify to it and proclaim to you the eternal life, which was with the Father and was made manifest to us—that which we have seen and heard we proclaim also to you, so that you too may have fellowship with us…” I John 1:1-3
In other words, it’s all about telling people what YOU have seen and heard and touched. It’s all about telling people what Jesus has done in your life.
You see, what matters to God isn’t the dramatic stories and earthshaking occurrences that you’ve had in your life. God does do that stuff in your life to give you better witnessing ability. He does those things in our lives to remind US what He can do in our lives.
And when it’s all said and done, God’s objective is to make you and I “Jesus men” and “Jesus women”.
For example: Philip isn’t a central figure in the Gospels. He doesn’t DO much and he doesn’t SAY much. But there’s one passage from the Gospel of John tells us a lot about him.
Philip found Nathanael and said to him, “We have found him of whom Moses in the Law and also the prophets wrote, Jesus of Nazareth, the son of Joseph.”
Nathanael said to him, “Can anything good come out of Nazareth?”
Philip said to him, “Come and see.” John 1:45-46
Notice Philip believed in Jesus. He was sold out for Christ. He knew who Jesus was and was convinced He was everything the prophets had said He was going to be. In fact, Philip was so convinced that Jesus was who He said He was that he went to his friend Nathaniel and excitedly told him all about this Messiah he’d just met.
Now notice when Nathaniel scoffs at the idea of Jesus being someone special Philip doesn’t have a great theological response. Do you remember how Philip responds to Nathaniel’s skepticism?
He just says is: “WELL, COME AND SEE!”
There’s no deep theological points, no doing an intense Bible study of Old Testament prophecies. Just a simple – “You gotta see this for yourself.” And that excitement was so obvious that Nathaniel got up and went to see for himself.
ILLUS: We had a young man in our first service who told me he was texting during the sermon (you’re not supposed to do that, by the way). But he was texting a girl that he’s always had a “thing” for. He told me she’s an atheist. But as they were texting she asked him what he was doing. “I’m in church” he responded. So she asked him what he believed… and so he told her. The upshot of it all was, she suggested that maybe she’d like to come check it out with him some Sunday.
For that, I can forgive him texting in church. But the point is – he didn’t have some deep theological thing to tell her. He just told her what he believed and that sparked her imagination to make her want to check it out.
One last thing.
I struggled all week with the question of what made the feeding of the 5000 so important that it was one of only 2 miracles recorded in all 4 Gospels. And I think I’ve finally came to an answer. It may not be the best answer… but for right now it satisfies me.
One of the key focuses of this miracle/sign that Jesus performed was to tell people that He was the Bread of life.
As I was reading about this feeding of the 5000 in the other Gospels, something caught my attention. In Matthew we’re that “(Jesus) ordered the crowds to sit down on the grass, and taking the five loaves and the two fish, he looked up to heaven and said a blessing. Then he BROKE THE LOAVES and gave them to the disciples, and the disciples gave them to the crowds.” Matthew 14:19
And then I remembered a passage from Luke where Jesus was eating His last meal with His disciples before His crucifixion. We call it the Last Supper. And we’re told that “Jesus took bread, and when he had given thanks, HE BROKE IT and gave it to them, saying, ‘This is my body, which is given for you. Do this in remembrance of me.’” Luke 22:19
And then I remembered something that was said about the worship of the Christians in the days of the early church. Acts 2:42 tells us “(the first Christians) devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and fellowship, to the BREAKING OF BREAD and the prayers.
And then I remembered the 2 men on the road to Emmaus. You remember that story? Jesus had just been crucified and these two men were distraught and discouraged. Their Messiah was dead and all hope was gone. And then Jesus shows up. But they don’t recognize him, they just figure he’s a fellow traveler who hasn’t heard about the tragedy of the crucifixion. As they walk and talk together, Jesus begins telling them all about what the prophets had predicted about His death, burial and resurrection.
And then we’re told they sat down to eat… and Jesus broke the bread. (I took the Matzah bread I had placed on the Communion Table and broke it). And we’re told that “when he was at table with them, he took the bread and blessed and BROKE IT and gave it to them. And THEIR EYES WERE OPENED, and they recognized him.” Luke 24:30-31
They SAW Jesus in the breaking of the bread. Really.
That’s the purpose of communion you know. Every Sunday when we gather at this table that should be our goal. But many folks will take of the Lord’s Supper and they’ll never see Jesus. They don’t understand the importance of that. They just go through a religious ritual and they feel content to simply drink from the cup and eat that little piece of bread. That’s fairly sad.
ILLUS: (I took a piece of the communion bread we commonly use). Now every Sunday I take this little piece of bread and I break it before I take of it. Let me clear, there’s nothing in Scripture that commands that we do such a thing… it’s just something I do. I do it to remind myself that this is an important time for me. This is when I get to eat with Jesus and I don’t want to take it lightly. So I break the bread to remind myself – I want to see Jesus.
CLOSE: I want to close by telling you the story of a man named Robert Tinsky.
Robert Tinsky was reared in Judaism, but over time he became dissatisfied with what he was being taught. It just seemed like something was missing. So one day he decided, for the first time, he’d go visit a Christian Church in his area. It was one of our brotherhood churches where they take of communion every week. And the practice astounded him. He didn’t understand it. He asked some young people seated near him what it meant. They faithfully told him the gospel story as portrayed in the loaf and cup. He was amazed that there was a God who loved mankind enough to give His Son to die for us and at the wisdom that originated such a living memorial. Shortly thereafter, he was baptized into Christ and became involved in the church… and eventually he became a faithful preacher of the gospel.
(Donald A. Nash Christian Standard 1/30/00)
(Long pause) Robert Tinsky became a Christian because… he Jesus in the breaking of the bread.
INVITATION.
