#33 Déjà Vu All Over Again
Series: Mark
Chuck Sligh
November 1, 2020
NOTE: PowerPoint presentation is available for this sermon by request at chucksligh@hotmail.com. Please mention the title of the sermon and the Bible text to help me find the sermon in my archives
TEXT: Mark 8:1-9 – “In those days the multitude being very great, and having nothing to eat, Jesus called his disciples unto him, and saith unto them, 2 I have compassion on the multitude, because they have now been with me three days, and have nothing to eat: 3 And if I send them away fasting to their own houses, they will faint by the way: for divers of them came from far. 4 And his disciples answered him, From whence can a man satisfy these men with bread here in the wilderness? 5 And he asked them, How many loaves have ye? And they said, Seven. 6 And he commanded the people to sit down on the ground: and he took the seven loaves, and gave thanks, and brake, and gave to his disciples to set before them; and they did set them before the people. 7 And they had a few small fishes: and he blessed, and commanded to set them also before them. 8 So they did eat, and were filled: and they took up of the broken meat that was left seven baskets. 9 And they that had eaten were about four thousand: and he sent them away.”
INTRODUCTION
Illus. – Yogi Berra was a famous New York Yankees baseball catcher, manager, coach and Hall of Famer who was known for his famous one-liners that came to be known as “Yogiisms.” Here are some of his more memorable ones:
• It was Yogi who first said, “You can observe a lot by watching.”
• He also once said about a restaurant he used to frequent, “Nobody goes there anymore. It’s too crowded.”
• Another gem: “When you come to a fork in the road, take it.”
• But my all-time favorite was when Yogi witnessed Mickey Mantle and Roger Maris hit two back-to-back homeruns one season in the 1960s. – After watching this, he famously said, “It’s déjà vu all over again.” Well, déjà vu is the feeling that you have lived through the present situation before. So Yogi was essentially saying the same thing twice.
Play along with me for a knock-knock joke:
Knock, knock. [AWAIT “Who’s there.”]
Déjà. [AWAIT “Déjà who?”]
Knock, knock.
In today’s text, you might find yourself experiencing a little bit of déjà vu all over again. It’s about Jesus feeding a multitude of people. You may be thinking, Wait, didn’t Jesus feed a huge crowd of people a couple of chapters ago? Yep, you are correct: back in chapter 6 when He fed 5,000 men.
In fact, unbelieving Bible critics have seized on this, saying this a repeat of the original story. “Ha,” they say joyously, “A mistake in the Bible! See, the Bible isn’t inspired.”
Well, not so fast.There are definitely many similarities in both stories: Both occur in deserted settings; both emphasize Jesus’ compassion on the crowds; both have Jesus asking, “How many loaves do you have?”; the command to recline is similar in both accounts; both accounts have Jesus thanking God for the food; both involve participation from the disciples; in both it is stated that the people ate and were satisfied; leftovers were gathered after both meals; and finally, both stories end with Jesus dismissing the crowd and taking a boat trip.
But there are important differences between the two stories:
• The first time Jesus fed 5,000 MEN (no women or children were present because it was a crowed of Zealots hoping to force Jesus to militantly declare His Messiahship and defeat Roman rule); the second time, Mark tells us there were 4,000 PEOPLE, indicating a varied congregation of men, women and maybe children.
• The first feeding began with 5 loaves and 2 fish, whereas the story in today’s text mentions 7 loaves and a few small fish.
• Next, the word for fish is different in each account: one using the generic word for fish and in the other, Mark chose a Greek word that refers to little sardines.
• In the first feeding, the crowd was with Jesus only 1 day; in the second, 3 days.
• In the second feeding, people were not broken up into groups as they are in the first feeding but are simply seated on the ground.
• And lastly, the number of baskets of leftovers also differs (12 in the first and 7 in the second), as do the Greek words used for “basket” (a picnic-sized basket in the first feeding and a basket big enough for a man to be put into in the second.)
But the strongest proof that Jesus performed at least two feedings is that later in Mark 8, Jesus specifically says there were two feedings. In rebuking the disciples for their spiritual dullness, He said in verses 18b-20 – “‘…and do you not remember 19 when I broke the five loaves for the five thousand, how many baskets full of fragments did you take up?’ They said to him, ‘Twelve.’ 20 ‘And when I broke the seven for the four thousand, how many baskets full of fragments did you take up?” And they said, ‘Seven.” 21 So he said to them, ‘How is it that you do not understand?’”
So Mark didn’t run out of material and decide to recycle the feeding of the 5,000. Today’s story is of a second feeding of a large crowd that is very insightful in its own right.
I. CONSIDER WITH ME IN VERSES 1-3 THE NEED JESUS WAS KEEN TO ADDRESS – “In those days the multitude being very great, and having nothing to eat, Jesus called his disciples to him, and said to them, 2 ‘I have compassion on the multitude, because they have now been with me three days, and have nothing to eat. 3 And if I send them away hungry to their own houses, they will faint by the way: for some of them came from far away.’”
The phrase, “In those days” at the beginning of verse 1 ties the feeding of the 4,000 to Jesus’ journey to Decapolis, which we pointed out last week was a Gentile territory. At the end of verse 1 we’re told that Jesus “called his disciples to Him.” The word for called literally means “summoned” and in Mark is used whenever Jesus is about to intervene in a situation. So if you see this in Mark, hold your breath: something awesome is about to happen!
In verse 2 Jesus says, “I have compassion on the multitude.” The word for compassion used here does not mean a fleeting emotional response, but rather being moved intensely within the deepest well of one’s emotions.
We’ve seen several instances of Jesus’ compassion on individuals and groups of people. He had compassion when people suffered greatly from some wretched disease or from the human damage caused by demon possession, but He also had compassion on something as simple as missing a few meals. It reminds us that there is no problem great or small that God does not care about.
Jesus said that the reason He had compassion on the crowd was that they had been with Him for three days, and some of them had come from far away. To be hungry after a day is bad enough, but these were people who were remaining long after their meager supplies had run out because they were seeking to learn from Jesus. He knew that some would collapse on their journey home since they were in such a deserted, isolated place away from towns and villages.
II. VERSES 4-5 IS WHEN WE EXPERIENCE DÉJÀ VU ALL OVER AGAIN THE FIRST TIME. – “And his disciples answered him, ‘Where can anyone find enough to satisfy these people with bread here in this desolate place?’ 5 And he asked them, ‘How many loaves do you have?””
Hold on now—Wasn’t this exactly what the disciples asked when Jesus fed the 5,000? Had they learned nothing in the weeks since the last time Jesus fed a multitude? What was WRONG with these dudes? How shortsighted, forgetful and lacking in belief they were!
This highlights for us again the slowness of the disciples in understanding the significance of the presence of Jesus when they experienced a new crisis. This has been a recurring theme throughout the book of Mark. Even when they had only recently experienced the need to feed a multitude in an isolated place, their first thought wasn’t “Oh, Jesus can take care of this.”
But before you judge the disciples too harshly, haven’t we been guilty of the same thing? How many times have you and I gone through a crisis in our lives and seen how God got us through it with either a miracle that saved the day, or by God giving us the strength to get through it, heightening our sense of God’s presence. The first time we go through these kinds of things, we naturally panic and worry and fret and struggle and complain to God. But in the end God brings us through the crisis and we come out on the other side stronger and better for it. Then sometime later on, we go through the SAME kind of thing and instead of turning it over to Jesus and trusting Him to guide us through it and give us peace and strength and endurance, we panic and worry and fret and struggle just like we did the last time.
But we’re not alone in this. Even great biblical characters in the Old Testament were guilty. In Genesis 12, Abraham denied Sarah before Pharaoh, and then turned around and did the same thing before Abimelech in Genesis 20. Elijah, one of the greatest prophets complained to the Lord that he was the only believer left. – God took Him out on a mountain and showed him an amazing display of His presence and power and after witnessing this once-in-a-millennium experience, he repeated the same complaint in exactly the same words as he did before.
Oh how slow we are to learn! It takes a lifetime before many of God’s most important character traits are seared into the inner core of our being. If it’s any consolation to you, as Susan and I have grown older, we have finally learned some of those lessons of faith God needed us to go through, even though along the way we stumbled many times. So if you’ll have perseverance in crises, there’s hope that change will come.
III. IN VERSES 6-9, WE EXPERIENCE DÉJÀ VU ALL OVER AGAIN…AGAIN…WHEN JESUS TAKES COMMAND AND MEETS THE NEED. – “And he commanded the people to sit down on the ground: and he took the seven loaves, and gave thanks, and broke them, and gave them to his disciples to set before the people; and they set them before them. 7 And they had a few small fish: and he blessed them, and commanded that these also should be set before them. 8 So they ate and were filled: and they took up seven baskets of leftover fragments. 9 And those who had eaten were about four thousand: and he sent them away.”
As in the first feeding, Jesus commanded the people to be seated on the ground and then He gave thanks for the food they were about to eat—but there’s an interesting difference: In the feeding of the 5,000, which took place in an area controlled by Jews, Jesus LOOKED UP and gave thanks (Mark 6:41). But in the feeding of the 4,000, Jesus simply gives thanks without the heavenly look.
I wouldn’t have noticed this little detail, but some of my commentators pointed out that in the first case, Jesus was following the Jewish custom of thanking God for the food by looking up to heaven since there was no inherent need to challenge a settled custom, whereas in the second feeding, Jesus seemed more intent on teaching this mostly Gentile audience the core biblical idea of expressing thanks for God’s provision without any unnecessary trappings.
As in the first feeding, the crowd ate what was essentially barley rolls and fish and when they had eaten, they were all filled. This time though, they had a lot more left over. The word for basket in the first feeding was a small wicker basket about the size perhaps of a picnic basket for the remnants, and the disciples had twelve baskets-full left over—one for each of the disciples. This time the word used for basket refers to a large rope or mat basket, some of which were large enough for a man to fit in. In fact, in Acts 9:25, when some disciples of Paul lowered him over the city walls in a basket to escape persecution, this is the word for basket used. So even though the number of baskets was fewer in the feeding of the 4,000, the quantity of leftovers the disciples took with them was significantly larger.
After everyone was fed and satisfied, verse 9 says that Jesus sent them home.
CONCLUSION
Last time, in the feeding of the 5,000 we saw some applications of the passage to our lives.
I won’t repeat them because that would just be déjà vu all over again, again, again.
A few new takeaways stick out to me from this passage that we should think about:
First of all, notice that Jesus cares about even the little things in our lives.
I have fasted at various times in my life and the worst part is day 3 of a fast. But really, you aren’t starving at that point. You’re ravenously hungry, but the hunger pangs die out around day 4, and depending on your weight, actual starvation doesn’t start until around day 40. In other words, though the crowd was hungry, they had probably brought at least a day’s worth of food to sustain them, so they were not in serious hunger. Yet even then, Jesus was moved with compassion on them.
Jesus cares for us in both the little things and in the big things. In Luke 12:7, Jesus said, “Are not five sparrows sold for two cents, and not one of them is forgotten before God? 7 But even the very hairs of your head are all numbered. Fear not therefore: you are of more value than many sparrows.”
Throughout God’s Word we see that God is interested in more than just the BIG things going on in our lives; He cares about EVERY ASPECT OF WHO WE ARE because we are His creation made in His image. He cares for all of His creation, including plants, animals and the environment. In Matthew 6:26, Jesus says, “Behold the fowls of the air: for they neither sow nor reap, nor gather into barns; yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they?”
If God cares so deeply about the needs of birds and other creatures He has created who are not made in God’s image and who have no will to choose or reject Him, how much more does He care about OUR daily needs and struggles.
God DOES care about the little things in our lives because He cares about US. We are more than “little things” to God. Psalm 136:17-18 says, “How precious also are your thoughts to me, O God! how great is the sum of them! 18 If I should count them, they would be more in number than the sand: when I awake, I am still with you.”
Illus. – A few months ago I went through a “big” crisis in my life that maybe I’ll tell you about at a later time. I poured my heart out to God and He was “there for me” during that time and guided me to the right people to find the answers.
One day after being on the other side of that experience, I was running a bunch of errands, and when I got to the post office, since I was on a tight schedule I prayed that God would both let there be a parking space close by and that there would be a short line if we got a slip for a package. Surprisingly, I was able to get a parking space right by the post office and though there was a package, I was in and out in 5 minutes flat, something I had not experienced since COVID-19 hit the fan in March.
I whispered, “Thank you, Lord.” And all during the day I was praying for little things like that and God was answering every one of them, and I was thanking God for each one.
Suddenly I thought, I have just gone through one the darkest times in my life. Does God really care about this little stuff I’m asking Him about now? Well, I like the way J.I. Packer answered that question – He said: “Of course God cares about the little things in our lives because everything is ‘little’ compared to God.”
I know God doesn’t always answer our prayers the way we want Him to in either big or little things, but what we do know from Scripture is that Jesus cares about US. Therefore, Peter says you should, “cast all your care upon him, for he cares for you.”
The other thing Jesus wants us to see from the feeding of the 4,000 is that Jesus Himself is the Bread of Life.
Jesus said in John 6:35 – “I am the bread of life. He who comes to Me shall never hunger, and he who believes in Me shall never thirst.”
Why did Jesus refer to Himself as the Bread of Life? Jesus said these words after the first feeding—the feeding of the 5,000. Bread was not a side item in ancient times. It was an essential food, a staple food, a basic dietary item. A person can live a long time on just bread and water. It was such a basic staple in ancient times that it became synonymous for food in general in virtually every language where there was cultivation. Bread was ESSENTIAL to human nourishment.
When Jesus says He is the Bread of Life, He’s teaching that He is not like a sweet treat—that is, something that is enjoyable but not really necessary. He’s saying He is ESSENTIAL for life—not just physical life, but eternal life. He’s essential for eternal life and spiritual life in the same way that bread was essential for physical life in ancient times.
Jesus is not just one way to the Father or to heaven or to have your sins forgiven. He is the ESSENTIAL and ONLY way. In John 14:6, Jesus left no room for other roads to God by saying, “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me.”
To go to the Father, to go to heaven, you MUST go through Jesus. He is the essential element of salvation.
Later in John 6:47-51, Jesus elaborated on this a little bit. – “Truly, truly, I say to you, whoever believes in me has everlasting life. 48 I am the bread of life. 49 Your fathers ate manna in the wilderness and are dead. 50 This is the bread which comes down from heaven, that one may eat of it and not die. 51 I am the living bread which came down from heaven: if anyone eats of this bread, he will live forever: and the bread that I will give is my flesh, which I will give for the life of the world.”
These verses tell us the Gospel in the metaphor of bread. Just as the Israelites received manna, a new kind of bread, from heaven, so Jesus as the Bread of Life came down from heaven. The bread He gave was His flesh, that is, His body, which was crucified on a cross to pay the penalty for our sins. To “eat” of Him is to take Him into your life by faith, for verse 47 says, “…whoever believes in me has everlasting life.”
Dear friend, have you come to a place in your life where you realized that your sin has separated you from God and that Jesus is absolutely necessary for you to be saved? Jesus is the Savior. This morning, turn from sin, give your life to Jesus, place your faith in Jesus and what He did on the cross of Calvary for your sin.
Illus. – The story is told of a missionary who was passing out copies of the Gospel of John in the central provinces of India. One man took the Gospel of John and the missionary was excited as the man opened it to read it. But when he realized it was Christian literature, he tore it into pieces and threw it on the ground. Another man shortly came by that same place and picked up a piece of the torn paper to see what it was. He read these words in his own language, “…the bread of life…”
He did not know what it meant so he asked some of his friends if they knew the meaning of this phrase. One friend told him, “I can tell you that these are words from the Christian Book. You must not read it, or you will be defiled.”
The man thought to himself, “A phrase as beautiful as this cannot defile.” So he bought a copy of the New Testament and read it until he found the statement, “I am the bread of life.” Which means he read through Matthew, Mark, and Luke until he came to John 6. As he read and studied the passage, the light of the God’s Word flooded his heart and he trusted Christ as his Lord and Savior. According to the story this man found a body of believer to worship with and learn God’s Word and eventually became a preacher of the Gospel in the central provinces of India.
That’s an amazing story, isn’t it? But everyone who has come to Christ has some sort of story of how they realized that Jesus Christ was absolutely necessary for his or her very soul. They realized He was the essential element to know God and be with God.
Listen again to Jesus’ words in John 6:35: “I am the bread of life. He who comes to Me shall never hunger, and he who believes in Me shall never thirst.”
Come to Jesus this morning. Partake of His life through repentance and faith in Him. If you do, you will never hunger or thirst spiritually again. You will be a child of God and have everlasting life.
