August 4, 2002 -- ELEVENTH SUNDAY AFTER PENTECOST -- Proper 13
Isaiah 55:1-5
Psalm 145:8-9, 15-22 (Psalm 145: 8-9, 14-21 NRSV)
You open wide your hand and satisfy the needs of every living creature. (Ps. 145:17)
Romans 9:1-5
Matthew 14:13-21
Color: Green
Title: “The basis for Christian ministry is trustful obedience.”
Feeding the Five Thousand
13 Now when Jesus heard this, he withdrew from there in a boat to a deserted place by himself. But when the crowds heard it, they followed him on foot from the towns. 14When he went ashore, he saw a great crowd; and he had compassion for them and cured their sick. 15When it was evening, the disciples came to him and said, "This is a deserted place, and the hour is now late; send the crowds away so that they may go into the villages and buy food for themselves." 16Jesus said to them, "They need not go away; you give them something to eat." 17They replied, "We have nothing here but five loaves and two fish." 18And he said, "Bring them here to me." 19Then he ordered the crowds to sit down on the grass. Taking the five loaves and the two fish, he looked up to heaven, and blessed and broke the loaves, and gave them to the disciples, and the disciples gave them to the crowds. 20And all ate and were filled; and they took up what was left over of the broken pieces, twelve baskets full. 21And those who ate were about five thousand men, besides women and children.
Moved with compassion, Jesus multiplies the loaves and fish to feed the crowd.
In Matthew’s order of events this first feeding story follows the flashback about the death of John the Baptist, which also took place in the context of a banquet. The contrast is intentional. At Herod’s banquet, symbolizing how people of this world enjoy themselves, there is pride, conspiracy, resentment and murder, all taking place in the lovely and comfortable surroundings of a royal court, a guarded place. At Jesus’ banquet there is healing, trustful obedience, sharing and unity, all taking place in an open field, a deserted place. Matthew has taken this story from Mark 6: 35-44, shortened it, and upgraded the image of the disciples. He wants to show what happens when disciples follow the commands of Jesus- the results are abundant, miraculous, stupendous. In Mark the disciples misunderstand much of what takes place and need explanations at every turn. In Matthew they show more understanding and function better as disciples, but they still need growth in faith.
The Old Testament background for this story is 2 Kings 4: 42-44, the feeding of a hundred men by Elisha with only twenty loaves of barley and some fresh ears of grain. There and in this story we find a small amount of food available, the servant protesting that; “It cannot be done” with so little, the successful feeding of the many and the surprising amount left over. Also the notation that the setting was “deserted,” reminds of the feeding with manna in the desert in Exodus 16. Jewish expectation of a return of manna when the Messiah comes suggests it was a messianic gesture. So, besides reminding of the past, the story looks to the future, immediate, the Eucharist and distant the eschatological messianic banquet at the end of time, as in Isaiah 25: 6.
The early church loved this story, so much that it is told twice in Mark and Matthew and is the only miracle story told by all four evangelists. They saw it as a lesson on the Eucharist. John has a long reflection on the “Bread of Life,” how revelation, the word, became Eucharist, the word-made-flesh, in Jesus. While the synoptic writers did not elaborate so much as John, there is ample symbolism in the way they tell the story to point to the Eucharist. In fact, it is so hard to separate what factually happened from its symbolic overtones that some have gone so far as to see only symbolism, no real miracle, in the story; an error, to be sure.
In verse thirteen, “Now when Jesus heard this, he withdrew from there in a boat to a deserted place by himself. But when the crowds heard it, they followed him on foot from the towns.” Matthew has already used the sending forth of the twelve in chapter ten, so he could not use the apostles’ return from mission to introduce this story, as did Mark (6: 30-31). Instead, he uses the report of the Baptist’s death (14: 2) as foil for contrasting Herod’s banquet with that of Jesus.
“to a deserted place by himself:” The location is obviously the Sea of Galilee, not a desert around for miles. In fact, there was the sea and towns near enough to buy food. However, the Greek word eremos, is meant to allude to ancient Israel’s wanderings in the desert and God’s feeding Israel with manna.
In verse fourteen, “When he went ashore, he saw a great crowd; and he had compassion for them and cured their sick.” Some interpretations have the word pity instead of compassion, “Pity” does not mean “feel sorry.” It means being able to put oneself in the place of another and act accordingly. If another is powerless and I can give that person power because I identify with the situation, I do not just “feel,” bad but am “moved, to act, with pity.” This brand of compassion motivated all of Jesus’ actions and imitated his Father’s motivation.
“and he cured their sick:” Mark (6:34) says that Jesus taught them. Matthew stresses that he healed their sick Luke mentions both. Since Matthew omits the reason for Jesus’ compassion, that is, that they were “like sheep without a shepherd,” he stresses the compassionate healing by Jesus.
In verse sixteen, “Jesus said to them, "They need not go away; you give them something to eat." This order from Jesus, commanding disciples to do the seemingly impossible, given their lack of resources, is the heart of the story. Because they obey, the people are fed. The disciples do not provide the power, they distribute its results. The power comes from Jesus, but reaches the people through the disciples. This is the whole basis for Christian ministry, trustful obedience despite the facts or the odds.
In verse seventeen, “They replied, "We have nothing here but five loaves and two fish." There is no symbolic meaning attached to the numbers five and two here. The amount of available resources was too small to meet the needs of so large a crowd. Bread and fish were basic Galilean rations and made for a very ordinary meal. The loaf would have been quite small itself, more like a bun. The fish would be more like a relish for the bread, something like our sardines. John tells us the bread and fish were those of a small boy, perhaps his lunch for the day. The reason for the fish, which fade into the background in the telling of the story, can only be that that’s what happened. Those who want to reduce the story to pure symbolism with no basis in fact are hard pressed to explain the fish. They really have no symbolic significance within this story. They do have symbolic import in Christian teaching outside the story, however.
In verse eighteen, “bring them here to me,” Jesus commands his disciples to bring all they have to him and he will multiply their meager resources to fit the task at hand. The disciples will then distribute or communicate what Jesus had done. This command by Jesus is not in Mark, but in Matthew serves to highlight the importance of obeying Jesus.
In verse nineteen, “Then he ordered the crowds to sit down on the grass. Taking the five loaves and the two fish, he looked up to heaven, and blessed and broke the loaves, and gave them to the disciples, and the disciples gave them to the crowds.
Bread and fish do not a banquet make, especially absent wine, but the reclining , is the position taken for banqueting and here the symbolic meets the physical. The intention is to allude to the Messianic banquet promised in the Old Testament.
“looking up to heaven, he said the blessing…broke…gave,” “Looking up to heaven” is the posture of prayer and saying the “blessing” like our “Grace Before Meals,” was the normal Jewish practice. Jesus performs the role of the father or head of a household at a typical Jewish meal and blesses God, not the food, for providing for them. There follows the breaking of the bread and it distribution to all at table. In larger gatherings, as here, others are enlisted to help with the distribution. There is no mention of the distribution of the fish. The event’s connection with the [later] Eucharist has taken over completely. The actions and words- blessed, broke and gave- are the same as those in any ordinary Jewish meal, but also the same as those in the meal at Emmaus (Luke 24: 30) and at the Last Supper. No doubt, their occurrence here would remind later Christians of the Eucharist.
In verse twenty, “And all ate and were filled; and they took up what was left over of the broken pieces, twelve baskets full.” This was no token meal or symbolic consumption of a small amount. It may not have been, strictly speaking, a banquet, but it was a full and satisfying meal. Such satisfaction was what people looked and hoped for in the Kingdom of God.
“fragments left over- twelve wicker baskets full,” This further indicates the abundance of food which began as a paucity of resources. Though many do, there is no reason to see the number twelve here as symbolic of either the Twelve apostles or the tribes of Israel.
In verse twenty-one, “And those who ate were about five thousand men, besides women and children.” “About” the Greek word, hosei, makes it clear that this is an approximation, not an exact number. Adding the note about women and children serves to indicate the number was even much larger than that and, even though they would not be counted in Jewish calculation, they do count in Jesus’ estimation and they were present and fed as well.
Sermon
It is impossible to read this story and not think of the Eucharist. On the physical level Jesus miraculously fed a lot of hungry people, powerless to feed themselves. Now, they were not hopelessly powerless. They probably could have gone to the neighboring towns and villages and gotten food. Probably none would have actually starved. Their physical needs were real but could be met otherwise. However, their spiritual need for nourishment, the kind that both gives and enhances life, as opposed to the kind that satiates physical hunger pains, those needs could only be met by the “miracle,” who is Jesus.
Now there are lessons and truths here that are not strictly dependent on the Eucharist. The idea that we offer to God whatever little we have available and he will add the rest to get his tasks done, that idea does not depend on the Eucharist. Non-Christians and even Christians who do not celebrate the Eucharist believe that and find that truth fulfilled in their lives, absent the Eucharist. For all Christians Jesus comes into us through his Word as well as his Word-made-flesh, the Eucharist.
The idea that God does not merely donate “matching funds,” that is, match what we offer even-steven, but blesses us abundantly, with far more than we need to accomplish his tasks, is not restricted to the Eucharist or Eucharistic theology. Nor is the idea that we are not to waste his grace, or take it for granted, simply because it is in more than ample supply, strictly Eucharistic.
The idea that when people eat food together something more happens than the mere satiation of physical hunger, that people experience a unity in sharing a meal, that what people do when they eat together is more than what animals do or what humans who eat alone do, is not strictly Eucharistic, not restricted to Eucharistic theology.
The unique experience of the Eucharist is not that any of these profound truths cannot be experienced without the Eucharist. The uniqueness is how all these and other truths are experienced together, all at once in the Eucharist. How multi-layered the experience of Jesus in the Eucharist is! It exceeds our experience of him through his Word because the Eucharist even includes that experience, whereas the converse is not true.
Like a great meal, a banquet, which brings together the finest food and drink, and prepares it with the finest accumulated experience of great cooks, masterminds of nuance, balance, taste as well as nutrition, artistic scientists, the Eucharist starts out with the rawest of ingredients- our lives, fresh but indigestible in their present forms and ends up with a result “simply divine,” indescribable in words, only appreciated by tasting and digesting. Yet, the banquet is not really the layout on the table. That’s just the raw material for the eating, conversing, laughing, singing, sharing, dancing, celebrating life.
Physically, the poor Galilean peasants did not eat what we would call a banquet, no matter how tasty and exquisite it might have seemed to their hungry mouths at the time. Nor do we at the Eucharist. But spiritually and symbolically they were having the feast of their lives. And so do we when we consume the small wafer and sip the wine. The divine world, Jesus, enters into us and we enter into his world. The earth rules do not apply. One need not be a Christian to enjoy life at a banquet, but one cannot be Christian and not experience life now as a banquet, even in the midst of physical deprivation, when he or she celebrates the Eucharist.
Obedience to his Word leads to feeding his people. Christianity without the Eucharist is just not enough fun, not enough feasting, not enough joy to be able to respond to the abundance God lays out on his table for us. Amen.
