Grace and the Feeding to the 5000

I have just been re-reading Philip Yancey’s brilliant book What’s so amazing about grace?  In the light of this I was reading the Feeding of the 5000 in Matthew's' Gospel and realised what a grace filled occasion it was.

The context for this miracle was that Jesus has just been told that John the Baptist, his relative, the forerunner of his ministry, has been beheaded by Herod.  I am sure Jesus was very upset and the Bible says ‘When Jesus heard what had happened, he withdrew by boat privately to a solitary place’ (Matthew 14: 13).  

However Jesus was not going to get any private grieving time or time to process what had happened or talk to his heavenly Father because the crowd ran round the lake and were waiting for him.  Most of us, I am sure, would not have been pleased to see them but Jesus full of grace and truth healed all their sick.

As evening approached, the disciples, full of worldly wisdom, asked Jesus to send the crowd away to get food and lodging for the night. Jesus however replied ‘They do not need to go away. You give them something to eat.’ (Matthew 14: 16).  

The disciples must have been amazed.  Most people hearing this suggestion would have gladly agreed and been happy to get rid of the crowd of needy people but Jesus not only does not seem to want to get rid of them but he actually expects the disciples to feed them.

In Mark’s Gospel the disciples told Jesus that for them to feed the people would cost half a year’s wage – a lot of money in anyone’s currency – but in the currency of heaven, all that is needed is 5 loaves and 2 fish.

Grace – being given something you don’t deserve – does the impossible and feeds a huge crowd, so that everyone ate and was satisfied. There was no portioning out the meagre rations. It was eat and be satisfied; have as much as you like.  Not only that but there was more food left over at the end of the meal than they started with. 

Grace is an attitude of life that Jesus exemplified. Jesus never decided if someone was deserving of a miracle or healing. He just did it. He healed all their diseases (Matthew 4: 24). Jesus didn’t look at the enormous, hungry crowd and teach them a lesson in personal responsibility, he graciously fed them.

Of course there were times when having healed someone, Jesus told them to ‘go and sin no more.’ However Jesus never waited till someone had got their act together before healing or providing for them.

When Mother Teresa spoke to President Clinton and top government officials at a National Prayer Breakfast, she confronted them about the appallingly high level of abortion in USA and it is just about as awful in all the Western world. She told them that if Americans did not want their babies, give them to her and she would take them and find homes for them. 3000 babies were sent to her. That is a level of grace and trust in God that falls into the Feeding of the 5000 category.

Mother Teresa was moved by compassion just as Jesus was. When he saw need, his heart was touched and he extravagantly met the need.  Grace does not decide the rights and wrongs of a situation; it just loves to bless.

I am so thankful for the grace God and many other have shown me. My prayer is that I grow in grace and compassion every day.

Praise the Lord!

¹ Praise the Lord, O my soul;
all my inmost being, praise his holy name.
² Praise the Lord, O my soul,
and forget not all his benefits—
³ who forgives all your sins
and heals all your diseases,
⁴ who redeems your life from the pit
and crowns you with love and compassion,
⁵ who satisfies your desires with good things
so that your youth is renewed like the eagle’s. Psalm 103:  1 – 5

There are times when, like David, we need to encourage ourselves about the goodness of God. If we wake up one morning and just feel a bit out of sorts, or life is not going well, this is a great psalm to read to remind ourselves of all God’s wonderful ways.

The psalm exhorts us to praise the Lord. Praise is a gateway into the presence of God. Psalm 100 tells us ‘to enter his gates with thanksgiving and his courts with praise’. This is not because God’s gates only open with praise; indeed there are times to rush to God in our distress for his comfort and grace. However, praise reminds us of who we are worshipping and why. As we think, speak, sing or shout his praises, it is our hearts and spirits that are enlarged and our vision of both God and the wonderful possibilities for our lives that is changed.

David then goes on to encourage us to remember all God’s benefits – and who do they benefit-  us!  He forgives our sins, heals our diseases and redeems our life from the pit. If that is not enough he crowns us with love and compassion.  A crown is what a king or queen wears to show their royalty or in past times the winner was crowned to show their success. God elevates us with love and compassion. The psalm says many times that God is compassionate to us. He feels deeply for us in our weaknesses and distress.

God also satisfies our desires with good things – God only gives good gifts because God is good. God does not give us bad gifts anymore than we would give bad gifts to our children, no matter how wayward they were. God does not send sickness, pain, poverty, unhappiness and so on. Indeed his desire is to lift us out of these things and give us good gifts. He wants to satisfy our desires, not keep disappointing us. ‘Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of the heavenly lights’ (James 1: 17).  

Finally, as if all that was not enough, God renews our strength like the eagle. In the Bible the eagle is a symbol of vigour and God does not want us weak – he wants us strong in him. God has such wonderful plans and purposes for our lives. He wants to fulfil our dreams; he wants to give us good things; he wants our lives dripping with his love and grace. This psalm is a source of huge encouragement to us and as we read it, let our spirits soar again with praise and thankfulness to our amazing, wonderful God.

Clothed with compassion

Jesus had sent the twelve disciples out on their first mission trip without him.  They came back full of excitement of all that they had seen and accomplished in Jesus name. Even the demons had fled!  Jesus invited them to come away with him to a quiet place for a de-brief and for some rest. 

As an aside - isn’t it interesting what value God places on rest? We place such value on work and achievements and little value on rest. But at the beginning God rested on the seventh day after the work of creation and this must be our model too.  We need to learn to take a proper rest and have a different day once a week to frame and shape our week.

So having taken the disciples away to a quiet place on the other side of the Sea of Galilee, who do they find when they get there?  The very crowd they were trying to get away from!  It is at this point that most of us would turn the boat around and try and find somewhere else and quickly.  Jesus though saw the crowd and ‘had compassion on them because they were like sheep without a shepherd’ Mark 6:34

Jesus' compassion at moments like this is truly amazing.  He and the disciples needed some down time, some rest but Jesus saw the greater need and his compassion rose.  It says in Matthew that he taught them and healed their sicknesses.  He saw their need – to be taught – but he also saw what they wanted and needed – to be healed.

What is even more amazing is that having taught the crowd and then healed their sick, he fed them.  The disciples requested that Jesus send them away to get food but Jesus instead fed them with the five loaves and two fish.  He had time for another miracle. No matter what was going on Jesus had time for those in need.

There are times when we feel we will never have even a gram of the compassion of Jesus. We feel just too selfish but God wants to work in our hearts and with his amazing love, win and woo us to better things than we could ever think or imagine. Let us pray for greater compassion for those people or situations that we find difficult or those we feel we have no time for. Let God’s compassion clothe us.

‘Therefore as God’s chosen people, holy and dearly loved, let us clothe ourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience’ Colossians 3: 12. Compassion is seen as a garment that we need to put on. It will cover our shortcomings and clothe us with the likeness of Jesus.  Let us encourage ourselves to ever greater depths and heights of compassion and let us have time for those in need.  

Who touched me?

 In both Luke 8 and Mark 5 we read the story of the woman who had been subject to bleeding for 12 years who came and touched Jesus’ clothes for healing.  Bleeding of this nature is deeply embarrassing even in this day and age but in Jesus’ time it was not just embarrassing but also meant that she was unclean. She would have been shunned by society as no one would have wanted to go to her house or have her come to their house as anything she sat on would be unclean and if you then touched it you also became unclean (Leviticus 15: 25 – 30).

She had suffered like this for 12 years and had spent all she had on trying to get well and Mark says she had suffered a great deal at the hand of doctors but had only got worse not got better. 

Jesus was on his way to raise Jairus’ daughter from the dead and both Mark and Luke record that the crowd pressed or crushed around him.  It must have been like getting out of a football match!  People pressing in everywhere and only one way to go – Jesus’ way! The woman seeing that Jesus was passing her way and having heard all about the healings that he had done, knew that this was her moment.  She was far too embarrassed to come to him directly for healing so she just thought that if she touched his cloak she would be healed and she was. 

No doubt she hoped that she could quietly slip out of the crowd, wait 7 days and then confirm her healing with the priests and offer her sacrifice (Leviticus 15:28 – 30) and she would be pronounced clean again.  However Jesus wanted testimony of what had happened and also I think re-instate her in society.  When Jesus asked who had touched him, the disciples looked at the crowd and then Jesus with disbelief.  Everyone was touching him but Jesus persisted; he knew healing power had gone out of him. Eventually the woman knew she could no longer hide but came and fell at his feet, trembling with fear. She was excepting to be rebuked for making him unclean and ‘stealing’ a healing.

Jesus though, with great compassion, wanted to commend and confirm her faith and I believe also wanted to release her from shame and embarrassment. Before the whole crowd pressing in he said, ‘Daughter your faith has healed you. Go in peace and be freed from your suffering’ Mark 5:34 Instead of just having a private healing she also had a public commendation. 

Jesus has such compassion for the sick, hurt and abused; for those on the margins of society and those who have suffered greatly at the hands of others. He wants us, his church, to minister to people with the same level of mercy, love and compassion.   Offer yourself to be used by God to bring his healing and release to others who may have suffered much. Let God stir your heart with the same compassion Jesus had as he uses you to minister his healing power into their lives with his love.

Jesus wept

Jesus had gone to a town called Nain and as he entered the city gates, there was a funeral procession coming out.  A young man, who was his mother’s only son, had died and she was a widow.  In that culture she was now in a desperate place. Provision for women came either through their father, husband or son.  She had none of these to provide for her so apart from the awful grief of losing her only son, she also had no one to provide for her in her old age.

And when the Lord saw her, He had compassion on her and said to her, ‘Do not weep.’  Luke 8: 13 (Amp)

This widow was not looking for Jesus, she didn’t even ask him for anything but Jesus in his great compassion, raised her son from the dead. Imagine her joy; her only son returned to her!

The shortest verse in the Bible is ‘Jesus wept’ John 11:35.  This verse is found in the story of Lazarus being raised from the dead.  His sisters, Mary and Martha were overcome with grief and with the belief that if Jesus had only come sooner Lazarus would not have died because Jesus would have healed him.  When Jesus saw her (Mary) weeping and all the Jews who had come along with her also weeping, he was deeply moved in spirit and troubled’ Luke 11:33.   Again Jesus is moved with compassion by the tears of the ladies whose breadwinner had died.  Lazarus was his great friend and Jesus knew he was going to raise him from the dead.  Nevertheless he was deeply moved and troubled by their grief.  

Again and again in the Bible God draws special attention to looking after widows and orphans (for example Deuteronomy 10:18 and Psalm 68:5). The Bible says God defends the cause of the fatherless and widows because they are often the most vulnerable members of society.  God is a compassionate God.  He is just as concerned about widows and orphans today. God cares deeply about the vulnerable members of any society and will defend them.  God has not changed; he is still deeply compassionate for those grieving or in trouble. If you feel alone, vulnerable, weak, uncared for God knows and cares. Trust him to defend your cause and look after you.

God’s mercies are new every morning

‘Because of God’s great love we are not consumed
For his compassions never fail
They are new every morning
Great is your faithfulness’                                           Lamentations 3: 22 – 23 

These wonderful verses come in the very centre of the book of Lamentations, one of the most tragic books in the Bible.  It was written probably by Jeremiah following the fall of Jerusalem in 586 BC.  It starts with

How deserted lies the city once so full of people

How like a widow is she who was once great amongst the nations
She who was queen amongst the provinces
Has now become a slave                                             Lamentations 1:1

Jerusalem the beautiful city with the awesome temple built by Solomon lay in ruins.  Her people had been taken into exile and the land was deserted.  The king, princes, priests, prophets, elders and commoners had all been taken away to Babylon.

The nation of Israel enjoyed its heyday in Solomon’s time.  ‘King Solomon was greater in riches and wisdom than all the other kings of the earth. The whole world sought audience with Solomon to hear the wisdom God had put in his heart’ (I Kings 10: 23 – 24). 

The reign of King Solomon was both the high point and turning point of the nation of Israel.  Despite being so fabulously rich and wiser than any other man, Solomon turned away from God, married many women and had hundreds of concubines against God’s instructions and they turned his heart away from the Lord. Despite some temporary reprieves during the reign of some of the later kings, it was a downhill slide for the nation into idolatry and disobedience and finally God brought the judgement that he had promised onto his beloved people.

This was not a violent outburst by an angry God but the inevitable consequence of a disobedient and wilful people who refused to stop sinning and had turned their back on God. He had such great plans for his people but their relentless desire for independence had ended not in triumph over their enemies and blessing but in defeat and exile. 

The prophet agonises over the land and the terrible things that have befallen it but here in the centre of his lament he reminds himself of God’s amazing love and compassion which never fails.  Despite all that had happened, God’s mercies are new every morning because of God’s faithfulness.  He encourages himself to wait for the goodness of the Lord.

If Jeremiah could find hope in God's love in the midst of this national disaster, we too can find hope in the midst of our difficulties. You may have been struggling through some difficult times when it feels like God has forgotten you.  Your prayers seem to be hitting a brass ceiling.  You feel deserted and alone; no one understands.  Remember God’s love and compassion.  He never leaves or forsakes you.  He is there.  His mercies are new for you this morning. Wait for him and he will answer and turn your situation around. 

Lord God, thank you I am not alone. You have not abandoned me nor have you turned your back on me. I do not have to depend on yesterday’s mercies because there are fresh mercies from you for this day because of your faithfulness.  Lord I trust you with my life and circumstances and I wait for your answers. In Jesus name, Amen.