You Give Them Something to Eat

Mark 6:35-44
July 28, 2024
William G. Carter

When it grew late, his disciples came to him and said, ‘This is a deserted place, and the hour is now very late; send them away so that they may go into the surrounding country and villages and buy something for themselves to eat.’ But he answered them, ‘You give them something to eat.’ They said to him, ‘Are we to go and buy two hundred denarii worth of bread, and give it to them to eat?’ And he said to them, ‘How many loaves have you? Go and see.’ When they had found out, they said, ‘Five, and two fish.’ Then he ordered them to get all the people to sit down in groups on the green grass. So they sat down in groups of hundreds and of fifties. Taking the five loaves and the two fish, he looked up to heaven, and blessed and broke the loaves, and gave them to his disciples to set before the people; and he divided the two fish among them all. And all ate and were filled; and they took up twelve baskets full of broken pieces and of the fish. Those who had eaten the loaves numbered five thousand men. 

It was a scene painted on the wall of a church classroom. The best I can remember was a large mural. It filled most of the wall. Someone had painted the Galilean countryside with hundreds of people. I don’t know how many figures were there. At least five thousand! Nobody took the time to count.

Somewhere near the bottom of the picture, if you were looking for him, you could make out the figure of Jesus. He blended in. He was in the center of the picture. Of course he was. He was holding up what now seems to have been a loaf of bread. The rest of the story remained untold.

Even so, sitting on one of those little chairs as a second grader, it was a curious story to see. Didn’t need to hear it – we could see it. It was somewhere on the scale between amazing and ridiculous. How was Jesus going to feed so many people with such a little bit of food? No idea. And the story never explains it.

I grew up in the church. We had plenty of potluck meals. Sometimes more people showed up than anybody expected. A few of them even came without any dishes to share. No one was ever turned away. Seeing the unexpected crowd, a few nervous parents whispered, “Take a little bit, we will eat at home.” Another nervous person slipped out to bring back a couple of buckets of chicken. But there was always enough to eat. Nobody went hungry, not that night.

Out in the kitchen, the miracle was explained with a smile: “Loaves and fishes.” As if to say, “He did it again.” To this day, that experience, as with this Bible story, was a complete mystery to me. It still is. I don’t know what happened then - or way back then. All I know is that nobody went hungry.

It was a mystery then. It still is. About all I know is the miracle cannot be replicated. We cannot make it happen on demand.

Picture five thousand people. How many people is a multitude like that? In the statistics available to me, when the Scranton/Wilkes-Barre RailRiders are playing well, about five thousand people show up for a game. Last year, the average attendance was 4,944. Close enough for the Gospel of Mark – and who’s counting? Imagine your preacher out on the pitcher’s mound, breaking two loaves of bread and shouting, “Come and get it!” Oh no.

If I were in charge, somebody would slip away to Chickie and Pete’s for some crab fries, somebody else would head over to Smokehouse BBQ or Pinstripe Pizza. Bread is not multiplied on demand, as if God’s waiting around to do whatever we ask. As the scriptures teach, “You shall not put the Lord your God to the test” (Deuteronomy 6:16). God may be generous, but grace does not come out of a faucet.

No, God remains shrouded in mystery. Always present, or so we trust, but rarely obvious. Were there many in that Galilean crowd who could see the miracle in motion? Doesn’t sound like it. The loaves and fish simply multiplied. Nobody knows how. It just happened. God is generous like that, generous without conditions. Jesus had taught as much: “God shines his sun on the evil and on the good, sends the rain on the righteous and the unrighteous.” (Matthew 5:45) That is generosity from heaven. It is unconditional. It just comes.

And for those who knew the Bible stories, they understood this. Years before, the prophet Elisha saw a hungry crowd. Turning to a certain man who had twenty loaves of barley bread, he said, “Give it to the hungry people and let them eat.” The man said, “But there’s a hundred people!” Elisha said, “Let me repeat myself: feed the people with what you have. There will be leftovers.” And there was. (2 Kings 4:42-44)  

Jesus says the same to his twelve disciples, “Give them something to eat.” It was a long, hot day. The crowd was large. There were no cafeterias around. The disciples would have been happy if Jesus has stopped teaching, stopped talking, adjourned the lesson, and turned them loose. But no, this is Jesus, who had compassion for these human sheep who had no other shepherd. He says, “You give them something to eat.” And we realize he is no longer teaching the people in that crowd. He is instructing the twelve people who stand closest to himself.

So, what do they do? They start fussing about the cost. That’s usually the first way to resist a new ministry. Somebody wants to see the budget. They want to tally the cost of goods and services, discuss if this is a charity or a profit center, debate if this is a good time for the start up. How much money are we talking about? The answer: “Two hundred days’ wages.” Well, what’s a day’s wage? How much do you think a day’s wage is?

For comparison, one of my musician friends expects three hundred dollars to play for a concert. That’s three hundred dollars for a day’s wage, times two hundred days, equals $60,000 to feed five thousand people. “We don’t have that kind of money?” So, the disciples fuss about the expense while five thousand hungry people are sitting quietly in front of them.

And Jesus says, “You give them something to eat.” They freeze in place, look at him, then look around. “Well, what do we have? Who brought any food? Anybody have something to give to the crowd?” All they find is five loaves of bread and a couple of fish. “And if we cut up the bread in really small pieces, it’s still not going to be enough.” What can we do with such limited resources, in the face of enormous need?

“What can we do?” Yes, what can we do? I have overheard some folks talk like that, especially when they step out of their comfortable church buildings to move among the hungry. The need is often out of sight, and it is overwhelming. So, maybe they prefer to stay inside, polish the stained glass, and renovate the organ one more time. It is a great way to avoid what lies outside – because we will never have volunteers, time, money, or food to feed all the hungry.

Plus, there are the structural issues, the invisible dynamics that keep people hungry. Like those kids we know, so excited to head off to Appalachia to repair the broken houses in a needy area. The first year, they felt so good about it. Next year, they went back to the same community to extend the work, only to discover a lot of those houses they had fixed were broken again. You cannot fix broken, hungry lives if you go as a tourist. The need is too great.

And Jesus teaches his disciples, by saying, “You give them something to eat.” Pretty soon, they realize they cannot do it all; so much for the illusion of being “victorious” (that’s Lesson Number One). They hear his command for them to do something (that’s Lesson Number Two). They give what they have to Jesus (and that’s Lesson Number Three). Five loaves, two fish, it is not much in the presence of enormous need.

Yet notice what Jesus does. He works with four verbs: took, blessed, broke, gave. These are the same exact verbs for his table at the Last Supper: took, blessed, broke, gave. They are four verbs that define his mission to the world: took, blessed, broke, gave. These verbs still define his mission to the world through us.

He took the bread. It is not enough. It’s never enough. Yet it is the community collection, the accumulated resources, the gathered offering to benefit everybody else. It is no longer private, no longer hoarded, no longer kept while others do without. He took it all because they offered it all.

He blessed it. That is, he sanctified what they offered as an offering to God. Jesus was a good Jew. No doubt he used the Good Jewish Prayer before every big meal: Baruch-ata Adonai Elohenu, Melech ha–olam ha-motz-i lechem min ha'ar-etz. That is, “Blessed are you, O Lord our God, ruler of the universe, who brings forth bread from the earth.” It is God who is blessed, blessed and affirmed, as the Source of all our food. We offer gratitude to God at our tables, for food does not originate from us.

Then he broke it. Broke it? Yes, broke it. If offered to God, it cannot stay the way it was. It cannot remain untouched or intact. Like every gift from God, the bread is to be utilized. Like Passover bread, the Bread of Affliction, the bread is broken to acknowledge that we are broken. We are broken by the world’s pain, the world’s starvation. And we are broken open to do something about it.

Then he gave it away. Of course he did. Giving is generosity. Generosity is grace in action. It is offered freely, without restriction. What Jesus receives from us is processed through him. What he blesses and breaks is given away. Our gifts always cycled forward, provided we do not hold them back in any way. We give because Jesus gives, because it is the very nature of God to give.

If there is any miracle in this Bible story this morning, it is not that Jesus once did a magic trick in a land faraway. No, the miracle is that God keeps giving. The generosity is all around us, waiting for us to participate. In Jesus Christ, God takes, blesses, breaks, and gives. In the end, there is – and there always shall be – plenty for everyone.

 

It’s true: there really is enough for everybody. What we must work on is the distribution plan. That’s why Jesus keeps saying to us, “You give them something to eat.” He could have agreed with the twelve and sent everybody back to their towns and scramble for the next meal, but he didn’t do that. He could have could have snapped his fingers and created free food forever for everybody, but he didn’t do that, either. No, instead he announced the dominion of God, where bread is collected, blessed, broken, and shared, and all of us take part. Jesus stands at the center. In his kingdom, there is little distinction between giving and receiving. It is all a circulatory system of grace.

 

Did you ever hear about the monk who sat down at the dinner table in the monastery one night? Someone passed him the basket of bread. He pulled off a generous piece. The bread was still warm. He took a knife to spread butter and it oozed into the crevices. The taste was sweet. The smell was overwhelming. Even though the brothers took a vow of silence, he couldn’t help himself and he exclaimed, “This bread is so delicious. It smells wonderful. It tastes so good. Did we bake this bread or was it given to us as a gift?”

 

The abbot turned to him, smiled, and said, “Yes!”

(c) William G. Carter. All rights reserved.