Sermon - Trinity VII 2021 - Mark 8:1-9

The Miracle of the Five Loaves and Two Fish, Lucas Cranach the Elder, 1472-1553

Sometimes we doubt God’s providence. Over the past year and a half for example, there have been ample opportunities to worry. A contagious virus and tyrannical rulers were just the beginning. Now recently there are various economic concerns: we have obviously high inflation since the cost of everything is going up and yet our investments have pitiful interest rates. So we’re losing our wealth, and on a fixed income especially, that’s no good.

Those things are really just the tip of the iceberg of all of the things to worry about. I’m sure each one of us has our own set of concerns and worries. So it’s a good thing we’re all in church today and can listen to Jesus address these worries.

“In those days, when again a great crowd had gathered, and they had nothing to eat, Jesus called his disciples to him and said to them, “I have compassion on the crowd, because they have been with me now three days and have nothing to eat.”” Today the scriptures show us that because God has great compassion upon His people, He therefore provides for all of their needs.

God knows the needs of His people. Before the crowds grumble to Jesus about their hunger, before the disciples bring up the matter with Jesus, He knows their needs. Before we even realize that we have a problem and a need, God knows about it. When we pray, it’s not to make God aware of our needs, because He already knows! 

Not only does God already know about our needs, He actually provides for all of our needs before we even realize we have needs. We learn this from the creation account in Genesis. Before God made man on day 6, God made everything that man could ever want or need on days 1-5. Once Adam had been created, “The LORD God planted a garden in Eden, in the east, and there he put the man whom he had formed. And out of the ground the LORD God made to spring up every tree that is pleasant to the sight and good for food.”

Before Adam even knew that He needed to eat or a place to live, God provided all of it. Then before Adam realizes that it’s not good for him to be alone, God knows this, and so God provides Adam with Eve. Everything is provided for Adam before he even knows that He needs those things! Before Adam even knows how to use things or that they even exist, God provides. 

Think of this, we just relatively recently figured out how to use electricity, but God created electricity at the very beginning knowing that we would use it thousands of years later! The same is true for any number of inventions and discoveries; we didn’t create them, we just finally figured out how to use those things which God created long ago. Doubtless, if God permits the world to keep going for more generations, there will be future needs those people will have, and incredibly God has already provided for them before those people are even born.

God, at the beginning, created this universe filled with everything we will ever need. Under the earth there is oil and coal and metal and water. On the top of the earth there is a thin layer of soil containing all of the nutrients and organisms necessary for plants to grow which provide us and the animals with vegetables for food, trees for lumber, cotton for clothes. 

Why does God do this? Why does God give us this day our daily bread? Because He is compassionate; He cares for us. “All this He does only out of fatherly, divine goodness and mercy, without any merit or worthiness in me.” That truly is the greater and more marvelous thing that we heard in the Gospel today. 

Sure, He fed four thousand people with seven loaves of bread and a few small fish, and had more leftovers than what He started with, that’s a supernatural miracle. But it’s no less a miracle that we put a few small seeds in the ground and a little later we have more than enough to eat. God does that too. He fed the four thousand then, and He still feeds the billions today.

The greater thing is that God has compassion upon us. God warned us in Genesis 2 about eating of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. “In the day that you eat of it you shall surely die.” Sin and death came from eating of that tree. “The wages of sin is death.” The fruit of that tree is sin and death, and that’s the tree we ate of. Yet, God is compassionate with us even in our grave disobedience. “The free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.”

Jesus’ compassion for the crowds and for us is more than just providing all of the things we need for the body. He doesn’t just fill our bellies, but He restores our souls! Today we witnessed a sinner deserving of death cleansed of sin and given new life in the waters of baptism. Jesus Himself is the bread of life and when we eat of Him He satisfies our hunger for righteousness and our thirst for eternal life! His compassion for us took Him to the cross where He was stripped, beaten, and killed so that we may be clothed, nurtured, and revived! 

Having heard of God’s great compassion for us, providing for our needs both physically and spiritually, what should we take away from this? A few things!

First, we should believe that God will provide for all of our needs. We never need to doubt God’s providence; He will provide. Even when the road is dark and frightening, even when pandemics, tyrants, and economies come crashing upon us, we have nothing to fear; He will provide.

Second, we should be thankful for all that God has given to us and be generous with it toward others. “For all this is it my duty to thank and praise, serve and obey Him.” We should continue praying, just as He taught us: “give us this day our daily bread.” We don’t pray in order to inform God about our needs, as if He were somehow ignorant of them, “but we pray in this petition that God would lead us to realize [His providence] and to receive our daily bread with thanksgiving.” 

Third, we should be more diligent in hearing God’s Word than we are in grumbling and worrying about our bodies. “Seek first the kingdom of God and all these things will be added to you.” We have a need much greater than the body, it’s a spiritual need which only Christ can fulfill when we hear His Word. 

This is quite convicting for us today. We too often prioritize our bodily convenience over our spiritual needs. We don’t want to travel far to get to church, we don’t want to be uncomfortable once we’re there, it can’t last too long, it has to be at the right time, and it can’t conflict with my mealtime. 

Yet look at the crowds who came to Jesus! They didn’t just take a short drive in a car, but they travelled over mountains, crossed seas, and braved the wilderness on foot to come and listen to Jesus. They didn’t relax and lounge about in a heated or air conditioned sanctuary on padded chairs while listening to Jesus teach them, because the custom at the time was for the teacher to sit and the learners to stand. Jesus had to direct them to sit down on the ground, because previously they’d been standing while He was talking. They didn’t just give up one hour on their day off once a week, but after travelling to reach Jesus they spent three days listening to Him. Jesus had to send them away in order for them to go home. When Jesus was done speaking to them, they weren’t just at risk of being late to the all-you-can-eat buffet, they were at risk of fainting on their way home from lack of food.

Theirs was obviously not a convenient faith or religion they practiced when it fit into their schedules. Rather, they trusted that God would care for their bodily needs, and so they prioritized the needs of their souls above their bodies. Let us learn from and imitate those faithful followers of Jesus. Let us believe that God will always provide for us, (even before we realize our need,) and let us seek first God’s kingdom before all other things. Christianity isn’t convenient, but God is good, and He provides for all of our needs, both bodily and spiritually. Let us not spend our days in worry, but let us spend them being nourished by Jesus bodily and spiritually.