Discipleship in the Desert

Lectionary 18, Year A – 3 August 2014

Text: Matthew 14:13-21

Our Redeemer Lutheran Church, Grand Prairie, Texas

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Grace and peace be with you, from God, the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Amen.

One thing to notice when you read the Bible is how much time the people of God spend out in the wilderness over the course of biblical history. I’m not only talking about the Israelites wandering in the desert with Moses for 40 years, waiting to enter the Promised Land. I’m not only talking about Jesus being tempted by the devil while out in the wilderness after his baptism. I’m saying that the people in the Bible spend a lot of time out in the wilderness. So much so, that the word “wilderness” appears in one version of the Bible 284 times, and the word “desert” appears 70 times. Clearly, the wilderness is an important place to be.

In the Bible, the wilderness often represents that which is untamed – the wild. There’s an awful lot that can happen in the wilderness that is completely out of anyone’s control. For instance, a storm can come up and create, quite literally, a river in the desert. The sun can bake the earth during the day, and yet the wilderness can be bitterly cold at night.

But another thing that the wilderness often represents in the Bible is a sense of uncertainty or wandering.  And so, when we look at just how much time the people of God spend in the wilderness in the Bible, we begin to see a pattern emerging: that they often are uncertain. They often are searching. And often, we see that God meets them in that place – in that place of wandering and searching – in that place of uncertainty.

Today’s gospel story – a well-known story to many of us: the Feeding of the 5,000 – begins with mysterious words: “Now when Jesus heard this…”

When Jesus had heard what, exactly?

Going back to the beginning of Matthew 14, before the Feeding of the 5,000, we see that Jesus has just heard about the death of his friend – also his relative – John the Baptist. Hearing about the brutal killing of John the Baptist by Herod sends Jesus out into a boat so he can simply be alone for a while. Upon returning to shore, he and his disciples encounter a huge crowd of people, and Jesus has compassion for them and cures some of them.

But then, the day gets a little long for the disciples, and they try to get Jesus to send the people away. We can almost hear them saying, “Where on earth are we going to get food to feed all of these people?! We're out in the middle of nowhere! Send them off, to fend for themselves!” (This is a crowd of 5,000 men – plus women and children. This is a sizable group!)

But the compassion of Jesus doesn’t give in to their demands. Jesus instead gives them a task: “You give them something to eat.”

I’m sure there was a moment of stunned silence at that point, until, finally, one of them points out to Jesus that all they have are five loaves of bread and two fish, and just what do you suppose we should do with these, anyway?

And Jesus takes them – these little gifts – and he gives thanks to God for them, and blesses them, and hands them back to the disciples to be distributed to the crowd. And there is enough – and even more than enough – more than enough so that twelve basketsful remain after every person has eaten their fill.

There is a miracle here – indeed there is – but I would say there is more than one miracle here. The obvious miracle is the multiplication of loaves and fish so that a huge, hungry crowd is able to eat their fill, out in the wilderness.

But the other miracle is the work that God does through the hearts and hands of some unwilling disciples - because the disciples aren’t completely happy about this scenario. They keep trying to throw obstacles down by focusing on the scarcity of resources available to them. It is Jesus who focuses on the resources they do have – using what they do have to feed a multitude, and to do that with grace and mercy and love.

I spend a lot of time with colleagues and friends who pastor churches of all sizes and types. Some are about the same size as Our Redeemer, some a little bigger, and a few which are a lot bigger. As you can imagine, there is a difference between pastoring a small church, a mid-sized church, and a huge church. One of the differences is, of course, the availability of resources – both money and people.

However, one thing I’ve noticed that we share with other churches, regardless of size or denomination, is that when churches focus on what they don’t have, or what little they have, it is very difficult to get anything done. When churches – no matter what size - have scarcity as their focus, they aren’t really focusing on Jesus. They aren’t focusing on what God might be trying to do within their midst and with whatever resources that they do have.

The really tricky part about discipleship in the desert is offering what we have to God, and then letting God use that to reveal his love and glory to the world. Every dollar we put in the offering plate, every hug and handshake we offer at the peace, every hour spent baking cookies for coffee hour, or cutting the grass, or scrubbing the place clean. Every minute spent in prayer for someone we love, or every loving word we say to a stranger. It all matters.

We look, and maybe see five loaves and two fish, and think, “What on earth can be done with this?” It feels small to us. But God takes what feels small to us – God blesses it – and gives it back to us to give away to others. Amen.

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