The Gospel for Thursday, March 18, 2004
Mark 6:30-46
The apostles gathered around Jesus, and told him all that they had done and taught. He said to them, “Come away to a deserted place all by yourselves and rest a while.” For many were coming and going, and they had no leisure even to eat. And they went away in the boat to a deserted place by themselves. Now many saw them going and recognized them, and they hurried there on foot from all the towns and arrived ahead of them. As he went ashore, he saw a great crowd; and he had compassion for them, because they were like sheep without a shepherd; and he began to teach them many things. 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. Immediately he made his disciples get into the boat and go on ahead to the other side, to Bethsaida, while he dismissed the crowd. After saying farewell to them, he went up on the mountain to pray. -- The Holy Bible : New Revised Standard Version. 1996, c1989. Thomas Nelson: Nashville
A Study
In the Navy, it is tradition for an instructor to stamp his foot a few times when he teaches an important point -- and one for sure that will be on the test!
All four Gospel authors stamp their feet at this point in Jesus' time with us on our planet.
The mere fact that John, the author focused so acutely on the spiritual relationship of Jesus, God, and humans, would take this episode about eating, and include it in his account, should tell us something of its importance. Mark, hurrying through to Gethsemane and Golgotha, takes his time here by the lake. Matthew and Luke each report it, and all give it about the same number of column-inches.
Why, why is this so important to all four of them?
Dean Samuel Candler of St Phillip's Cathedral in Atlanta, says that there are three entitities in this story. Jesus, the five thousand, and the twelve. He remarks on how delightful it is to be part of the five thousand: when I need something, I ask Jesus, and whammo! there's the answer. But to be one of the twelve who have just received this instruction, "You give them something to eat," means that we disciples had better start looking for something with which to feed them. Dean Chandler concludes,
" ... It probably would not be something big that we find. It may not be a supermarket just over the next hill. It might be just a little child. We go out looking and working and seeking, and all we find -usually-- is very small indeed.
But we do not despair with that small amount. A disciple does not despair. A disciple gives even that, even that small gift, to Jesus. What we seek, we find, and we offer it to this Jesus. We offer it to this same Jesus who said, "you, you give them something to eat."
Jesus takes our meager offering. Only then does Jesus actually do something in this great miracle story. Jesus does nothing until the disciples, the disciples!, do the seeking and finding and offering. He takes that bread and fish, and he makes them enough. He performs a miracle, when the disciples have taken a step of faith.
Would you rather be one of the five thousand, or one of the disciples? It's hard work being a disciple. But when you're a disciple, you get to produce the miracle...."
A Reflection
"You give them something to eat."
I feel a vocation to give others "something to eat." It has been developing and gaining strength for far longer than I care to think, probably at exactly God's pace, but it makes me recognize how much I have missed in my relationship with God, and with others. Unless you have lived in the desert for a long time, abundant water is not a magnificent blessing, just a nice-to-have.
Our younger son is a superior student and a wonderful teacher. He explained to me the true value of relationships as I read something that he wrote about his own spiritual conversion -- which occurred, interestingly, while he was standing in a shower. Like someone in the desert, I was able to quench my thirst with the wisdom he gained during his solitary baptism; he created a wellspring of abundant water, flowing just for me, just when I needed it.
For whatever reason, I had grown into adulthood without gaining fully mature insights about the importance of relationships. And of course, everything that is really important is all about relationships: from the most important relationship, us with our Creator, to the close-second of us with our spouses and close-third with our children and close-fourth with our parents and siblings. The way you have set up your order after number one may vary a bit; I just described my own scale for you as an illustration. Number five, whoever that is, is about a gazillion miles from number 4, which itself is within a mere hair's breadth of number one.
Jesus is all about relationships, isn't he? He didn't talk about things, just people, and how he related with them or they with each other. He probably didn't care much about things -- a good example for us who are so wrapped up in them.
For us who choose to be His disciples, learning to create, nurture, and value relationships needs to be near the top of our to-do list. Maybe we could put it right after "You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart ...."
A Postscript: Robert's kidneys started working again, praise God!
9:14:11 PM 
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