THE FEEDING OF THE 5,000
“After these
things Jesus went over the Sea of Galilee, which is the Sea of Tiberias. 2 Then
a great multitude followed Him, because they saw His signs which He performed on
those who were diseased. 3 And Jesus went up on the mountain, and there He sat
with His disciples. 4 Now the Passover, a feast of the Jews, was near. 5 Then
Jesus lifted up His eyes, and seeing a great multitude coming toward Him, He
said to Philip, “Where shall we buy bread, that these may eat?” 6 But this He
said to test him, for He Himself knew what He would do. 7 Philip answered Him,
“Two hundred denarii worth of bread is not sufficient for them, that every one
of them may have a little.” 8 One of His disciples, Andrew, Simon Peter’s
brother, said to Him, 9 “There is a lad here who has five barley loaves and two
small fish, but what are they among so many?” 10 Then Jesus said, “Make the
people sit down.” Now there was much grass in the place. So, the men sat down,
in number about five thousand. 11 And Jesus took the loaves, and when He had
given thanks, He distributed them to the disciples, and the disciples to those
sitting down; and likewise of the fish, as much as they wanted. 12 So when they
were filled, He said to His disciples, “Gather up the fragments that remain, so
that nothing is lost.” 13 Therefore they gathered them up, and filled twelve
baskets with the fragments of the five barley loaves which were left over by
those who had eaten. 14 Then those men, when they had seen the sign that Jesus
did, said, “This is truly the Prophet who is to come into the world.”
The little
boy in this story was just a normal little boy. He obliviously had gone fishing
and was going back home with his daily catch. Maybe he stopped
somewhere and bought some bread for his family or most likely exchanged some of
his fish for bread. Meanwhile, Jesus after preaching to the multitude went up on
the mountain, and there He sat with His disciples. They were all very tired from
ministering to a large crowd. But, when Jesus lifted his eyes, He saw that the
multitude had followed Him. He turned to Philip and said: “Where shall we buy
bread, that these may eat?“ Jesus already knew what to do, He was just testing
his disciples. Then Andrew showed Jesus the little boy who had five barley
loaves and two small fish. Five loaves of bread and two fish to feed more than
5,000 people. In the natural, it seemed quite impossible. But, Jesus was there!
And when Jesus is “there” we know that things change. And they often change
drastically. Jesus could have very well done a miracle and fed all those people
without involving the apostles. But, He wanted them involved. He knew that if He
got them involved it would change their lives forever. And He wants each
of us to be involved in Kingdom matters because He knows that it will transform
our lives forever. He wants us involved in helping people. That little boy did
not have much, but the instant that he
gave all he had to Jesus, his life was changed forever. When he got up that
morning, probably just thinking of going fishing. He was just a very ordinary
little boy. But, at the end of the day, he was the one Jesus used to feed 5,000
people. From unknown to famous in the space of a few hours. Nobody knows his name, nevertheless he is famous. This miracle is so important that it is mentioned in all four gospels. Through this
short teaching, I want to encourage each of you. You all have fives loaves of
bread and two fish. For me, it is a privilege to serve the Lord in Mexico. This
is my “five loaves and two fishes.” For each of you, it's something else. But,
all of you have something to offer the Lord. You can serve Him one way or the
other. To serve the Lord is not our own ability that qualifies us. No, but what
qualifies us is the ability of God to work in us in and through us. It is also
our availability that qualifies us. The Lord will always provides, but we must
always do our part. On the mission field we constantly face situations that
in our eyes seem impossible. But when the Lord sees our hearts and especially
when He sees that we give Him our “five loaves and 2 fish”, He always gives us what we
need. I could give you hundreds of examples where we
only had fives 5 loaves and two fish, but the Lord always provided what we
needed. In the last 30 years, we have fed thousands and thousands of children.
We never had to return a child to their shack on an empty stomach....never! In the summer of 2019, I had a situation where again I felt I had only had “5 loaves and two
fishes.” July is a very expensive month for our ministry. Our Vacation Bible
School program is very important outreach not only for the church kids
but for the children in the shantytowns. During VBS we teach the kids the Word of God. We also do arts and crafts. For the children in our house group, we had to daily rent a little bus to bring the kids to the church, because they live too far to come on foot. We feed the
kids a good meal every day. It means hundreds and hundreds of extra meals. Extra
meals cost money, but our vision is never to return the kids to their shacks
without feeding them #1 the Word of God & #2 a good meal. In Mexico, school starts the third week of August. TLCCM always buys school supplies, and help families with the cost of school
registration fees and school uniforms. Again, I had to ask for help, which is
something I do not like to do. Nevertheless, I wrote a letter to
my partners and friends asking them to help me. I also prayed. Because I did my part, I knew
the Lord would supply. And He did. Donations started to come in on a daily basis. A couple who partner with TLCCM on a regular basis donated enough funds to cover the expenses of feeding the kids for the entire month of July. Others gave monies to buy school supplies and school bags. A lady I do not even know, gave a donation to buy 100 school bags. These are
awesome answers to my prayers. On the closing day of VBS, we also had enough funds to give every family a bag of groceries. My question to you: What are your five loaves and two fish? Have no
fear of offering them to the Lord. Then you will see Him open doors that you thought were impossible to open, to provide for needs that
seemed far too great for your own abilities. Watch Him bless you in some absolutely
wonderful ways. Jesus knows what He wants to do in
each of your lives, He is only waiting for you to offer Him your “five loaves and
two fish”. Who wants to be one who is ready to offer to the Lord his five loaves
and two fish so you can be used by Him to feed the “5,000” in your own situations, in your
family, in your church? In closing, I want to thank all my friends and TLCCM partners. Because they have been giving so generously for so many years, TLCCM has been able to provide a Vacation Bible Program for the past 26 years for thousands of kids in Tijuana and surrounding areas.
Thank
You!
Denise xxxxx
