Mark 6:30-44 30 The apostles gathered around Jesus, and told him all that they had done and taught. 31 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. 32 And they went away in the boat to a deserted place by themselves. 33 Now many saw them going and recognized them, and they hurried there on foot from all the towns and arrived ahead of them. 34 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. 35 When it grew late, his disciples came to him and said, ‘This is a deserted place, and the hour is now very late; 36 send them away so that they may go into the surrounding country and villages and buy something for themselves to eat.’ 37 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?’ 38 And he said to them, ‘How many loaves have you? Go and see.’ When they had found out, they said, ‘Five, and two fish.’ 39 Then he ordered them to get all the people to sit down in groups on the green grass. 40 So they sat down in groups of hundreds and of fifties. 41 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. 42 And all ate and were filled; 43 and they took up twelve baskets full of broken pieces and of the fish. 44 Those who had eaten the loaves numbered five thousand men.
I went to the grocery store on my usual day and my usual time to pick up the groceries my family and I needed for the week. One of the items on my “to buy” list was a dozen eggs. Much to my surprise, I arrived in the dairy aisle of my grocery store and approached the refrigerated case where the eggs were supposed to be, and I found the shelves almost empty. The store only had a few containers of eggs to purchase, and the price had increased drastically. I did not buy any eggs. I did not need 48 of them and I was not paying ten dollars to buy them. Turns out the egg farms had lost most of their egg-laying chickens and the country was in a shortage. Eggs were just scarce, even though many people wanted to buy and eat them.
If you can imagine a scarcity of eggs, you can imagine the scarcity of having a crowd of 5000 men, not including women and children in a deserted place, and all of them needing to eat. Food was scarce enough in a large crowd for everyone to eat and be satisfied but add in the wilderness where the local wildlife has barely enough to survive on, and you truly have scarcity. It might not be eggs, but the people needed food to eat and there was none.
This is why the disciples ask Jesus to send away the crowd. 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. They knew that everyone needed to eat, and food was scarce. Is there some selfishness in the disciples, knowing that the few loaves of bread and fish were needed for them, and they had no intention of sharing? Whatever the motivation, the crowd needed to eat, and food was scarce. Send them away so they can eat, the disciples ask of Jesus.
But Jesus flips the script, he not only does not send them away, but he also commands the disciples to feed them. Talk about on the job training. The disciples are about to get a crash course not in plumbing a sink or installing a dryer, but a crash course in the abundance of God. But, but, but the disciples respond, we would need 200 denarii or about 200 days of wages to pay for enough bread for everyone?
Here is perhaps where we find ourselves in this story. How many times have we seen the enormity of our needs and our problems and thought to ourselves we don’t have enough? How many times have we seen the size of the scarcity of resources and tell ourselves and Jesus, we don’t have enough? For smaller churches this is the great struggle with church life together; not enough people, not enough money, not enough officers, not enough time, not enough energy, not enough commitment, not enough…. We are exactly like these disciples, we don’t have enough of anything to fight for justice, feed the hungry or visit the sick, we would need 200 denarii for that.
What do you have? Jesus asks this of his disciples, then and now. Five loaves of bread and few fish. What do we have? We do have a core group of people committed to following Jesus Christ, which is a blessing. We do have a pool of money, which is a blessing. We do have a pool of time, which is a blessing. We have a pool of energy, which is a blessing. We do have people with the gifts and skills to lead, love and serve, which is a blessing. What would it look like instead of seeing the 200 denarii we don’t have; we start looking at the 5 loaves and few fish we do have?
Because in the hands of Jesus Christ, the little that we do have is not only always enough, but in His hands, plenty will be leftover. The few loaves and fish feed the over 5000 people with baskets leftover aplenty. In the hands of the Great Shepherd, God will always provide daily bread for all those in need. In the Kingdom of God, the idea or reality of scarcity does not exist; because the life God gives in Jesus’ Kingdom is one of abundance, one of always having more than enough even when what is at hand is not much.
Brothers and sisters in Christ, while we live in a world where communities at times face the scarcity of resources, even eggs; in the Kingdom of God’s Son Jesus Christ our Lord, God always provides for His people, and what resources they do have, will always be more than enough. Instead of worrying about what we don’t have, we can begin looking and seeing what we do have and finding that in the hands of Christ, we will always have enough, we will always be satisfied, and we will always have plenty leftover for all those outside our churches. For that the Church has always said Thanks be to God. May it be so.
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