2024-07-14 San Jose CRC - sermon only - Gil Suh

John 5:1-14

Contributing - Even small gifts can do big things

Transcript

 Today's scripture is John 6 1 through 14. Jesus feeds the five thousand Some time after this, Jesus crossed to the far shore of the Sea of Galilee, that is the Sea of Tiberias, and a great crowd of people followed him because they saw the signs he had performed by healing the sick. Then Jesus went up on a mountainside and sat down with his disciples.

The Jewish Passover, the Jewish Passover festival was near. When Jesus looked up and saw a great crowd coming toward him, he said to Philip, Where shall we buy bread for these people to eat? He asked this only to test him, for he already had in mind what he was going to do. Philip answered him, It would take more than half a year's wages to buy enough bread for each one to have a bite.

Another of his disciples, Andrew Simon Peter, uh, Andrew, Simon Peter's brother, spoke up, Here is a boy with five small barley loaves and two small fish, but how far will they go amongst so many? Jesus said, Have the people sit down. There was plenty of grass in that place, and they sat down. About 5, 000 men were there.

Jesus then took the loaves, gave thanks, and distributed to those who were seated as much as they wanted. He did the same with the fish. When they all had enough to eat, he said to his disciples, Gather the pieces that are left over. Let nothing be wasted. So they gathered them and filled twelve baskets with the pieces of the five barley loaves left over.

by those who had eaten. After the people saw the sign, Jesus performed, they began to say, Surely this is the prophet who is to come into the world. Jesus, knowing what they intended, knowing that they intended to come and make him king by force, withdrew again to a mountain by himself. This is the word of the Lord.

We are starting a new sermon series called ordinary people for extraordinary purposes. So for next seven weeks, we're going to hear the stories of these individuals in the Bible. We don't know their names, but somehow God used them and their ordinary tasks for extra ordinary purposes. And I pray that this story will inspire and encourage us to to be involved in our daily, ordinary lives and ordinary tasks.

But with faith and love because God can use us to even beyond what we can think and imagine. So now, today's story, known as feeding of the 5, 000, is very, very special story. It is the only miracle story that all four Gospels record other than the resurrection of Jesus Christ, which means this story was well known among the first Christians, and it is very significant.

And, to me personally, it is one of the top five stories in the Bible that I want to find out what really happened. If time machine is real, I want to go back to witness what was really happening. Really curious. Of course, there are so many stories we want to go, but this is one of my top five. And let's see what happened.

So Jesus and his disciples, they went up on a mountainside near, uh, Galilee, and it is a remote area far away from the main places, but then great crowd of people follow Jesus to see him, to hear him,

And Jesus consider these people, thousands of people as his guests. These people came to visit me as a good host. He wants to feed them. The challenge is they're far away from any food source and it's getting late. It's a mission impossible to feed all these people. But Jesus already had in mind what he's gonna do.

But then he said to one of his disciples, Philip, hey Philip, where shall we buy bread for these people to eat? And he asked this only to test him. And Jesus already knew that this task will be seemingly impossible to these disciples. Now to to face situation or mission that seemingly impossible among ourselves, Christians, there are two types of responses we can expect, and we can see it in this story.

First type is when we face impossible task or situation, We want to try to solve that problem as best as we can, relying on our own abilities, experiences, technology, whatever. That's the first response. The second response is trying to solve this problem, doing what we can do, but relying on God and His power instead of our own.

So you see the difference? First type is doing our best, relying on our own abilities or resources. But second response is doing our best, relying on God and His power. And in today's story, the Philip and Andrew, these two disciples represent the first type, and the unnamed boy represent the second. Let me explain a little further.

So Philip and Andrew, these are two disciples. Basically, they face this mission impossible on their own, but slightly different approaches. Even within the first type. There are two different approaches. So first, like people like Philip, when Jesus asked this question, Hey Philip, where can we buy? food to feed them.

Basically, how can we feed these people? Of course, other disciples are there hear what Jesus was saying. But Philip, he first calculate the people like Philip, when they hear this challenge or task facing, they calculate on their own head and fairly quickly conclude it's not possible. And people like Andrew, they first try to find out what resources are available to solve this problem and then gradually realized, uh, it's not going to work.

So Philip is obviously intelligent guy. He's an engineer type. So he quickly calculate in his mind how much it would take. To feed 5000 men, thousands of men plus women and Children. So let's say just conservative estimate 7000 people altogether. So in his mind, 7000 plus I look it up. What's the cheapest meal you can get these days in this area?

$5 McDonald's meal. So 7000 times 5 is 35, 000 That's more than six months of man's wage to feed these old men. The cheapest food that you can find. Of course, it's too late. Even if we have money, where are we going to get this? It's too late to order. So, Philip's response is basically, It's impossible to feed all these people.

Now, Andrew,

In the meantime, while Philip was thinking and calculating, Andrew was the action guy. He just went out. Okay, who has food among you? The rabbi master is asking for it.

But he soon realizes it's impossible, even though he tries to survey and try to find out what's available to address the need. It's not possible. Although he found a boy with five fishes and bread, five pieces of bread and to the dry fish. What can these do? It's impossible. So, Philip and Andrew actually represent our natural responses to facing the impossible mission. Some of us try to figure out what it will take to solve the problem first, but then realize it's not possible. And some of us trying to do what we can do by doing action. But the same conclusion. It's impossible. We can't solve this. So we think and decide on our own, even in churches, even among God's people.

That's our tendency. Then today's story introduced in this unnamed boy, a response of childlike faith who gave up his dinner. So today's title is The Boy Who Gave Up His Dinner. We don't know much about this boy. Actually, this passage used the boy, that word in Greek, is a very unusual word. Appears only here.

You know, there are a lot of boys mentioned in the scripture. But this word is probably somewhere 10 around 9 10 11 years old boy. But these boys role is actually kind of house boy helping others serve. I mean, nowadays we don't have that. But at that time, there's like, Oh, you know, young girls and young boys.

Their role is helping do the chores at home. So that's the word. Now, he must have responded. He must have heard what Andrew was saying among people. You know, Andrew was going around. Let me see what you have. What kind of food you have. The rabbi and master is asking.

Nobody was saying anything, volunteering. But then all of a sudden, one hand going up. I have something.

It's dinner. And Andrew said, Okay, come with me. But no one else is volunteering. So come with me. So, Andrew brought this boy with his dinner to Jesus. So imagine, Jesus, he saw him, he saw this boy. So Jesus, penetrating eyes, now looking at this boy coming and meeting this boy's sparkling eyes of curiosity and sense of, what What can this do?

He may not figure all this out, but he was simple enough to give up his dinner to the call of the Lord is asking for it. Here is my dinner. Here is. So when I think about this story, that's just somehow I can imagine this boy with a sparkling eyes of curiosity and faith.

Nobody knew what Jesus would do with it. We tend to size out. size up and judge people and things according to the worldly standard that we are all accustomed to. Don't we? We easily minimize and ignore ordinary tasks and small things of the world. What difference will this small effort of mine make? In our mind, we ask the question.

We may wonder, What can I do for this impossible challenge? But now, taking that small offering of this unnamed boy, Jesus would do an extraordinary thing. So first, Jesus had the people sit down. As I mentioned, now Jesus is host, and these are the guests. Have a seat. So he asked his disciples, okay, have people sit down.

There was a plenty of grass. And he's not only a good host, he's actually a good shepherd. He wants to now feed his flock. Good host inviting guests to sit around dinner table. Have a seat. It's time for dinner. Then he just Took the robes, five pieces of robes and two dry fish. We're told he gave thanks and that he distributed to those who are seeded, seeded and as much as they wanted.

Now here's where now I want to, if time machine is real, I want to go, what happened? What happened to that pieces of bread and the fish? the fish that fed thousands of people. It's a magical multiplication. It doesn't make sense how it's gonna work. So there is a moral interpretation of the story. You know what?

Some people say, you know what happened? It should really happen is everybody brought their dinner. They didn't want to give up their dinner. But then this boy volunteer and they saw wow. Put them into shame. Like, Oh, then when Jesus give thanks and then, you know, this tried to distribute, they said, like, Oh yeah, I brought mine too.

So everybody just took out their own. There was enough for everybody. Very compelling interpretation. Inspiring. But is that really what happened? I do not believe so. Why? First of all, verse 14 says, they saw, these people saw a miraculous sign that Jesus did. So something miraculous happened. They saw it. Of course, the moralistic say, yeah, that was a miracle, you know, inspired a people.

If we know Jesus did perform miracles, he turned water into wine too. And of all, he raised the dead, and he himself rose again from the dead. See, now you know why I wanted to go and see actually what happened. Miracle. The time machine is real. But when I go to heaven, I'll ask to those who were there, What happened?

What did you see? Anyway, the seemingly impossible mission was accomplished. All, people there all ate to the full, and there were twelve baskets of leftover. Abundance. And you know that good host always prepare enough food so that there will be leftover, right? At the end of the meal. How did Jesus do?

Still we wonder. How did God create the universe out of nothing? How does he run this universe with all these seemingly evil things and broken things, misery? How can still God, good God run this universe? We tried to figure out how is it possible that God became 100 percent man to die for our sin and then rose again from dead.

Our curious inquiring minds ask this question. However, we cannot figure things out scientifically or even logically with our head how God works everything. We can only believe God does all of those because of his power and love. It's true and it's real. By faith, we can understand and gradually as we believe and grow in our faith, understanding who God is and how He works.

Gradually, small. But here today, the two important lessons that we want to learn from this story is about the boy and about the master. The boy who gave up his dinner and Jesus who gave up His life. Like what Jesus did with the boy's ordinary act of giving his food to the Lord. The Lord accomplishes extraordinary, extraordinary purpose for the kingdom due to our ordinary acts of faith and obedience to him.

So simple, simple, chilled, childlike faith says, Yeah, there is a need that seems so big.

But instead of like, no, it's not possible. I have something to contribute. Then praise. This prayer. You have given all to me. This is a very well known prayer. You have given all to me. To you, Lord, I return it. Everything is yours. Do with it what you will. Give me only your love and grace. That's enough for me.

That's the childlike faith. But this story should lead us ultimately to worship Jesus who gave himself for us. The boy gave up his bread and fish and Jesus multiplied them to feed the thousands. But Jesus gave himself to save us all. He's the living bread of life. Amen. So the communion not only symbolize that true, but actually Jesus is present here and nourish us and nurture our faith and somehow by taking the flesh and and the blood of Christ that is symbolized by this, somehow the eternal life, the springs forth from our hearts and our

So as we now ready to receive the communion and witness the baptism, let us believe that these ordinary acts of involving water, the bread, and the juice, somehow God's extraordinary purposes are accomplished. Let us pray. Dear God, we thank you for showing us the That even our small gifts can be used in big ways.

Just like the boy who gave up his meal helped us to trust you with what we have. When we face problems that seem too big, remind us to have simple faith and rely on your power, not just our own efforts. Guide us to be generous and faithful in our daily lives, shining your light to those around us. May we always remember that you gave yourself for us as true bread of life.

So we receive you by faith and gratitude. Your name. Amen