John 6:4-7, Matthew 5:48

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Loaves and fish. I give that phrase, I’ve answered that phrase to people several times recently who have been asking about, how are you going to get through all the things that you have going on this year, or how have you? This last year for me has been crazy. Maybe you can relate, but I’ve just had a number of things, many things that have been very challenging situations, difficult ones personally, but then also very just ones that have a lot of responsibility and are big tasks. And people have said, how do you keep getting through that? What how do you feel about this? And I just keep answering loaves and fish and here’s why.

I think about when we’re told in John chapter six that

The Jewish Passover Festival was near. When Jesus looked up and saw a huge crowd coming toward him, he asked Philip, “Where can we buy bread for these people to eat?” But Jesus was saying this to test him, for he himself knew what he was going to do. Philip answered him, “Two hundred denarii[a] worth of bread would not be enough for each of them to have just a little.” (John 6:4-7)

What I love is that Jesus asks Philip, where are we going to get bread for all these people, knowing full well that what’s going to happen next is what we call the feeding of the 5000. Jesus knows he’s going to multiply just a few loaves of bread and some fish to feed the 5000. When he asks Philip to do this, Jesus is not expecting Philip to be the source. He’s not expecting Philip to come up with this on his own. The whole point was to drive Philip and the rest of his disciples to look to him. Jesus did not ask his disciples to feed these 5000 and then expect them to do it themselves. Jesus said, hey, how are you going to feed them, knowing that they would need to look to him and he would provide.

And that’s why I keep saying loaves and fish, these things that have been in front of me this year and are continuing to be in front of me. How are you going to get through them? Loaves and fish. If God has put this in front of me and called me to do it, I know he’s not saying, now, Nate, you have to figure out how to get it all done. You have to muster up the strength. That’s not how God works. It’s not how the gospel works. These different life experiences like this where we have to depend on Christ, are all little exercises and reminders of how the gospel really works. Well, God, he does say, be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly father is perfect, (Matthew 5:48) but as sinful people, God knows we are not going to be perfect.

He knows, though, that he had a way and has a way for us to be made perfect before him again. And that way is that Jesus came into this world to be everything you and I were created to be, but aren’t. He was perfect for us. He laid down his life and died for you, and rose again for you, so that through faith in him you could be right with God. When you are baptized into Christ, you are clothed with Jesus. And Jesus is God. Which means then that when God looks at you, he sees you through God. He provides what you need to be right with him. This is how your relationship with God works. And every time that you face a time where you are reminded, ah, I, I don’t have the capacity. I can’t do it. I need to look to him. It’s a little reminder, a little exercise, that yes, this is how our life with God works.

Loaves and fish. God doesn’t look to us to do it for him. We get to look to him and trust in him always. How are we going to get through this? The same way that we’re right with God looking to him, trusting him. Just bring your loaves and fish.

[This devotion is part of our series on The Apostles’ Creed, you can find all the videos in there series on our Apostles’ Creed Page. The devotions will be added as they are posted.]

Micah 5:2, Zechariah 9:9, Psalm 41:9, Zechariah 11:12-13, Psalm 22, Genesis 3:15, Isaiah 7:14

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I believe Jesus was born of the Virgin Mary. What are the odds of this seemingly simple Bible prophecy coming true? Well, to talk about the odds, I imagine most of you are probably familiar with the lottery. Do you know what your odds are of winning the lottery? It’s 1 in 300,000,000. That number is expressed as three times ten to the eighth power. Eight is the number of zeroes that comes after the three.

If you want to visualize this number three times ten to the eighth power. Picture a football stadium. And if you were to fill that football stadium with golf balls, you would have about 300 million golf balls. So imagine marking one golf ball, dropping it in there, stirring them all up, and three times ten to the eighth power would be your odds of picking exactly that golf ball out of that stadium.

A mathematician by the name of Peter Stoner wanted to know the odds of biblical prophecy coming true. And so he and a team of mathematicians, together with some anthropologists based on population numbers from what we know about ancient civilization, wanted to calculate the odds of just eight biblical prophecies coming true. So they picked some things, like being born in the city of Bethlehem (Micah 5:2), riding into Jerusalem on a colt (Zechariah 9:9), being betrayed by a friend (Psalm 41:9) for 30 pieces of silver (Zechariah 11:12-13), and being crucified (Psalm 22). They came up with one times ten to the 17th power, were the odds of those eight biblical prophecies coming true.

Let’s visualize that number one times ten to the 17th power. So we actually have to leave the football stadium behind to visualize this number. And we have to go to the state of Texas, the entire state of Texas, 268,000mi². We’re going to cover the state of Texas with golf balls 37ft deep. Take one golf ball, put a mark on it, drop it in and mix them all up, and one time ten to the 17th power your odds of picking that golf ball up. That’s just eight biblical prophecies.

So Peter Stoner and his team wanted to know, what does 16 biblical prophecies look like? The number is one times ten to the 45th power. To visualize this number, we have to leave the planet Earth behind. Go to the center of our solar system and start building a planet with golf balls. If you were to have enough golf balls to have 45 zeros in the number, you would have a planet with a radius that is 2.7 billion miles long in every direction. Your planet of golf balls would have swallowed up the sun, the Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn and have gone just past the orbit of the planet Neptune. Mark one golf ball, drop it in, mix it up. And one times ten to the 45th power is your odds of drawing exactly that golf ball out.

What if we triple it? What if it’s just 48 biblical prophecies coming true. What are the odds of that? Well, the odds are one times ten to the 157th power. That is a number so big that if you were to use golf balls, you would fill the known universe with golf balls and then some. There are over 400 prophecies directly connected to Jesus, and many of which were already fulfilled in his life on earth.

But of all the amazing prophecies that come together in the life of Jesus, the most profound is just one. In Genesis three, when God says that the seed of a woman would come and crush the serpent’s head (Genesis 3:15). In Isaiah, when he would promise that the Virgin will give birth to a child and will give him the name Emmanuel, which means God with us (Isaiah 7:14). Just what are the odds of the infinite God who fills the whole universe, coming down to be born of a virgin, getting nailed to a cross and by his foot being struck on the cross that he would crush the serpent’s head. What are the odds of that? Amen.

Matthew 15:21-28, 27:46

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What if a heart breaking test can turn into a heart making test? Sometimes there’s moments in life that are just so challenging, and yet in those moments, God can work to teach us some really amazing things about him and about what he has done for us and what he’s doing in and through us.

I think of this story in the Bible where Jesus and his disciples went to a region called Tyre and we’re told that there was a Canaanite woman who was there. (Matthew 15:21-28) And that word Canaanite, it draws you back to the Old Testament, to the people who were in the land that God had promised his people, that were associated with worshiping false gods and doing a lot of bad things. So this woman, that name is kind of a noteworthy name. And this woman is calling out to Jesus, just begging Jesus to heal her daughter. Her daughter has been possessed by a demon and begging Jesus to drive that demon out to heal her. And Jesus just seems to blow her off. He doesn’t say anything. He just seems to ignore her. It gets to the point where the disciples are like, hey, send her away! And then Jesus, he says, well, I was sent only for the lost sheep of Israel, which still seems to be like this no.

And looking at this it can seem actually kind of cruel. Like, why would Jesus respond this way? This woman is just begging for for help. And so it pushes you to consider what’s going on. Is Jesus just ignoring her? Well, that wouldn’t be like Jesus. That doesn’t fit with Jesus’ character in other sections of scripture. Is Jesus, does he have something against her because of this Canaanite thing? Well, earlier in Matthew’s Gospel, when you read through the genealogy of Jesus, it mentions a number of Canaanite women or Canaanite connected women. So that wouldn’t really fit with the message of that either. Is Jesus just being cruel? Well, that doesn’t fit with what Jesus has done in other sections. And actually the Gospels, instead of portraying Jesus as being distant or cruel, we see on the cross that Jesus meets us in our pain. On the cross he said, My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? (Matthew 27:46) And so he’s not a far off, distant, cruel God.

So what was going on? I don’t know exactly why Jesus did what he did and how he approached that. I do know that when she kept asking for help and she kept asking him that Jesus does in fact heal her daughter. So when Jesus says “it’s not right to take the food from the children and give it to their dogs,” and then she responds, “yes, but even the dogs get to eat the crumbs that fall from their master’s table,” and Jesus marvels at her faith. Jesus wanted her to keep asking, and he was happy to help her.

When you think about that situation, that’s a hard situation. That’s a hard story in the Bible. And it’s in some ways looks like a heartbreaking story, that he would not answer her right away, but it can be a heart making one. It can push us to consider those times when maybe we’ve been asking God and reaching out to God, and he seems silent and we might wonder, Is God have something against us? Or what’s going on? And by making us ask those questions, it can push us to consider and answer those questions. Does Jesus have something against us? No, that’s not the way Jesus works. Is Jesus ignoring us or being cruel? No, that’s not the way God works. By having this difficult time, it can push us to really ponder how God works. Or it makes me think of, recently I was replacing a mailbox post in my yard and I thought, wait a minute, I think I might have the wrong post. And I had this negative like sense that, oh no, maybe I bought the wrong one. So then I went and checked it out. And you know what I found out? I had exactly the right one I needed.

Sometimes these hard moments push us to check. Wait, do I have it right? Do I have it wrong? Sometimes we have these subtle feelings that maybe God has is not for me. That maybe God isn’t good. And these hard moments can push us to ask the questions and to really think about what God is like. And when we do that, we can be reminded that God is good, that God is loving, and most importantly, that God is so gracious that God Himself, Jesus, came into this world to meet us in our pain, to meet us in our struggle, and to rescue us from it. He laid down his life. He died for your sins and mine, and he rose again to set us right with him. When we go through these hard times, it can push us to think deeper about who God is. What is his character like? How does he work with us? What has Jesus done for us? And when that happens, a heartbreaking test can turn into a heart making one.

Exodus 14, 1 Corinthians 10:13

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One of the most iconic scenes from the Old Testament has to be when Moses led the Children of Israel out of slavery in Egypt. The armies of Pharaoh were chasing after him, and soon they found themselves wedged up against the Red Sea. In front of them was a watery grave, and behind them the soldiers and chariots of Pharaoh ready to cut them to bits. It seems as if no human escape was possible. But God had a plan. He had Moses hold his staff over the water, and soon the entire Red Sea was split in half, and the Israelites were able to escape on dry land. (Exodus 14)

This is an excellent reminder of how God is willing to work for our good even in seemingly impossible situations, and is one of the big points that Saint Paul writes about in first Corinthians ten, verse 13.

No temptation has overtaken you that is not common to man. God is faithful, and he will not let you be tempted beyond your ability, but with the temptation he will also provide the way of escape, that you may be able to endure it. (1 Corinthians 10:13)

This may sound all well and good to us, but how often do we practice this in our lives? When our bank accounts low and the rent’s coming due, how often do we trust in our own strength, our own abilities to deal with these and other problems? And when things don’t work out like we want them to? How often do we complain to God? God, what’s going on? I thought you wouldn’t give me anything more than I can bear!

How do we make sense of what Paul says here? The way to understand this is to realize that on our own strength, we aren’t able to bear things on our own. Far too often, we put our trust in our own strength, or in our money, or in the people we know. And far too often, these things disappoint. The answer instead lies with God. God is the one who’s created us. He is the one who provides for us. And he is the one who will help us in difficult times. We know this to be true because he has helped us with our greatest problem, that of sin and death.

You see, none of us have lived up perfectly to God’s law, and we deserve nothing more than to be condemned by him. But God helped us out of this seemingly impossible situation. He sent his Son Jesus into the world to live the perfect life that we could not. What’s more, Jesus went to the cross and died on our behalf. And because of his perfect life and his innocent suffering and death, we’ve been reconciled with God. Death has tried to swallow up Jesus, but it could not contain him. And he was able to escape its jaws of the tomb on Easter Sunday, showing once and for all his total victory.

And Jesus is still with us today. Through His Word we read about what he has done for us, and that gives us the strength to endure our trials. It’s because we don’t find our strength in ourselves, but rather we find our strength in Christ. If God was willing to give his only Son to die for us, how much more is he willing to be with us in our problems? He encourages us to pray to him, to ask him for help. Now, it may be that the answer to our prayers may not come as fast as we want, or it may not be the answer that we were hoping for. But God promises that he is working all things for our good. Beside His Word, God also gives us people in our lives, resources, such as parents, pastors, family, friends, all of these we can lean on in difficult times. And with all of this, we can be certain that because Christ has solved the biggest problem of our salvation, he is also willing to be with us in all temptation and provide us a means of escape.

Matthew 9:18,23-26, Mark 5:41

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Our devotion today comes from Matthew chapter nine. Jesus has a man named Jairus, a ruler who approaches him and says to him,

“My daughter has just died. But come, place your hand on her, and she will live.” (Matthew 9:18 EHV)

And then later it says,

When Jesus came into the ruler’s house and saw the flute players and the noisy crowd, he said to them, “Go away, for the girl is not dead but is sleeping.” But they laughed at him. When the crowd was sent out of the house, Jesus went in, took the girl by the hand, and she was raised. News of this went out through the entire region. (Matthew 9:23-26 EHV)

I remember years ago when I was a young pastor, an elderly man came to me to talk to me about something and began telling me about his son, a little boy, who had drowned on his property back when the boy was probably about seven years old. This older man just suddenly began to cry. It showed how the death of a child can really stay with somebody. It hits you differently than like, a grandparent or an adult. It’s one of the pains that we can feel in the sadness of this fallen world. And pastors will tell you that trying to help people through the loss of a child can be one of the most agonizing, difficult things.

And there are certain times in life when the troubles and pain of this world can really land on one individual. And this Jairus coming to Jesus is one who’s experiencing that. But he’s also going to the right place. He’s bringing his petition, his prayer to Jesus. And we’re told in the rest of the Bible that he came and worshiped Jesus and made this request known to him.

And so Jesus now goes to this man’s house, and he passes through this crowd of professional mourners, people that would actually be paid to come and express the sadness in your house. And one of the translations says that Jesus said to them, make room. Kind of like, get out of the way because I need to go to this girl’s side. It’s almost like a rescue of a paramedic. And when a child has been drowning and has to tell everybody going through the crowd to get out of their way so they can go and rescue the child.

And this wonderful declaration, and God’s analysis of this girl’s situation. Listen, Jesus says she is not dead, but sleeping. That’s a great way for the Christian to look at death. She is not dead, but sleeping. Now, of course, the crowd reacted like, well, that’s ridiculous. And they even laughed at him and they mocked him for this. But notice how different our human minds are when they look at things compared to the power of God, who controls all things and has his hand over all the laws of nature.

And the Bible records many of these resurrections to give us comfort with our own future death and the resurrection that we can have by faith in Christ. Jesus, because of his power and because of his invitation for us to believe in him, he invites you and me now to stare at your future death, just like a nap or like a sleep that you will awake from. And to look at it with defiance. Martin Luther once said that if the devil comes to make you afraid of being in your grave, say to him, I have Christ, Satan, even if you should explode on me with all of hell.

And I want you to notice one last thing. Notice what Jesus uses to bring this little girl back to life. The gospel of Mark tells us he spoke two little words. “Talitha, koum!” (Mark 5:41) “Little one, get up” is how it’s translated. “Little one, get up.” God opens these graves and raises these people, as we see in the Bible, as kind of a little foretaste for us of the coming resurrection that we will get to enjoy.

And that’s why Easter and the resurrection has been such a wonderful, important part of Christians in their lives. In fact, that’s why they pick Sunday mornings as the day to worship, because that was the day our Lord was raised as well. Amen.

John 20:30-31

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I was watching a long series on television about halfway through. It occurred to me that the main character of the story, even though he had started out as a fairly decent person, had probably directly or indirectly been responsible for the deaths of many, many people. And I thought, oh, somebody should keep track and count up how many people died because of him. Well, that was just a TV show. And finally, that doesn’t matter. But someone not long ago asked this question how many people did our Lord Jesus heal during the three years of his public ministry?

And we know that he healed quite a number of people. Some of the healings he carried out were really quite spectacular and famous. He healed people who were suffering with leprosy. He restored movement to paralyzed people. He gave sight to the blind, restored hearing for those who were deaf. He healed little children. So it’s good for us to have that record. But finally, we don’t have the exact number. It’s probable that he healed many, many more people than we learn about in the Bible. John wrote a couple of verses in his gospel account kind of dealing with this. In John chapter 20, verse 30 and 31, this is what he wrote.

Jesus performed many other signs in the presence of his disciples, which are not recorded in this book. But these are written that you may believe[a] that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and that by believing you may have life in his name. (John 20:30-31)

So it really isn’t the final number of healings that Jesus performed that is so very important to us. Rather, it’s this comfort that we can have in knowing that as both true God and true man in one person, Jesus was able and still able to deliver and rescue those who are in any trouble. That’s the comfort that we have, knowing him.

It’s good for us to remember that he is still able to hear and to answer prayers for rescue and healing and deliverance. And he does that sometimes still in miraculous ways, where someone who is very, very sick or injured, inexplicably makes a good recovery. More often, he does that healing through the vocation of first responders and emergency room doctors and nurses, others who are able to help. All of this comes from him.

It’s good for us to know, though, that and to rely on him not only for the physical healing that we probably all need at one time or another, but more important, the spiritual healing that we have. Because he is the one who went to the cross. He’s the one rightly known as the Great Physician, who took upon himself and immersed himself in the disease of our sin, and by his suffering and death for us has removed that curse from us, has won the forgiveness for our sins, so that we as God’s own forgiven, innocent children, trusting in him, can look forward to eternal life forever in the bliss and peace of heaven, where there is only perfect health and joy forever.

And so he says that he is the Son of God believing in him. We may have life in his name elsewhere. He said, I’ve come that they may have life and life to the fullest. Amen.

Matthew 9:2

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I need it! You probably said those words at one point or another. When I was younger, I said those words a lot. For example, when we’d be at the grocery store and I’d see that new snack on the shelf. “Hey, mom, I need it.” Or there’d be that toy on the television commercial, “dad, I need it.” Or really, anytime someone had something that I didn’t. I need it.

There are many things that we need. Or at least we think we need. But what do we need the most? In the Gospel of Matthew, we read about a person who had a need, a much greater need than any snack or toy. In chapter nine, Matthew writes about a paralyzed man who couldn’t walk and a group of people who carried this man to Jesus to be healed. This man had a legitimate need. He couldn’t walk, and the people knew that Jesus was the one who could satisfy this need and heal him. When the people bring this man before Jesus, Jesus doesn’t do what we might expect. Matthew tells us that Jesus saw the faith of these people.

And then he said to the paralyzed man, take heart, your sins are forgiven. (Matthew 9:2)

Jesus didn’t deny this man’s need to be able to walk, but rather recognize the man’s greater need, the need to receive forgiveness for his sins. This was the need that Jesus came into the world for. Jesus came to live that perfect life free from sin that you and me were meant to live. He laid his life down on the cross as the payment for sins, and then rose from the dead so that we could be made right with God. Jesus loved this man, and he wanted him to know that this need, his greatest need, had already been met. His sin had been paid for and forgiven.

But then Jesus did something else. Jesus didn’t just forgive this man’s sin and then leave him there how he was. After forgiving his sin, Jesus told the man to get up and walk and he healed his legs. You see, Jesus first meets our primary need by forgiving our sins, but then he also desires to meet our secondary needs as well. Like the paralyzed man. When you have a need, whatever that may be, you can bring it to Jesus, knowing that he has the power to meet that need. And he might or he might not, because what we think we need isn’t always what we actually need.

The truth is, we don’t know everything that we need in this world. But Jesus does. Jesus loved that paralyzed man and he loves you. You can be certain that Jesus will meet all those needs that he knows you have. You can be certain that he has already met your greatest need. Take heart. Your sins are forgiven. Amen.

Matthew 14:16-18

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Jesus feeds the 5000. We learn some things from this true story of what Jesus actually did, this incredible miracle. We learned that we can trust God to take care of us physically, but even more importantly, we can trust that God takes care of us spiritually. Jesus is the bread of life from heaven that gives us eternal life, forgiveness, salvation. But there’s something else we can learn from this too. Jesus gives us bread to distribute. Sometimes when I look at really familiar stories like this, it’s helpful to just slow down and think about what is actually pretty amazing, what is unexpected in this section, or put yourself in the sandals of the people in the story. What are they thinking?

We’ve talked about how Jesus was trying to get away privately by himself. He had learned that his cousin had just been murdered, but yet the people come to him. So he has compassion on them. Imagine the disciples at that time. They know Jesus wants to get by himself. They come and see all the people crowded on the shore. How frustrated are they that these people just keep coming to Jesus? They won’t give him a break. And yet Jesus goes and he’s filled with compassion.

Eventually the disciples come up to Jesus because they realize there’s a problem. Jesus, it’s getting late and the people don’t have any food to eat. So they notice there’s this problem. The people are in this remote place and they’re getting hungry. Maybe there’s even a little bit of compassion for them. Jesus, what should we do about this? And they have a plan that they’ve come up with. Jesus, send them away. Send them to a nearby town. They can find some food then. Then they won’t be hungry. There’s so many of them. Here’s a solution, Jesus. And what does he do?

He says something that is really unexpected. He says

They do not need to go away. You give them something to eat. (Matthew 14:16)

Okay! They check their resources that they see what they have. It’s completely inadequate, but they bring it to Jesus and say,

“We have here only five loaves of bread and two fish.” “Bring them here to me.” He said. (Matthew 14:17-18)

How does it sometimes work for us? We’re around Jesus. We’re in his word. He’s rubbing off on us, his love and his compassion for people. And we see people who are hurting, who maybe have physical needs, who have spiritual needs for eternal life. And we say we got to do something about this. There’s something wrong here. So we go and we take it to Jesus and we say, Jesus, there’s some huge problems here. Here’s my best guess at a solution. Here’s how maybe you could solve this, Jesus. And like he so often does. He says no. You give them something.

No, Jesus, that’s not what I was hoping you would say. I was hoping that you could take care of this. Or I could pass it off to somebody else. No, you. You give them something. So the Christian goes back and they evaluate and they say, what can I do in this situation? And they bring back to Jesus. All right, here’s what I have to offer. And it is woefully insufficient and inadequate. And Jesus says. Yeah. Bring that to me. That’s perfect. I can use that. And Jesus takes this from the Christian and he gives thanks for it. And then, like the disciples, what did he do?

He fills up their baskets. After breaking and giving thanks for what they so inadequately supplied him. And he sends them out and they go and they distribute the bread and they distribute the fish. And then, and then their baskets are empty and they’re like, All right, what’s next? I fed 15 or 20 people, and then they go back to Jesus and there he is, and he fills them back up. And then they go out and they distribute and they run out. And then they go back and he fills them back up.

And it is kind of a neat picture of the life of discipleship, isn’t it? We see these opportunities. We bring them to Jesus. Jesus says, you, you help them. And he gives thanks for us. And he sends us out, filled up to be able to go and, share physically or spiritually sharing the life that we have, the good news of the gospel. And sometimes we go and do that and we run out and we’re like, oh, I don’t have anything left. And what do we do? Go back to Jesus. We go back to His word. We go back to church. We go back to the Lord’s Supper where he forgives our sins and fills us back up and sends us out again. And after all of that life of service, there’s always leftovers. And there’s always Jesus. And he equips us to serve him. God be with you as you do that.

Matthew 14:13-21

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For the next few videos, I want to just take a look at Jesus feeds the 5000 for Matthew chapter 14, and I think we’ll learn a few things from him. First of all, verse 13 says,

When Jesus heard this, he withdrew from there in a boat to a deserted place to be alone. When the crowds heard this, they followed him on foot from the towns. When Jesus got out of the boat, he saw a large crowd. He had compassion on them and healed their sick. (Matthew 14:13-15)

So first of all, let’s just remember familiar story for many of us probably, but it says, when Jesus had heard what had happened, he withdrew by boat privately to a solitary place. What comes right before this in the Bible is we hear about how Jesus’ friend, his cousin, a ministry partner in a way, John the Baptist, had been ruthlessly murdered by King Herod. And Jesus is hearing about this. He’s hearing that Herod is now associating him with John the Baptist. So he’s in trouble. He knows his time isn’t supposed to be here yet. So he goes off to a solitary place and he says it in a few different ways. He withdraws, privately, to a solitary place. So you can kind of just get in the mental, emotional headspace of Jesus. He wants to be alone with his disciples.

And what happens? They follow him and they follow him, they’re carrying their sick and bringing them to Jesus. And he gets there and… and he has compassion on them. And he heals their sick. Just Jesus doing what Jesus does, caring about people.

When evening came, his disciples came to him and said, “This is a deserted place and the hour is already late. Send the crowds away, so that they can go into the villages and buy food for themselves.”
But Jesus said to them, “They do not need to go away. You give them something to eat.”
They told him, “We have here only five loaves and two fish.”
“Bring them here to me,” he replied. hen he instructed the people to sit down on the grass. He took the five loaves and the two fish. After looking up to heaven, he blessed them. He broke the loaves and gave them to the disciples. The disciples gave the food to the people. They all ate and were filled. They picked up twelve basketfuls of what was left over from the broken pieces. Those who ate were about five thousand men, not even counting women and children. (Matthew 14:15-21)

So the first point I just want us to remember today as we look at this familiar story, Jesus Feeds 5000 plus, is that Jesus takes care of us, right? Jesus provides for us. We can trust Jesus to take care of us. And first of all, physically.

What’s going on in your life? How do we need God to take care of us? When do we wonder if he cares about us? Well, here we see just a picture of the God of the universe coming and seeing people who needed help. And he has compassion on them. He sees you. He knows you. He cares about you. You’re not just a speck out in the universe that’s unimportant to God. But Jesus sees and cares about you. And He provides for you.

Can he do that? Absolutely. Look what he does with five loaves of bread, think little pita loaves here, and two fish. And he gives thanks to God for it. And he just provides until people have more than enough. I would invite you to look back over your life and think about the times when you’ve been in need and thank God for the different ways that he provides for you by people that he uses. We can think of the first article of the Apostle’s Creed where we say, I believe in God, the Father Almighty maker of heaven and earth. And what does this mean? That he provides us with clothing and shoes, house and home, land, cattle and all that I own. You think of that from the meaning to the Apostle’s creed.

And God does this. Sometimes miraculously, maybe you can think about just really surprising things that have happened to you. But how does he usually do it? Through natural means. Through God using people like me and you, others around us, the grocers, the farmers, the people just serving God or living their lives. And God uses all of them and uses us to take care of each other.

Next time we’ll look at how God took care of us in the most important way. But today, let’s thank God for the ways that he physically takes care of us. And trust him that he’s going to continue to do that.

Hebrews 13:5-6, Romans 8:31-32

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Recently there was a news story about a teenager, 14 year old boy who was fishing with his dad up at the Lake of the Woods in northern Minnesota. This huge lake, over a million acres in size, 70 miles long. He was fishing with his dad and he snagged something off the bottom. He pulls it up. Lo and behold, it’s a wallet and it was full of $2,000 worth of cash. Incredible. Can you imagine the odds of that?

Now, they were able to actually track down who it belonged to and they returned it to a farmer from Iowa who realized that as he was fishing, he dropped his wallet over the side of the boat sometime during the day. He had no idea where it was. He had counted on it being gone forever. And that farmer in the news article, he speaks about the odds like how incredible. What are the odds of someone snagging my wallet and then being willing to return it to me? Incredible odds.

But for us as Christians, we don’t look at odds like that. I think this is something that we would look at and say, this is evidence of the hand of God. And we see things like this happening all around us. Maybe we even take them for granted incredible things that are happening. Sometimes it’s a healing or an accident that we see where someone walks away, where they should be dead, or someone in the hospital who was diagnosed with some terrible disease. And then they go back for a second testing and it’s gone. So many different things throughout our day that we might even take for granted. And yet for us as Christians, we look at things like this a wallet full of money on the end of a fishing line. And we might say this is evidence of God’s active hand.

I find that to be so encouraging when I hear stories like this, when I hear stories from people of these other things, to think that God is here for us. His hand is active still even in our lives today. So many people feel that God must be far away. We look at the disappointing, difficult situations that we face in this life. We think God must be far away from us or not care. That’s not true. The Bible assures us of that as well. I love the verses that we find, especially in Hebrews 13, where it says

For God has said: I will never leave you,
and I will never forsake you. So then we say with confidence: The Lord is my helper, and I will not be afraid. (Hebrews 13:5-6)

God has promised to be at our side. He has promised to be our help throughout life. He is here, active in our world. Or another verse I love from Romans Chapter eight.

What then will we say about these things? If God is for us, who can be against us? Indeed, he who did not spare his own Son, but gave him up for us all—how will he not also graciously give us all things along with him? (Romans 8:31-32)

God is for you. And we see proof of that, as Paul writes here, especially in the sacrifice of Jesus upon the cross, He went to the cross for you so that your sins could be forgiven, so that you can have peace with God, so that eternal life in heaven belongs to you. If God was willing to go to all of that work, he’s going to continue to be working for you here and now. Take comfort in that. And when you see these little evidences of God’s active hand, rejoice, say God be praised. He is here and He is for us. God’s peace be with you.

Exodus 17:6

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When you go to your kitchen faucet and you turn it on, what do you expect to happen? Do you expect water to come running out of that faucet? When you go to the store, do you expect to find groceries and food on the shelves? When you come to the table for a meal? Do you expect food to be there in the table that someone has so wondrously and graciously made for you?

The answer to all that is yes. We expect those things, we often take them for granted. But God’s people, well they couldn’t go to the faucet as they’re wandering in the desert. They couldn’t just go to the store and find food. And at one point they went and there was no water. And they grumbled and complained at Moses. And they were near rebellion against Moses because they were thirsty. So, so thirsty in the desert. So Moses went to God and God had an answer for Moses. Exodus chapter 17, verse six. God says to Moses,

Watch me. I will stand there in front of you on the Rock and Horeb. You are to strike the rock. Water will come out of it and the people will drink. (Exodus 17:6)

And so that’s what Moses did. He went to the rock, took his staff and struck the rock and water flowed out like a faucet. If we have all those things, the water from the faucet, the food and the grocery store, the food, our table, and all of a sudden they were gone. Would we complain like the Israelites? Would we grumble against God as if he wasn’t really providing for us at all?

What God said to Moses he says to us too. To watch him and watch him and he will provide. Just watch and see how God who created the world and preserves the world, he still provides for you and for me. He provides for all that we need, even if it doesn’t look like it. He’s doing a very good job of that. We know God keeps his promises. And we know God can and he does care for us every day. Just look at the Son he sent into the world, the Son he sent to die on the cross for you and for me. And if he’s done that, then certainly he will continue to care for us and provide for all our needs. Amen.

Mark 4:38

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Jesus, don’t you care? This was the question that the disciples had on their minds as they fought against the wind and the waves of this huge storm that had come upon their small boat. Meanwhile, Jesus slept in the stern. And so they wake up Jesus and they say,

Jesus, don’t you care that we are perishing? (Mark 4:38)

Don’t you care that we’re about to die? How often do we feel like this? We’re going through our life and suddenly a storm of life hits us out of the blue and we’re left feeling like we are floundering. Like we’re drowning in this difficulty and that Jesus is asleep at the wheel like his attention is somewhere else. Maybe it’s a job lost. Maybe it’s a relationship that has been broken. Maybe it’s because we are grieving over the death of somebody that we have loved and lost. Maybe it’s financial issues, health troubles, the list goes on and on. And as we’re floundering, we feel like Jesus’s attention is somewhere else. God, don’t you care?

This feeling in itself is a temptation. It’s a temptation to give in to the worry, to give in to the fear, to let these troubles overwhelm us, to cause us to doubt the promise and the providence of our God, the promises that he will be there for us, that he will lead us through these difficulties, that he will give us everything that we need. The very fact that Jesus was on that boat that day is proof of God’s care and not just for the disciples, but for us.

Jesus, who is God, he took on human flesh in order to come and show us His care. He lived every single day according to the law. He fulfilled God’s law for us because He cares for us. He came to proclaim the good news because he cares. He came to go to the cross and to pay our price, to die for us in our place and to win for us forgiveness as the greatest display in the history of the world of how much he cares for us.

God sees the storms of life that you are facing right now. He sees the difficulties and the challenges that are mounting up. He knows your struggles and your difficulties, and he who never slumbers or sleeps. Hears your prayers. He knows your needs and he promises to supply everything necessary for you.

Because of the work of Jesus in every single storm that you face, you know that God himself is standing by your side. As Jesus calmly wakes up from his slumber, he goes to the front of the ship and he rebukes the wind. He tells the waves to be still. And suddenly calm comes over. The disciples seeing this there, they understand and they learn more about who their Savior is, who this teacher is, the power that he has and their faith in him grows. This is the result of God bringing us also through the storms of our life. Whatever storm you’re facing right now, quiet your troubled heart by hearing again and again the comforting promises of God’s Word and know that they are true.

Every single storm, every trial of your life, God will use for your good. He will use them to empty you of any reliance you have on yourself and to remind you to put your faith and your trust in him. Who is he? The one who even the winds and the seas obey. He is your Savior from sin. He is the conqueror of death and Satan. He is the Son of God and Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.