We've Got Nothing (8-6-2023)

August 6, 2023

Tenth Sunday After Pentecost (A)

Isaiah 55:1-5; Psalm 145:8-9, 14-21; Romans 9:1-5; Matthew 14:13-21

We have all heard the story of the feeding of the five thousand. It is one of the few stories about Jesus that appear in all four gospels, and most of us have heard it many times before.

As many times as I’ve heard and read this passage, I’m not sure I’ve ever really focused the way I have this week on the way in which the gospel text – and not just in Matthew but in all four gospel narratives – does not tell us exactly what happened. I mean, how did Jesus feed five thousand people with five loaves and two fish? Was Jesus just standing there and suddenly a pile of baguettes appeared in front of him? How did this work? The gospel stories don’t tell us. What if someone had just taken out their phone and made a video of what happened, what would we have seen? The gospels just don’t tell us that.

And that’s not unusual in what Jesus does. I wonder if the experience of being there on the day Jesus fed the crowds in the wilderness was anything like the experience of being a guest at the wedding feast in Cana. In that story it’s pretty clear that hardly anybody knew what had happened.  Just about everybody recognized that the quality of the wine suddenly improved, but that’s about all. The disciples of Jesus knew, the people who filled the jars with water knew, but that’s about it.

And I’m trying to imagine, in a crowd of thousands of people, how many of them would have known that it all started with five loaves and two fish? How many of them would have just been sitting there on the grass, talking to the people next to them, and suddenly one of the disciples of Jesus show up with a basket. They reached in, took the bread, passed it to their family members, to their neighbors – and everyone ate until they were full – which probably didn’t happen every day for people in that place and time. Where did the bread came from? They probably had no idea. The disciples knew. They were there when it started with five loaves, the disciples were there when they collected 12 baskets of leftovers – and I’m not sure they could have explained what exactly had happened. The gospel writers don’t even try to explain it.

We see this over and over in the gospels. Even for the resurrection of Jesus itself. There are no eyewitness accounts of the moment Jesus rose from the dead; if you want to know what a video camera set up at the tomb would have captured on Easter Sunday morning, the gospel narratives don’t give us a clue. The gospels tell us that, when the women arrived, the tomb was already empty; the gospels tell us of visions of angels and appearances of Jesus, alive, the same but also different.  Faith is like that – God acts, God acts in ways that are beyond our immediate comprehension. But the effects are undeniable – full bellies and baskets of leftovers, merry hearts enjoying rich wines, the confused and fearful have their eyes opened in the breaking of the bread.  And only then do their brains catch up and say, Wait a minute! What just happened here?

In the previous chapter of Matthew’s gospel, Jesus told the crowds many parables about the kingdom of heaven. Parables that, as we have seen, are complex and multi-layered. Yhat have many levels of meaning, that obscure as much as they reveal. That provoke thinking and rethinking about who God is and what God is doing. And now Jesus performs a living parable.

To what shall I compare the kingdom of heaven? It is the meal that you have just eaten, “without money and without price,” as the prophet Isaish might have said, the meal that has left you satisfied and there is even some left over.

One detail the disciples remembered about this day is that the Jesus had directed the crowds to sit down and relax on the grass to enjoy their meal. And this, too, points to this event being a living parable. Might the crowds have thought to themselves, The Lord indeed is my shepherd, I am satisfied and lack nothing, he makes me to lie down in green pastures, he sets a table before me, my cup and my plate are overflowing. This is indeed what the kingdom of heaven must be like.

And I think it is also significant how such a huge crowd came to be there with Jesus in that deserted place on that day. The disciples remembered that detail, too. It was when Jesus had learned that John the Baptist had been beheaded by King Herod, and Jesus got into a boat and set off for a deserted place. Perhaps Jesus wanted some time and space to mourn for his cousin and mentor. Perhaps he was worried that Herod might come after him too. Perhaps because he just needed time to think and pray and process this terrible news.

But when the news about John’s murder got out to the public, everybody wa sangry and upset. We know, both from the gospels and from secular history, that John was popular, that John was revered as a prophet who stood up to the corruption of the political and religious institutions of the day, that John had promised something better was right around the corner. And if the king could behead someone like John – under circumstances that were more grotesque than anyone could imagine – you couldn’t blame people for thinking, We’re living in the kingdom of hell.

Where is the Lord who is supposed to be our shepherd? Where is the one John told us was coming? Where is the one who John said would baptize with the Holy Spirit and fire? Is the kingdom of heaven real or not? And if it’s real, where is it already? Where is God? And so they found Jesus and came to him looking for answers.

And at the end of a long and stressful day, the disciples came to Jesus and said, Enough already. It’s late, this is a deserted place, people are hungry. It’s time to send them on their way. I know we didn’t give them the answers they were looking for, but it’ll be dark soon. And then things will get even worse. So just tell them to go home.

And Jesus looked at them. I imagine he looked at them in silence for a while, for an uncomfortably long silence. And then he said, “Why don’t you give them something to eat?”

Seriously? With our resources? Jesus, this is a deserted place, and we have nothing. These problems are too big for us to solve. We got nothin’. Look. Five loaves, two fish.

Does that sound familiar? Can you relate to these disciples? People looking for answers, traumatized, frustrated, overwhelmed by problems they know they can’t solve, wondering where God is. We have no answer, and it feels like the only option to shut it down for the night and see what tomorrow brings. “Why don’t you do something about it?” Like what, Jesus? Like what do you think we can do? Realistically, what do you expect us to do?

We are in the wilderness and we have nothing. We are sick and don’t have the strength we did when we were younger. We have lost so much and have nothing left to go on. We are divided from one another and don’t know how to talk to each other any more. We try to invite people to join our community and most of them don’t seem all that interested. The planet is breaking down and we don’t have the power to fix it. And that’s your advice to us? Why don’t you do something yourselves? What exactly do you think we can do that will even make a dent? And then Jesus tells his living parable.

To what shall I compare the kingdom of heaven? It’s like a handful of people in a deserted place, with woefully inadequate resources, up against powers too strong for them to resist on their own, who nonetheless take what little they have, give thanks and bless God for it, break it, and share it – not because they can see how it could possibly make a difference, but because Jesus showed them how to do it and told them to keep doing it. And then suddenly they discover that something has happened. They cannot tell you how, but they know for sure it did. The hungry are fed and, for a moment at least, everyone’s needs are satisfied. This is what the kingdom of heaven is like.

Let anyone who has ears, hear. Let anyone who is hungry, come to the table, without money and without price.