Welcome today to the Weekend Sermon. It is good to be able to be with you today, and I hope that everyone is having a good week.
I want to thank the Lord for allowing me to have a good job. It took a long time and a lot of prayer, but my job is working out well.
For the last several weeks we have been praying for nations of the world where there are few Christians. This week, let us pray for the nation of Israel. Only about two percent of the people of Israel are Christians. Let us pray that the message of Jesus would reach the land where He walked and ministered two thousand years ago.
Today, I am starting a new series of messages about the miracles of Jesus. We will take a break from the series for messages about the themes of Holy Week during the Easter period.
Of all of the miracles that Jesus performed while He was here on earth, only one of Jesus' miracles is recorded in all four of the Gospels. That miracle is the feeding of the five thousand.
Jesus had been teaching and performing miraculous acts of healing. His words and deeds drew massive crowds of people to see and hear him. They wanted to listen to the one who taught with authority, and they wanted to be healed of their afflictions.
On one occasion, the people had been listening to Jesus for a long period of time. As the day progressed, the people grew hungry. Jesus had compassion on the multitude and wanted to provide them with food so that they wouldn't faint from hunger on their way back to their homes.
When Jesus told His disciples to give the crowd something to eat, Philip said that it would take eight months wages to feed just one bite to that many people. Andrew, mentioned that there was a boy with five loaves and two small fish, but that was nothing among so many people.
Jesus had the multitude sit down. Jesus took the loaves and the fish, blessed them, and then He gave them to the disciples to distribute to the masses. The people all had enough to eat. In fact, the disciples took up basket fulls of left over food.
So, what does this miracle of Jesus have to teach us today? First of all, I believe that this miracle demonstrates the divinity of Jesus. Jesus demonstrated that He had the power of creation. He was able to create enough to fill the people by His wonder working power. This demonstrates to us today that Jesus had the power to supply all of our needs.
I often get down and depressed because I don't always have enough financial resources to get the bills paid. I have to remind myself that Jesus has the power to supply all that I need. And Jesus has supplied my needs over and over and over again. Praise be to His name.
Jesus also has the power to supply all of our needs spiritually as well. He is the only way of salvation. He alone is the way to the Father. Jesus is our comfort and strength when the storms and trials of life press in around us. Jesus will help us now, and He will take us to be with Him when this life is over.
I also learn from this miracle that Jesus is compassionate. Jesus could have just sent the people away. But, Jesus loved everyone, and He wanted to help everyone. Jesus cares when people are hurting. He wants people to have the good things of life. He came to seek and to save the lost, and He wants everyone to turn from their sin and turn to Him as Savior and Lord.
In this miracle, Jesus also calls on His followers to be compassionate and meet the needs of the those around them. Jesus told the disciples to give the people something to eat. We live in a world that is filled with great need. Hundreds of thousands of people in this world go to bed hungry every night. Many children die from starvation each day. It is our responsibility as the followers of Jesus Christ to provide food for the hungry. With the resources that Christians have, there is no reason that anyone in this world should go hungry. This is an important ministry of the church that we must fulfill in obedience to the Lord.
This miracle also teaches about faithfulness. The boy in this story was willing to give up his loaves and fish to meet the needs of others. He was willing to give what he had to Jesus so that Jesus could use it to help others. This should be our attitude as Jesus' followers. We may not have a great many talents or gifts. We may not have a lot of money. However, what we do have, we need to offer up to the service and use of Jesus so that others may know of the reality of Jesus' love and mercy.
This is just one of many miracles that Jesus performed. Over the course of the next several weeks, we will look at other miracles Jesus performed and see what we can learn from them. I will post a book review on Wednesday. May God bless you.
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