Feeding the Hungry
by Keith Brenton
05/20/2008 - "Jesus called his disciples to him and said, 'I have compassion for these people; they have already been with me three days and have nothing to eat. I do not want to send them away hungry, or they may collapse on the way.' " ~ Matthew 15:32
Three days.
Had the crowds been out in the wild, away from their cities and homes and jobs, for three days while He taught them? Was it the kind of encampment that Restoration churches picture at Cane Ridge, Kentucky? Had they exhausted the food that they had brought, hungering so much to hear His words that they were willing to put up with a little growling in their stomachs?
We don't know. But the possibility does cast doubt on the idea proposed by - and with all due respect to the intentions of - folks like former minister Barbara Brown Taylor or Frank Cottrell Boyce, scriptwriter of the movie Millions: that the "real" miracle may have been that Jesus persuaded the crowds to share what they had brought and hidden away in folds of their cloaks for themselves. He did say, "...they have nothing to eat." And He was rarely wrong about such matters.
What we know for certain is that Jesus cares for people in the here and now, as well as in the hereafter. He shared the words, the bread that brings life here and to come, but He also shared the bread and fish that sustain it now.
Else He would not have placed such a priority on feeding them by the five thousands or the four thousands or as an instruction to His followers in Matthew 25.
Three days.
Had the crowds been out in the wild, away from their cities and homes and jobs, for three days while He taught them? Was it the kind of encampment that Restoration churches picture at Cane Ridge, Kentucky? Had they exhausted the food that they had brought, hungering so much to hear His words that they were willing to put up with a little growling in their stomachs?
We don't know. But the possibility does cast doubt on the idea proposed by - and with all due respect to the intentions of - folks like former minister Barbara Brown Taylor or Frank Cottrell Boyce, scriptwriter of the movie Millions: that the "real" miracle may have been that Jesus persuaded the crowds to share what they had brought and hidden away in folds of their cloaks for themselves. He did say, "...they have nothing to eat." And He was rarely wrong about such matters.
What we know for certain is that Jesus cares for people in the here and now, as well as in the hereafter. He shared the words, the bread that brings life here and to come, but He also shared the bread and fish that sustain it now.
Else He would not have placed such a priority on feeding them by the five thousands or the four thousands or as an instruction to His followers in Matthew 25.
posted at 5/20/2008 06:53:00 AM
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