November 7, 2021: A Basket Full of Not Enough
John 6:1-21
Rev. Rhonda Bevins
After this Jesus went to the other side of the Sea of Galilee, also called the Sea of Tiberias. A large crowd kept following him, because they saw the signs that he was doing for the sick. Jesus went up the mountain and sat down there with his disciples. Now the Passover, the festival of the Jews, was near. When he looked up and saw a large crowd coming toward him, Jesus said to Philip, “Where are we to buy bread for these people to eat?” He said this to test him, for he himself knew what he was going to do. Philip answered him, “Six months’ wages would not buy enough bread for each of them to get a little.” One of his disciples, Andrew, Simon Peter’s brother, said to him, “There is a boy here who has five barley loaves and two fish. But what are they among so many people?” Jesus said, “Make the people sit down.” Now there was a great deal of grass in the place; so they sat down, about five thousand in all. Then Jesus took the loaves, and when he had given thanks, he distributed them to those who were seated; so also the fish, as much as they wanted. When they were satisfied, he told his disciples, “Gather up the fragments left over, so that nothing may be lost.” So they gathered them up, and from the fragments of the five barley loaves, left by those who had eaten, they filled twelve baskets. When the people saw the sign that he had done, they began to say, “This is indeed the prophet who is to come into the world.” When Jesus realized that they were about to come and take him by force to make him king, he withdrew again to the mountain by himself.
When evening came, his disciples went down to the sea, got into a boat, and started across the sea to Capernaum. It was now dark, and Jesus had not yet come to them. The sea became rough because a strong wind was blowing. When they had rowed about three or four miles, they saw Jesus walking on the sea and coming near the boat, and they were terrified. But he said to them, “It is I; do not be afraid.” Then they wanted to take him into the boat, and immediately the boat reached the land toward which they were going.
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Let me set the scene, and as I do so, I want you to think about whether this describes you. It’s first thing in the morning. You wake up, delighted that it’s morning. You spring out of bed, glide over to the bathroom, look in the mirror, and sing, “You’re just too good to be true.” Raise your hand if that describes your typical morning.
For those of you who raised your hand, this is a very important day for you. Take out a pen and a piece of paper and write down these words: “Axis Two Narcissistic Personality Disorder.” I have just diagnosed you. Now take that piece of paper to the closest therapist you can find and tell that therapist, “My pastor has finally diagnosed me.” Really. Do it now. This sermon really doesn’t apply to you.
This sermon is for the rest of us. This sermon is for those of us who drag out of bed, look through bleary eyes in the mirror, and sing “Gloom, despair, and agony on me.” This sermon is for those of us who often feel like the disciple Andrew must have felt that day on the mountain. Andrew, the one who said “Here is a boy with five small barley loaves and two small fish, but how far will they go among so many?” Andrew, wanting to have faith, but yielding to doubt. Most of us are a lot like Andrew:
Andrew looked around and saw thousands of people who were hungry;
We look around and see thousands of people who are hungry.Jesus expected Andrew to feed the masses;
Jesus expects us to feed the masses.Andrew took inventory and all he had to work with was five loaves and a couple of fish;
We take inventory and all each of us has to work with is five fingers each on a couple of hands.Andrew looked in his basket, and it was a basket full of not enough;
We look in our baskets—I look in my basket—and far too often, it is a basket full of not enough.
Five fingers—two hands. “How far will they go among so many?” “If only I had more charisma or more compassion. If only I had more time or more talent. If only my waistline was a few inches thinner and my wallet was a few inches thicker. Maybe if I could finally get it together, maybe then I could feed the masses.
At other times I feel like Andrew must have felt on the boat that night—armed with nothing more than a paddle against the churning sea. So I row and I row and I row and I row. “What in the world? Jesus is out there running around on the water? He’s playing aquatic hopscotch when we’ve got a storm brewing? Ok, I don’t really have room in my cerebral cortex for that right now. All I know is that we’ve got a long way to go, and all I’ve got is my paddle. Just keep rowing, just keep rowing, just keep rowing, rowing, rowing.”
Like Andrew, I’m with Jesus a lot. It’s sort of the nature of the profession I suppose. From my private, devotional life, to my public, pastoral life, Jesus is there. We read the pages of Holy Scripture together. We go visit people in the hospital together. We go to church potlucks together. We sit on the finance team together. We make plans for the church together. We even raise a family together. I once had a dream that I was in an airplane with Jesus, and he was the pilot. Seriously. I’m with Jesus a lot.
But so much of the time—too much of the time—I feel like I’ve got all of Jesus’ presence and none of Jesus’ power. This is where I live most of the time. This is my faith set-point. Every now and then I’ll be amazed, but most of the time I hold a basket that seems less than adequate for the task I’ve been called to do.
Back in 2005 I accepted the call to direct a poverty initiative by a group of churches in Eastern Kentucky. The goal was to eradicate poverty. Simple enough, right? After I’d been on the job for a couple of months, I began to joke that now that I had single handedly eradicated poverty, I was going to tackle world peace. I had to make jokes about the job, because frankly, it overwhelmed me. Cynicism helped me face the inadequacies I felt at taking on such a task. Facing down such a huge problem, I grasped for some handles, some practical, proven pathway lest I throw my hands up paralyzed and despairing. The only handle I could find was simply to do what I knew I could do—I knew I could mobilize people to build houses. Now, I barely knew the difference between a hammer and a skill saw, but I knew that I could find people who knew the difference. I knew that with building affordable, decent housing—one family at a time—we could potentially break the cycle of poverty for that family. So with a little bit of dumb faith, that’s what I set out to do. I poured my energy into forming partnerships with other non-profits in the area. I pounded the pavements looking for people who could catch the vision for coming together to build a house—just one house. And we did it. I didn’t do it—I still don’t know the difference between a hammer and a skill saw. We called it “Extreme Build” because we did it in basically a week. I used my five fingers on two hands that week. Boy, did I use my hands that week. And when eighty-year-old Charlie, our volunteer construction supervisor, handed over the keys for that far-more-than-decent house, my tears and the tears of the entire crew—let’s just say they were more than enough to fill twelve baskets.
Andrew and I, we’re pretty ordinary people. Our baskets—well, let’s just say we both have pretty ordinary baskets with just a few loaves and a couple of fish. So we do what we know how to do. We know how to get the people to sit down, so we seat them. We know how to pass the plate, so we pass the plate. And after we pass it, it’s out of our hands. It’s out of my hands.
And that’s the place . . . that place out of my hands . . . where the power of God takes over and multiplies the loaves and the fishes. “Out of my hands” is the place where my two little hands are more than enough. I am enough, not through any special giftedness. Not through theological training. Not through experience or wisdom or my stunning good looks. I am enough because the Holy Spirit becomes the fire in my faithfulness. All I have to offer—the only thing in my basket, really—is my faithfulness. So I offer it up. It’s up to Jesus to bless it.
So Andrew and I have the people sit down. And we pass the plate that Jesus has blessed. And we trust that the people will be fed. Andrew and I invite Jesus to get in the boat, we offer him our paddles, and we trust that we will get to the other side.
Up there in Kentucky, the people wanted to build another house the next year. I helped with the planning, but when it came time to build, I was great with child and couldn’t be there. They built that house in a week. By the third summer, I had accepted a call to a church in Tennessee. I was out of the picture entirely. They have now completed their sixteenth Extreme Build house. The first house was pretty cool. It was an incredibly exciting thing to be a part of. The second house—they did a great job. There was one more house I participated in, but thirteen houses were totally out of my two hands. Sixteen houses—the result of my inadequacy. That makes no sense. It must be God—the fire in what little faithfulness I could muster.
When we trust God to be the fire in our faithfulness, a basket full of not enough becomes more than enough to feed the hungry throngs. When we trust God to be the fire in our faithfulness, the weight of the world no longer rests on our shoulders. When we trust God to be the fire in our faithfulness, we get over ourselves and find healing for that messiah complex many of us carry around. When we trust God to be the fire in our faithfulness, we begin to sing a new song.
We wake up, wipe the sleep from our eyes, plant our feet firmly on the floor, walk over to the mirror and take a long, hard look, and we offer ourselves a little dose of reality. So maybe I’m not “too good to be true.” Nor is the song “gloom, despair and agony on me.” Maybe the song we sing to ourselves is an easy, gentle reminder: “Trust and obey, for there’s no other way, to be happy in Jesus, but to trust and obey.”