Bible Text: John 6:1-15 | Preacher: Rev. Jenn Geddes
Some of you might be familiar with Stuart Maclean and the Vinyl Cafe. Just this past week the Vinyl Cafe was listed on buzzfeed.com as one of the “storytelling podcasts that you need to be listening to”. Most often this CBC radio program includes stories about a family Dave, Morely, Stephanie, Sam and their neighbours in Toronto and Stuart began telling these stories in 1994 and so for people like me, I have grown up with this family. For a few years now Stuart has also included in his program once a year a segment called “The Arthur Awards.” These awards are named after, Dave’s dog, Arthur. Because like a dog their are modest and unassuming. These awards are given to people who show ordinary kindness but often have an extraordinary impact. They are to recognize small acts that often go unnoticed. Former winners have included people who found lost luggage and tracked down the owners, or stay at home mothers, or someone who each year strings up lights across a town intersection. Basically it celebrates those people that do little things that often go unthanked. Usually there is no prize but the opportunity to get a call from Stuart which is later aired on his radio show. One year the Arthur award went to a student at St. Mary’s University in Halifax, Jamie Hawkins. Jamie as a mature student had incurred a huge student debt of over $45, 000 and one day he found $10,000 in bag in the student union building. Instead of taking the money and putting it toward his costs he took it to campus security and they eventually found the owner, a security guard had misplaced it. Jamie received the Arthur award for being his best self, returning something that was lost despite the fact that it could have improved his situation. As I mentioned normally there is no prize in winning an Arthur award. However, Stuart decided that this was different and he wanted to help Jamie out. Well, actually he wanted all kinds of people to help Jamie out. So as he toured across Canada with his travelling story telling show he would put out an empty paint can in the theatre lobbies and asked people if they had a little spare change left over to leave a loonie or a twoonie in the bucket. Basically collecting donations from whatever change was in peoples pockets. On his Christmas show that year Stuart contacted Jamie and told him that Canadians had put in buckets of twoonies, loonies and change and that over those few months of collecting change, $15, 079. 21 had been collected. People across Canada simply put their spare change into a bucket but as these small amounts were collected a great amount was obtained. It is a modern day version of the loaves and fishes…although, while he tells great stories, I don’t think Stuart MacLean is Jesus.
As I mentioned the story of the feeding of the 5,000 comes up in all four Gospels and as a result it is one of Jesus’ best known miracle stories. In John’s version however, Jesus is the one who asks the question, “Where are we to buy bread for these people to eat?”, in all the other versions, it is the disciples who begin to panic when they see all the hungry, angry, or hangry people. As a result I want to attempt to focus less on the miracle story and instead study the dialogue between Jesus, Philip and Andrew. John claims that Jesus is the one asking the questions as a form of test to Philip. There are a few comparisons that we can make especially as we think of the collective history of the Hebrew people. During the exodus Moses, via God’s instruction and gifts, fed the Israelites with bread from heaven. But God was also testing the Israelites and their own trust in God. So as Jesus asks, “Where are we to buy bread for these people to eat?” to Philip, as part of a test, it reflects that story in the Old Testament of when God rained bread from heaven and each day the people were to gather only enough for that day, in this way God tested them, to see whether they trusted that God would provide for them the next day. In our Gospel story Philip answers that it would take an enormous amount of money to buy bread to feed all these people. Even two hundred denarii would not buy enough bread for everyone to receive even a little sample. Two hundred denarii being about a year’s salary for the average worker. Money the disciples do not have. Philip relates it to cost and thus establishes the mind-set of scarcity. It would cost way too much to feed these people! It would appear that Philip is trying to subtly say, its going to cost too much and therefore we shouldn’t even try.
Andrew pipes in mentioning that a boy has brought with him a small supply of food but that such a small amount is worthless among so many people. If Jesus is testing Philip and Andrew, well, they seem to have failed the test. Failed to realize that with Jesus it shouldn’t be only about the cost and with Jesus a small meal can change lives. I can’t help but think it is those excuses that often hold us back. We don’t have the funds so we might as well not even try to do something different. We don’t have the energy so we might as well not even try to seek volunteers. We have such a shortage on resources that it won’t even be enough for one person. We have so few young families that we might as well not even try to provide programs.
And then, I see the opposite of that, I see the way that over the Lenten season funds came in to support the Cedar Tree Ministries, a church and mission that up until that point weren’t even sure they would be able to pay their rent. I see the way that the Children’s and Baby supplies are being collected and know that those simple items will make a difference in those young families’ lives. I know, that you know, that we can accomplish a lot with very little when we work together. But sometimes the work is intimidating, so intimidating we don’t want to even try.
Yes, the numbers can be overwhelming, yes, it may seem like we don’t have enough money, or energy or resources, or expertise. But what are we and what is the world hungry for? God cares about our hunger and our desires, God knows what it is we hope for and what we want more of and if it is improving God’s kingdom- God’s will, will be done! In this story not only are the people fed and satisfied with those limited resources but then there are leftovers. No matter what we are hoping for, Jesus’ resources are without limit, and he can meet our needs and more.
We are often more like Philip in our response to Jesus, we measure the need, quantify our inadequate resources and resign to hopelessness. We make excuses. As a friend of mine once said, “the truth is we have closets packed with thousands of excuses.” But then Jesus is standing on the shore amongst all of that need and hunger, with nothing but a few loaves of bread and a couple small fish, demonstrating that when we work with God, we have to expect the unexpected and trust that it will work out. Trust that we will have enough. Trust that small acts will show big results. Trust that just a little bit of change can change everything. Amen