Jesus Feeds Us: Mark 8:1-9

When we think about Jesus feeding the multitude, in this case, a crowd of 4,000, we normally pay little attention to the setting.  We stand amazed by what Jesus did.  He multiplied a minute amount of bread and fish to feed an enormous crowd.  But that’s just the obvious part.  If you look at the setting, you find there’s much more taking place!

This crowd of 4,000 had been following Jesus for three days.  His words and teaching had so captivated their hearts and minds that they forgot about their stomachs.  They followed Jesus deeper and deeper into the wilderness, hanging on His every word that He spoke.  Finally, famished and weak, in such a far-removed and desolate place, they had no place to go and get food to stay alive.

Yet, the conditions were even more precarious than that.  They no longer had the strength within them to walk a couple of days to get the food they needed.  It’s not that they were just hungry; they were in danger of starving to death!  So, Jesus’ miracle of feeding them wasn’t simply to show His power.  Jesus showed, through His miracle, how He would put a stop to death by feeding His flock what they would need to live.

Now, at one time or another, we’ve all been so caught up in what we were doing that we forgot to eat lunch.  But how long did it take until your stomach reminded you?  A few hours are the most we ever make it.  If we even go a day without any food, we feel as if we are starving to death, even though we are not.

How did these people stay so distracted for three days?  How did 4,000 people all fail to realize they were going so far into the wilderness that they wouldn’t have enough food to support life?  This happened because the Lord was at work on them.  Like the Pied Piper, our Lord led them there–on purpose.  He brought them along by the joy and peace that only His Word can give.  He seduced them with theology, the teachings of God.

Jesus had arranged these events to happen.  Jesus didn’t have to do this.  He could have sent the crowd home before they became famished.  He could have sent some of them to get supplies along the way.  But that’s not what Jesus did.

Instead, Jesus preached eternal truths that transcended the moment.  The people left this world for the kingdom of God.  They forgot themselves and their circumstances.  The vision of angels and archangels and all the company of heaven had captured their hearts.  They were unaware of the drums of death, beating louder all around them.  For they were captured and pulled in by the words of Christ.

So there was the crowd of 4,000, famished in the wilderness, lacking the food they needed.  They suddenly became aware of their dire need.  But it was too late.  There was nowhere to buy food.  It was then the disciples asked Jesus, “Where in this desolate place can anyone get enough bread to feed these people?”  It was a rhetorical question.  They didn’t expect an answer.  It was like asking, “How can we end world hunger?”  It’s impossible.  These people can’t all be fed.

Jesus doesn’t even answer the question.  He doesn’t explain.  He quietly performs His miracle.  He simply gathers the meager supplies they have–seven loaves!  Our Lord Jesus Christ, on the same night in which He was preaching in the wilderness, took bread.  And when He had given thanks, He broke it and gave it to the disciples and said, “Give this to them.  This bread feeds those in the wilderness.”  In the same way also, He took a few small fish, and when He had given thanks, He gave it to them saying, “Give this to them.”  So they did.

The disciples took the seven loaves and the few small fish, which the Lord had blessed.  The fish and bread looked no different.  There was no outward change.  Their reason and senses saw nothing remarkable.  But the disciples distributed the food anyway, because that’s what Jesus said to do.

Every time the disciples reached to get the food that Jesus had blessed, another piece was there.  By Jesus’ own word, bread and fish abounded for 4,000 to eat and have their fill.  He fed the crowd in the desolate wilderness, the same wilderness that had them all collapsing on the doorstep of death.  Jesus had put a stop to death.

When the crowd all had their fill, the disciples then collected the fragments and filled seven large baskets.  For we cannot contain the bounty of the Lord.  His mercy and generosity are far greater than our needs, as is His love–far greater than our sins!  Then our Lord lifted His hands over them and said, “Depart in peace.”  He sent them on their way, back into the world, to home and neighbor.

But Jesus didn’t stop there.  He continued to travel the road prepared for Him by His wild-looking, locust-eating cousin, John the Baptizer.  Jesus went from wilderness to wilderness, with no place to lay His head, until He put it down outside the city of Jerusalem, on the stony slope of death.

Unlike the crowd whom Jesus fed, no one will provide for Him.  Instead, He will give Himself as Bread to satisfy the souls of men.  He will be skewered on the cross, baked over the coals of hell, until the fire burns itself out and death meets its downfall.  And then, death will be no more.  Now, no more needs to be done.  For sin, death, and Hell, accusation and guilt, are finally defeated, finished, and gone.

Order finally comes to the desolate wilderness.  Like the wilderness, which had become the place of death for the crowd except for Jesus’ intervention, the place of the crucifixion death now becomes the place of God’s enduring mercy.  This hill of death, Calvary, now orders our days and directs our attention.  For on this hill, death finally met its match and died its own death.

Jesus Christ, our Lord, has died, once for all.  Never again will He die.  The enemy is done.  Jesus of Nazareth, the King of the Jews, is risen from the dead.  The devil’s dominion over us is no more.  Never again will we face our accuser.  Never again will the chains of hell shackle us.

Yet, even if we find ourselves in the desolate wilderness, subject to evil, weak and fainting, we will be safe, free, and loved by God in Christ Jesus.  Death lies dead in the wilderness place outside Jerusalem, a victim of its own hungering greed.  The accuser’s mouth is stopped, emptied of all its power and might.

That’s the point of Jesus’ miraculous feeding in the wilderness.  The Lord led the multitude into the wilderness to pull back a corner of the curtain and reveal the coming death of death.

Yes, it’s true, on this side of heaven, none of us is ever more than a missed-heartbeat away from death.  Our bodies can fail for thousands of reasons, without warning, because of genetics, a slip on the stairs, or something in our food or water.  We can be undone in seconds, dead before we hit the floor.  Yet, we survive, and even prosper, by our Lord’s providence and grace.  This, Jesus taught the crowd that day when He fed them, as death loomed large before them.

For us also wandering in the desolate wilderness of this world, how can receive life when eternal death looms large around us?  How can we have any joy when our bodies are broken, when we are struggling with cancer, when physical exhaustion has had its way with us?  To strengthen us, our Lord gives us more than daily bread.  He gives us His body, the body He gave to the cross for the sins of the world.  He gives it to you, your food and salvation.

Like feeding the crowd of 4,000, our Lord simply takes bread, breaks it, and gives thanks.  He says, “Take eat, this is My Body, which is given for you.  Do this in remembrance of me.”  Then, when you have eaten and taken in Jesus, when He has transformed you anew into His holy temple, He sends you away, back into the world.  Jesus then says to you, “Depart in peace.”

Jesus feeds you with Himself to captivate and keep you in His kingdom.  He brings you into a different reality, an eternal reality.  For when Jesus feeds you with Himself, you have no need to be afraid.  Jesus is now coursing in your veins, nourishing you for eternity.  In His body and blood, He is reminding you that He has defeated eternal death.  You take in the true substance that destroyed death for you: Jesus Himself in His body and blood.

So don’t be afraid.  Jesus will not leave you or abandon you.  So what if you become weak and weary on the way to eternity, or find yourself in a desolate place.  Jesus’ name is on you.  He is in you.  You not only have His Word.  You have Jesus Himself in His body and blood, so you can continue to walk by faith.

Now, you live and wait in this grace, like our Lord Himself waited in the tomb for Easter morning.  You wait in eager expectation of the eternity that awaits you.  For you will soon taste once again, the foretaste of the Feast to come–Jesus’ body and blood in His holy Supper.

So, come to the table, O child of God.  Like He fed the crowd of 4,000, Jesus now feeds and nourishes you with His life, even as you journey in the death-filled, desolate wilderness of the world.  So come now to receive Him where He comes to feed you in His Supper, where He takes you from the doorstep of death to the doorstep of life.  Amen.