Matthew 14: 13-21 When Jesus arrived, he saw a large crowd. He felt sorry for them and healed those who were sick.
15 Late that afternoon, his followers came to Jesus and said, “No one lives in this place. And it is already late. Send the people away so they can go to the towns and buy food for themselves.”
16 Jesus answered, “They don’t need to go away. You give them some food to eat.”
17 The followers answered, “But we have only five loaves of bread and two fish.”
18 Jesus said, “Bring the bread and the fish to me.” 19 Then he told the people to sit down on the grass. He took the five loaves of bread and the two fish. Then he looked to heaven and thanked God for the food. Jesus divided the loaves of bread. He gave them to his followers, and they gave the bread to the people. 20 All the people ate and were satisfied. After they finished eating, the followers filled 12 baskets with the pieces of food that were not eaten.
The account given of the next day was quite different, again, a large crowd gathers, no doubt with empty bellies, seeking to be fed. But what Jesus offered them this day differed greatly from the previous day and left many quite repelled, freaked out, and even repulsed. Less eager to follow a man proclaiming to be the bread of life, giving instruction to them to eat his flesh and drink his blood, many of them left.
The beauty in these passages of scripture when Jesus performs miracles is that Jesus never did anything without a two-fold meaning. While he was providing with a loaf of bread, he was also revealing to them that he was the Bread of Life. While he was satisfying a physical hunger that would inevitably return, he was reassuring them that he could also, and ultimately, eternally satisfy a spiritual hunger.
Yesterday, sitting in church our Pastor referenced the basket of "Bread of Life" that we so often hold in our arms and look at with distress and distrust, as the disciples did that first day, saying, "There isn't enough to go around." It hit me, I do that!! The Bread of Life is in my basket; the Bread of Life that says, "My grace is sufficient." Yet, I look in disbelief, lamenting over the shortage of grace, among many other things, that I am in, specifically where my children and husband are concerned. The Lord reminded me of the Samaritan woman at the well, (read the entire thing in John 4). The conversation goes, in part, like this:
13 Jesus answered, “Every person who drinks this water will be thirsty again. 14 But whoever drinks the water I give will never be thirsty again. The water I give will become a spring of water flowing inside him. It will give him eternal life.”
15 The woman said to him, “Sir, give me this water. Then I will never be thirsty again. And I will not have to come back here to get more water.”
How foolish I am! Here I beheld the Bread of Life, the Living Water, yet insist that I am not satisfied. My heart broke. There is plenty to go around to satisfy with even more left over! Let us be this woman that cries out, "GIVE ME THIS WATER. THEN I WILL NEVER BE THIRSTY AGAIN!" I had to repent and surrender the shame of how stubborn and prideful and just blatantly idiotic in my audacity to pronounce the Bread of Life, The Living Water, The Blood of Redemption, unsatisfactory. Even this morning, I am clinging to this revelation; of my sinfulness, of my insufficiency, of my need for a Savior, of his provision. I cried out to him, "Lord, let me be satisfied in you!" I may be one of the only people who struggle with this, but I have found myself over and over again, broken before the Lord hearing the exact same truth of the state of my heart: unsatisfied.
I often get myself in a dizzying whirlwind of all my unsatisfied-ness. (I am aware that this is not a word, but it is now.) I start grasping like a mad woman, literally, usually filled with irrational anger and just pure craziness, pulling at Cory to satisfy with me, demanding my children's behaviors satisfy me, looking to our finances to satisfy me; viciously clinging to any material/ physical thing in existence to satisfy this black hole in me. And this is where I am reminded of the woman in Proverbs 14:1,"The wise woman builds her house, but with her own hands the foolish one tears hers down."
I can't remember the countless times, as shameful as this is, that I have bought into the lie that this menial, mundane activity of merely raising children and being a house wife was beneath me, that I was capable of so much more with my life. I can't number the times I have bought into that lie when children are screaming and fighting, when I haven't had one adult conversation the entire day and feel my brain going numb, when I look around at the laundry and dishes piled up, when I see another Facebook mom 'living it up' with all her "ME" time and "meeting HER goals", when I am assaulted by the visions of cereal scattered all over the floor and the trail of toys strung out across the living room leading up and down the stairs.
And then every time, because he just loves me too much to leave me in this place of deception, precious Jesus gently crushes my heart with a reminder of my brokenness and the heavenly measures he went to to save me from ME. He reminds of how he lowered himself to a place far 'beneath' his great worth and holiness. He reminds me of all my filthy rags that are my righteousness before him. He reminds me of the greatest commission to "Go, and make disciples", and how he has provided four perfect specimens of disciples-in-the-making in my living room, that they are the arrows in the hand of this warrior- that I will never have a greater accomplishment that raising them to love Him. He reminds me that he is the Living Bread and that I am wholly satisfied in Him.
This morning I woke up, looking into my basket and begging him to make my heart believe that I am satisfied, because sometimes, most times, my heart is my worst enemy, and I need him to be bigger than the mirages my heart manufactures. I need him to be better than all the things my flesh, the enemy, our culture, social media and the brokenness of the world tells me are better than being right in the middle of His will and His way. I hate dying to myself. I hate it. It's more than difficult, it is excruciating, but in the precious, moments when I fall flat on my face and peer up at my suffering through the eyes of Jesus, I get a glimpse of sharing in the suffering, death and resurrection of Christ. And isn't that how it should be? Shouldn't this gospel story flesh itself out in my life every single morning, every single minute of every single day? In the morning when I wake up and choose Jesus instead of looking, robotically at my iPhone, checking emails, Instagram and Facebook. My first waking thought being the overwhelming confession that I can not make it through this day or do anything without his enabling me with his grace to do so. I am not exaggerating, you guys, I absolutely, desperately need Jesus always, or I am a rogue missile, headed for destruction, off the map, I'm done, I quit life.
May my encouragement as a fellow laborer, a fellow warrior in the trenches beside you be this: as you stare into your basket today, wondering if it is enough, know that the Bread of Life satisfies and there is enough to go around and then some! When you don't believe it, cry out to him to make your heart believe.
