“GIVE YE THEM TO EAT”
-Matt.14:13-23.-March
20.-
Golden Text:-“Jesus said unto them, I am the Bread of Life.”-John 6:35.
ON hearing of the
death of John the Baptist, Jesus crossed the Lake of Galilee,-out of the
dominion of Herod. Possibly his thought was that his min-istry was not yet
concluded, and that Herod, having shown such boldness against John, might seek
to interfere with his labors and the completion of his ministry. Or possi-bly
he feared that a rebellious spirit might be aroused amongst the people-and his
teachings would seem to fos-ter this. An intimation of the kind is given in
the fact that after the miracle the people sought to make Jesus king. To have
encouraged any such matter would be to have opposed what he recognized to be
the divine arrange-ment.
Possibly, as some of the epistles seem to intimate, Je-sus sought privacy
with his apostles that he might contemplate the character of the work he was to
do. Evidence of his growing popularity at this time is given in the fact that
so large a multitude went afoot for many miles around the shore of the lake
that they might be with him and hear his precious words of life-parables, etc.,
respecting the Kingdom which he proposed to establish, and in which all his
apostles and all his faithful were to share.
INSTANT IN SEASON
AND OUT OF SEASON.
When Jesus
saw the multitude his heart was filled with compassion, and he could not
withhold himself from them. In season and out of season, so far as his
convenience was concerned, he must work the works of God, lay down his life
inch by inch, hour by hour. We read that “he had compassion on the multitude,”
for they were as sheep without a shepherd. They had a heart-hunger, although
they knew not what it was really, for they longed for higher, better, nobler
conditions than surrounded them, and this great Teacher seemed to have words
such as none other had for them-words of hope, of reconciliation with God, of
divine providence and care. Those who sat in Moses’ seat (scribes and
Pharisees, Matt. 23:2) were so filled with a misconception of their proper
attitude toward God, misled so, that they merely banded themselves together to
enjoy the divine promises and to appropriate them to themselves, and give up
the remainder of their nation as publicans and sinners, considering them too
lacking in piety to have divine favor or any part or lot in the Kingdom
privileges. Jesus, however, passed by these self-righteous ones who rejected
him and the only way of approach to God, and showed his special favor to the
humbler poor, who heard his message gladly and won-dered at the “gracious words
that proceeded out of his mouth”-words telling them that God despises not the
imperfect and weak if they are sincere and consecrated to him.
It was after three o’clock in the afternoon, in the early evening, that
the disciples suggested that it was time for the multitude to be dismissed that
they might find food and lodging in the surrounding villages. John and Mark
record a dialogue on the subject between Jesus and Philip, the home of the
latter being in the adjoining town of Bethsaida, and who was therefore
acquainted with the region, its resources, etc. Jesus inquired of Philip,
“Whence shall we buy bread that these may eat?” Philip replied that it would
require two hundred pennyworth of bread to give each of them a little. This
would mean about two hundred dollars’ worth of bread according to our present
day reckoning. All of the apostles then seemed to join in with the sug-gestion
that the multitude be sent away that they might buy their own provisions as
well as secure lodging-though as a matter of fact the people of the East make
little ado about lodgings. They will camp almost anywhere, and, wrapping their
cloaks about them, lie down in the field or by the roadsides to sleep-in any
place not supposed to be dangerous.
SEEKING FIRST A
NATURAL SUPPLY.
It was then
Jesus said to his disciples, “Give ye them to eat.” Mark says that they
inquired, “Shall we go and buy them 200 pennyworth of bread and give them to
eat?” Jesus asked, “How many loaves have ye? Go and see.” It was the Apostle
Andrew who returned with the word that a lad of the company had five loaves and
two small fishes which he had put at their disposal. Jesus accepted the
situation and instructed that the multitude be directed to be seated in
companies. It is supposed that they arranged themselves in groups of fifty, and
that there were 100 groups, making in all 5,000. Apparently they adopted the form
of a three-sided square, after the shape of a Ro-man reclining table, the
disciples who served them pass-ing in at the open side and thus being able to
reach the entire company. We are not informed how the five barley loaves and
two small fishes were increased so as to be suf-ficient for the five thousand
people with a remainder of twelve baskets full. Quite probably the increase
was while being broken in the Lord’s hands, though possibly also the increasing
continued at the hands of the apostles as they in turn distributed the food to
the people.
If such a story were told us respecting an ordinary person we could not
believe it. Indeed it would be not faith but credulity on our part to believe
it. So it is with those who deny the heavenly origin of our Lord Jesus: they
do not believe that he could or did do such works as are recorded in the
Scriptures. Neither could we believe the matter from their standpoint. It is
because we believe that Jesus was the only begotten of the Father, who came into
the world to be our Redeemer-because we believe that the Father poured upon him
the divine spirit or power that we can also believe that he had power to still
the tempest or thus increase the food by his blessing.
EVERYDAY MIRACLES
OVERLOOKED.
But, after
all, the greatest skeptics in the world do be-lieve in miracles: they see them
all about us, in all the affairs of life. They well know that the same amount
of barley that composed those five loaves, if planted, might have brought forth
a harvest sufficient for the five thous-and; they also know that the two fishes
in the ordinary course of nature in a short time might have brought forth a
sufficient supply of fish for the five thousand. It is easy to be seen that
he who arranged the provisions of nature had full control of the situation, and
could as easily sup-ply the needed food in the way he did as by some other
method. Who will deny that it is a miracle from man’s standpoint to have the
grain grow and the fishes produce their kind? These miracles of nature are
going on about us every day, and hence they are common to us and we forget that
they are miracles. It is a fact, nevertheless, that while we can analyze the
fish and determine exactly its component elements, and could bring these same
ele-ments together in a dish and could form them into shapes of fish, we could
not give life to the fish or cause them to bring forth of their kind. That to
us would be a miracle.
It is also true that we can analyze the barley and de-termine definitely
its component elements and could bring them together in the same proportions
and shapes, yet it is beyond our power to cause the products to germinate or to
increase. Let these standing miracles that surround us every day convince all
those who trust in the omnipotent God that he is able to do all that he is
recorded to have done through his Anointed One. And let us remember that these
things which Jesus did, as the Apostle declared, “manifested forth his coming
glory”-illustrated and ex-emplified the coming power and glory of the great
King of the world, who is to bless and feed and uplift the race of Adam and
give life everlasting to as many as will re-ceive it upon his terms.
If we could not accept these Scriptural testimonies re-specting the power
of Jesus over natural things, neither could we accept the declarations of the
prophets and apostles respecting his coming power in the Kingdom. If we can
accept the Scriptural declaration respecting him as the great Restorer of all
things, God’s representa-tive, Emmanuel, who in the future shall bless the
whole world of mankind, then with equal propriety and with the same kind of
faith we can recognize him as the one in whom the Father’s power operated in a
small way in con-nection with the miracles under consideration and others at
the first advent.
CAREFUL USE OF
DIVINE BOUNTIES.
The whole
lesson was intensified by the Lord’s direc-tion that the disciples should
gather up the fragments; and, besides, another lesson was given, namely, that
how-ever great and bountiful are God’s provisions for people, none of them are
to be wasted. We cannot see wasteful-ness in any of
the Lord’s consecrated people without feel-ing that, however great progress
they have made in under-standing the mind of the Lord in some respects, they
are still deficient in this particular. An appreciation of the gift and
respect for the Giver implies a carefulness and a stewardship in respect to all
that comes to us from our heavenly Father-things temporal and things spiritual.
According to our Lord’s parables he is measuring our love and zeal in a
considerable degree by our use or abuse of the talents, opportunities,
blessings, temporal and spiritual, now bestowed upon us.
We may be sure that in this miracle as in the others our Lord
intended to inculcate some important lesson of faith or practice-not so much
for the public as for his special followers, his disciples. We may presume,
there-fore, that he had a twofold purpose in sending them away by ship while he
remained and dismissed the multitude, telling them that his discourses and
miracles were at an end. One of these purposes doubtless was private
fellow-ship and communion with the Father in the mountain-apart from the
multitude-apart even from his beloved twelve apostles. There are times when we
love to join our hearts and voices with others at the throne of heav-enly
grace, and come as a company of the Lord’s people into fellowship and communion
with him, and there are other times when we seem to need individual, personal,
private communion with God, as our Lord seemed to have required on this
occasion.
Our Lord’s second object was, doubtless, to give his disciples opportunity
for thinking over the miracle and talking it over by themselves in his
absence. They might thus speak more freely one with the other, and get more
benefit than if he had been with them, and they would have been under a certain
degree of restraint in his pres-ence. The Lord wished this great lesson to be
thoroughly impressed upon their minds: it would be helpful to them in future
years to remember how he had power to increase their temporal food without
human interference and inde-pendent of human conditions. It would be a lesson
also respecting the spiritual food, that they should not despise the day of small
things; that if sent by him to break the bread of life to the people, they
should not be fearful and hindered by reason of unpropitious conditions
prevailing, but should have full confidence in him that he had the power to
overrule in all the affairs of life, that all his gra-cious purposes might be
accomplished.
WE MAY DISPENSE
THE BREAD FROM HEAVEN.
There is a
lesson for us of the present day, too, in this matter, as there has been a
lesson for the Church all the way down throughout this Gospel age. We may feel
that the multitude is large and that the means at our disposal for reaching
them with the bread of life are limited. We may be inclined to say here, we
have such and such things, but “what are they among so many?” Let us hearken
to the Lord’s Word, “Give ye them to eat.” It should be sufficient for us to
know that any one is present who is hungering and thirsting after
righteousness. “He that hath an ear to hear, let him hear.” Tell him the
good tidings, no matter in what form they must be pre-sented, no matter how
intolerable the conditions. The important thing is that here are some who are
hungry for the Truth, and that if we will the Lord will bless us in ministering
it to them.
We have been reminded of this parable sometimes as we made out our annual
reports of the work done by the WATCH
TOWER BIBLE & TRACT SOCIETY-and endeavored to realize the
immense amount of spiritual food borne to the people all over the civilized
world, and our privileges connected with its dissemination. We have marveled
how the Lord blessed the comparatively small amount of money so that it reached
so far;-it seemed to multiply under the Lord’s blessing. The matter is with us
as it was with the apostles. The Lord himself raises the question of how much
it will require. We look about us and see how few are hungering and thirsting
for the Truth, how many grasping after multitudinous errors, false gospels, new
lights, etc., and we hear the Lord’s word, “Give ye them to eat.” It requires
faith to go forth and to hope to accomplish the great harvest work under
present limited conditions, but so surely as the Lord is the Chief Reaper, his
blessing upon what he has given us to dispense will make it sufficient,
so that all who are really hungry may be fed.
Let the lesson sink deeply into our hearts; let us have the more
confidence in him who not only provided the temporal food centuries ago, but
who now according to his promise has come forth a second time and is dispensing
again spiritual food, meat in due season, things new and old from the treasury
of his Word. Let us be swift to appropriate these promises to our hearts,
seeing to it that we are still hungering and thirsting after clearer views of
the divine character and plan. Let us be on the alert
to give to all who are hungering and thirsting the blessed food which has so
greatly refreshed and strengthened us. If they do not get it they will faint by
the way as they go looking for other provisions. We have the very thing which
all of the household of faith need; without it they cannot maintain their
standing, they cannot press on, they shall surely become discouraged. A
thousand shall fall at our side and ten thousand at our right hand with-out
this needed nourishment. Let us be alert.
THE USE OF
MEANS-THEN AND NOW.
The lad who
had the loaves and fishes and who put them at the disposal of the Lord, we may
be sure was greatly blessed, although we hear nothing further of him than is
here mentioned. It was a case of opportunity, and we may be sure that the boy
thus willing to put his all at our Lord’s disposal, instead of attempting to
sell it to the hungry at famine prices, received a corresponding blessing. The
les-son for all is that whatever we may have of
financial means for sending forth the bread of life to others, or whatever we
may have of knowledge of the Truth, is neither to be self-ishly hoarded nor
selfishly partaken of by ourselves. It is to be consecrated to the Lord, and
out of that consecra-tion the Lord will bring blessing to others and increased
blessings upon our own heads and hearts.
The Golden Text of our lesson may be said to be the very heart of
it in some respects. It was after Je-sus had spent the night in prayer and
toward morning came to his disciples still on the lake in the
boat-stormstayed-and after they had come to the landing safely, that some of
those who had been with him and who had partaken of the miraculous bread and
fish had returned to the vicinity of Capernaum and sought Jesus again, that he
upbraided them and accused them of seek-ing him more for the loaves and fishes
than on account of the truths which he proclaimed; and using this as a text,
proceeded to tell them of himself as the Bread of Eternal Life that had come
down from heaven, of which if a man eat he would never die-the bread of life
everlasting.
Blessed are our ears for we have heard! blessed are the eyes of our
understanding for we have seen him! blessed are we for we have tasted of this
Bread of Life! Blessed are we if we are still hungering and thirsting after
right-eousness, and day after day being more and more filled according to the
promise,
A FAMINE FOR THE
WORD OF GOD.-AMOS 8:11.
We live in
very stirring times, in times when there is a greater hungering for knowledge,
for wealth, for influ-ence, for power, for everything, than there ever was
before. Everybody seems to be hungry. Yet our day is so full of philosophies,
inventions, sciences (true and false), money-making schemes, financial schemes,
theological schemes, etc., etc., that the whole world is absorbed in at-tempts
to satisfy these various hungerings of the soul. Yet these things do not satisfy
even the worldly;-they still hunger and thirst; and nothing will ever satisfy
them but the living bread-the Truth. Now is the time for us who have become
“new creatures in Christ Jesus” to see to it that we dispense to others the
true bread and water of life; and that our own earthly hunger for earthly
things shall not be prospered or gratified at the expense of our spiritual
hunger for spiritual things, but that the latter shall have our special
attention and care and provision.
The more people are satisfied with earthly things the less inclination
they will have for the heavenly things, and the more we are satisfied with the
heavenly things the less of appetite will we have for the earthly things. The
new nature flourishes at the expense of the old nature, and the new ambitions,
hopes and desires at the expense of the old. Likewise when the old nature
flourishes, it is at the expense of the new in all of life’s affairs. Let us
then, realizing the difference between the food that perisheth and the food
that brings divine blessing-eternal life-let us choose the latter, let us feed
more and more upon the Lord and upon his Word and thus grow strong in the Lord
and in the power of his might, and be more and more weaned from the world, its
spirit, its hopes, its ambitions. We seek a heavenly country, a heavenly
Kingdom, a heavenly nature, and heavenly qualities, fitted and prepared for
that heavenly nature. We have found the great Life-giver, the one who can and
does supply this bread from heaven. It is our great privilege to be the
dispensers of this bread-“Give ye them to eat.” “He that hath an ear let him
hear.”