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Turn back your calendar with me.
Turn it back 365 days to one year ago. It was one year ago
that a single image dominated our national consciousness.
That image? A map. A weather map, to be exact. On this day,
one year ago, it was a weather radar map of the Gulf of
Mexico that dominated the national headlines. But it isn’t
just the map we remember. It is also a name—Katrina. It is
hard to believe that it was only a year ago that the
hurricane named Katrina came ashore.
It was in the waning days of
summer that a nation sat transfixed to the television and
watched a storm of biblical proportions wreak its havoc. I
remember watching the television…almost numb…completely
overwhelmed by what I was witnessing. But you know what
really got me? It was the faces. It was the faces that
disturbed me the most. I couldn’t get the faces out of my
mind. Desperate faces. Scared faces. Panicked faces. As I
laid my head down to sleep, it was those faces that kept me
awake.
It was one year ago that we saw
the destruction of Hurricane Katrina. But something else
happened during that week, as well. I remember it well. It
was Friday afternoon and there were a handful of us who
gathered at noon for lunch. The only thing we could talk
about that day was the faces. It was the faces…no one could
shake them. That’s when somebody finally asked the question,
“What are we going to do for these people?” It was silent
for a minute. Nobody knew what to say. The devastation was
so immense. The need was so great. The distance between us
and them was so far. What could we possibly do?
Somebody finally said, “Water.
They are going to need drinking water. Maybe we could all
buy a case of water to send down there.” You could feel the
energy in the room begin to pick up. Maybe we could do
something. It might not be much, but maybe it would help.
And just as we were all about to run out to Costco and buy a
case or two of water, somebody else asked the question
nobody wanted to ask, “Once we have all this water, how are
we going to get it where it needs to go?” You could feel the
collective wind go out of our sails. She was right. This was
going to be more complicated than we thought. We are a
church, not a shipping company. And besides, even if we had
a truck (which we didn’t), where would we come up with the
money to pay for a driver and the gas? Maybe there was
nothing we could do.
We were about to admit defeat
when yet another person in the circle said, “Well, I guess I
could call my husband and see if his company could help us.”
After lunch she made the call, and that’s when amazing
things started to happen. She discovered that the folks at
her husband’s company were having the same conversation we
were. They too couldn’t get those faces out of their minds.
They too wanted to help. And so by the close of office hours
that Friday, we had a truck, a driver and all the gas to get
us to New Orleans and back.
That was all that was needed to
set a miracle in motion. Slowly but surely, over the next
week our church was transformed into a hurricane relief
center. One by one, people came through the doors with
water, blankets and supplies for health kits. By the week’s
end, tens of thousands of dollars had been raised. Before
the week was out, literally hundreds of people volunteered
their time to build kits, pack blankets and stack water. It
was nothing short of amazing. In fact, before it was all
said and done, we had collected enough supplies to fill a
second truck, which was also miraculously donated to help
the cause. To date, that week stands out as one of the
defining moments of my ministry. It was a time when
scripture literally came to life.
Turn the calendar back with me
one more time. This time, turn it back two thousand years.
It was a day when Jesus also couldn’t get those faces out of
his head. The crowd had followed him again, and this crowd,
like every crowd, was filled with desperate faces. It was
filled with fearful faces. It was filled with lonely and
distressed faces. These were the people who always came to
Jesus, and on this day, he and his disciples ministered to
them. They healed the sick. They touched the untouchable.
They brought a little light to those who lived in darkness.
The day had been long and it was
time to call it quits. But just as they were about to leave,
Jesus took one last look at the crowd—and it was the faces
that froze him right in his tracks. In the faces of the
people, he saw the unmistakable look of hunger. And once he
saw those hungry faces, thousands of hungry faces, he just
couldn’t leave. So Jesus turned to his disciples and asked,
“Where can we get enough bread to feed all these people?”
Philip was the first to respond.
Philip had surveyed the crowd. He did some quick
calculations and said, “There is no way we can do it. Don’t
get me wrong. I am as compassionate as the next guy, but
there are five thousand of them and only twelve of us. There
simply is not enough time, there certainly is not enough
bread, and we clearly don’t have enough money to feed all
these people. There isn’t enough.”
There isn’t enough. There are no
words more deadly to a church than those. There isn’t
enough. There isn’t enough money. There aren’t enough
volunteers. There aren’t enough young people. There isn’t
enough time. There isn’t enough of this, that and the other
thing. Churches that live by that mantra are churches that
will quickly implode. They will become inwardly focused,
isolated from their communities and suspicious of outsiders.
“There’s no way,” they’ll say. “The problems are too big and
we are too small. We barely have enough to take care of
ourselves, let alone to worry about the crowd. It’s not that
we’re not concerned. It’s just that there isn’t enough to go
around.”
If Philip’s response had been
the only response, that might have been the end of the
story. But just as the disciples were about to pack up for
the day, a voice rose above the crowd and said, “Excuse me.
I overheard that you needed some help feeding these hungry
people. I know it isn’t much. It’s all I’ve got. But if it
will help, then it’s yours. Take it.” The disciples turned
around to see one of the most beautiful scenes in all of
scripture. What they saw was a young boy standing there
holding five small loaves and two small fish in his
outstretched hands. “I know it isn’t much. It’s all I’ve
got. But if it will help, then it’s yours. Take it.”
We have become so familiar with
this story that we often miss this detail: this nameless
boy’s small gift of five loaves and two fish sets into
motion a miracle of epic proportion. The story tells us that
from this small gift, Jesus was able to feed the entire
crowd—all five thousand of them, with leftovers to fill
twelve baskets.
But how could that small gift of
five loaves and two fish possibly feed that crowd of five
thousand—with leftovers, to boot? I’m not exactly sure. The
story doesn’t fill in the details. It just says that from
this boy’s small gift of five loaves and two fish, there was
eventually enough food for everybody. So how did it happen?
Maybe it happened in the same way as the miracle our church
experienced in response to Hurricane Katrina. Just as
somebody’s generous gift of a truck set in motion a chain
reaction of giving, maybe when the people saw this little
boy give away his dinner, someone else in the crowd said,
“Well if he’s going to share his food with everyone, I guess
I can share mine, too.” Which in turn caused another person
to say, “Well, I don’t have much to give, but if my couple
of loaves will help, then here, you can have them.” And I am
sure if there were some mothers in that crowd that day, I’ll
bet they had stashed away some boxes of Goldfish or graham
crackers and some extra juice boxes. (Lord knows, my mother
never went anywhere without enough food stashed away to feed
a small army.) His meager but sincere offering resulted in
the crowd realizing that among them there was more than
enough to go around. Maybe this miracle was started by the
simple but profound words, “I know it isn’t much. It’s all
I’ve got. But if it will help, then it’s yours. Take it.”
“I know it isn’t much. It’s all
I’ve got. But if it will help, then it’s yours. Take it.”
This is the mantra of churches that are truly alive,
churches that live not just for those inside the walls, but
for those outside as well. The churches that are continually
facing the needs of the world—saying, “I know it isn’t much.
It’s all I’ve got. But if it will help, then it’s yours.
Take it.”—are churches that know something about God’s
abundance, believe in the reciprocal nature of generosity,
trust that there is enough to go around (and then some), and
know that at the end of the day, everything they need to
respond to a hungry world…they already have.
I believe that this story, as
well as our experience one year ago, communicate to us one
of the most powerful truths that a community of faith can
ever grasp—that everything we need to carry out God’s call
to the world…we already have. Every time we needed something
during our relief efforts, we discovered we already had it.
Whether it was equipment, supplies, money or people,
whenever the question was asked, we realized somebody had
what we were looking for. It was absolutely amazing.
Everything we needed…we already had. We just needed to ask.
I imagine that Jesus also knew that all of the food that was
needed to feed the hungry crowd that day was already
there…he just needed to ask. And once asked, starting with
that little boy, people began to respond.
What if we really believed that
everything we needed to carry out God’s mission, God had
already given us—every dollar, every person, every idea,
every resource was already here? If we believed that, then
we would face the problems of the world unafraid, the needs
of our community undaunted, and we would experience untold
joy as we witnessed the ways God worked through us to feed
the world.
So why get into all of this
tonight? Simple. Because of the faces. You see, I can’t get
the faces out of my head. Those faces within the crowds. It
is those faces, those hungry faces that keep me awake at
night. People who are hungry for healing. Hungry for
meaning. Hungry for community. Hungry for God. It is those
faces that I can’t get out of my head. A study done for our
church a couple of years ago told us that are 10,500 people
living within a five mile radius of our church who are
looking for a church home. That’s 10,500 hungry people. I
know you have also seen their faces. They are the faces of
the people you live with, work with and go to school with.
So, if I might be so bold, let me ask the question Jesus
asked, “How are we going to feed all these people?”
Friends, I believe the answer to
that question is found by living like the little boy who
believed that even the little bit he had, God could use for
a greater purpose. I believe that everything—and I mean
everything—we need to reach out to that crowd of 10,500
hungry folks in our community…God has already given us.
Every dollar, every volunteer, every idea that is needed is
right here in this room tonight. And perhaps the reason that
so many of our gifts have remained untapped is because
nobody ever asked you to use them. So let me ask you one
more time, “How are we going to feed all these hungry
people?”
We are like the people who made
up the crowd two thousand years ago. We come here with a
handful of loaves and a couple of fish that we have tucked
away. We’ve come with these gifts and talents tucked away
because we just don’t believe that what we have to offer
will make a difference. Well, we can take courage in our
story tonight, for each gift, as small as it might seem,
when given in sincerity can start a miracle.
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So let me ask again, “How
are we going to feed all these people? What are the
untapped gifts that you carried in here tonight that
just might start a miracle?”
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Are
your loaves and fish the warm heart and friendly smile
needed to be an usher or a greeter?
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Are
they the patience and love to help in our children’s
ministry?
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Do you
bring the creativity to plan worship or the voice to
sing with the praise team?
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Maybe
you carried in here tonight an untapped love of cooking
that could help with our dinner ministry?
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Maybe
you have a skill for building and could help us with
staging or an artistic eye that could help us create
beautiful artwork?
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Is it
perhaps a love of new people and a heart for hospitably
that would help us be more welcoming and attentive to
visitors?
Maybe the
gift that you have tucked away is a vision that would help
work towards our goal of reaching out to our hungry world?
There is much that we need to
help us to take this next step, but if we take seriously
what our text has to say to us tonight, then everything we
need to accomplish God’s call…we already have. We don’t need
to look any further or wait any longer. Instead, we need to
take out the loaves and fish we brought with us and say to
God, “It’s all I’ve got. But if it will help, then take it.
It’s yours.”
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