Turn back to Matthew 14. Matthew chapter 14. Title this message, Bring Them
to Me. Bring Them to Me. It reminds
me, as I just stated this title, It reminds me of a time in the
Gospels where a father had brought his son to the disciples. He
had been foaming at the mouth, casting himself in water, casting
himself in fire, and the disciples could not do anything for him.
And the Lord said, bring him to me. Bring him to me. What a blessing. that we can take everything we
have to the Lord. Everything. Nothing is too small,
nothing too great. Nothing. Our Lord here, in these verses,
and we want to see the spiritual application of it, not just to
read that He fed a multitude. He does that every day. He said,
wow, he fed 5,000 with a few loaves of bread and a couple
of fishes. Well, he's feeding over 7 billion today. There'll
be over 7 billion people fed today, not counting the animals,
the fish of the sea, the birds of the air. He's feeding them
every day. You know, the scripture says,
by him, all things consist. In Colossians, that means by
him, all things are maintained. He's maintaining everything every
day. He's feeding, he's taking care
of. Our Lord is busy, busy. Don't think of Him as sitting
with His hands folded and just waiting and watching for things
to happen. He's busy. He finished salvation. He finished
redemption. But now He said, My Father worketh
hitherto and I work. I mean, they're active. God is
active all the time. He's active in the heart of His
people. He's active in this world. His mercy is over all His creation.
Who feeds the animals out there where no man lives? He does. Who takes care of the lily of
the field where there's no farmer? He does. He does. Now, let's look at this. In verse 12, His disciples, they
came to Him, they had taken up the body, of John the Baptist. He had been beheaded, and it
says they buried it, and they went and told Jesus. The first thing that hit me when
I read this is this is the essence of true prayer. How simple. They went and told Jesus. I have
been singing this tune in my head since I read this. I must
tell Jesus. I must tell Jesus. All my troubles
and trials and heartaches. I think it's page 344 in the
hymnal, but I must tell Jesus. That's been going on over my
head over and over since I've read this. They went and told
Jesus. Doesn't that have such a comforting sound to it? They went and told him. The Lord
knows the heart, and He knew they were confused. And it says
here in verse 13, and He heard it. He heard what they had to
say. He felt their heart. He felt their heart. We have
a high priest who can be touched with the feeling of our infirmities.
They didn't just take up that body, go bury it, and go on their
way. confused, they were touched, they mourned for John. Our Lord
said, there's none greater than John the Baptist. He's the forerunner. He's the one who pointed out
the Lord Jesus Christ. Behold, the Lamb of God which
takes away the sin of the world. And the Lord heard their prayer.
They went and taught Him and He heard them. He heard them. What a blessing! He hears our
prayers. Don't ever think God doesn't
hear you. He hears his children. There was a young man that used
to work for me years ago when I had the business. And when
he and I'd be talking, and sometimes I'd say something, he goes, I
hear you. That was one of his favorites to say, hey, I hear
you. And he was like, I know what you're saying. I know what
you're saying. I'm there. And our Lord heard
them, but He heard their voice. He heard the lament in their
voice. He heard their heart, their broken heart over John.
And He said, let's get into the ship and depart and go to a desert
place apart. Let's get away from the crowd.
He knew that it was time. in this situation and what happened
to John and them experiencing barrenness in his body and their
situation, he said, let's go apart for a while. And no doubt
when they went apart, the Lord spoke to them and he comforted
them. Even though it's not written
here, I know that's what he did. And he went apart and he prayed.
And I have no doubt he prayed for John's disciples. They were
definitely confused. but he prayed for them. And he
went apart for a while, got away from the crowd. It's good, it's
good when we can come apart for a while, to get away from the
crowd and to take the things that God has taught us, to take
what's on our heart and lay them before the Lord, it's good to
do that, to get apart by yourself. away from the family, friends,
and be alone with God. As Jacob, we saw in the Bible
lessons, Jacob was alone with God. But when the people heard
it, they heard that he left, you see, they had seen some miracles,
they had listened to him talk, they heard, never a man spake
like this man. And when they heard that, they
followed him on foot out of the cities. Our Lord didn't
make it easy. He didn't make it easy for them
to follow. To truly follow Christ is not
easy. To truly follow the Lord Jesus
Christ is more than a profession. It's much more than a profession.
It is life. It is life and it's your life. You follow Him, it's your life.
He's my life. I'm following my life. He's your
passion. He's your interest. He's your all-in-all. Is that
right? That's what it says in Colossians, He's all-in-all.
He's our all-in-all. That's it. You know, I've learned
in this life nothing matters but Jesus Christ and my relationship
to Christ. I see that more and more as I
grow older. And I really see it in my parents
now, as they've gotten into their late 80s, pushing 90, and they're
coming up to the end. And I sat in the hospital with
my dad here a couple weeks ago, and I said, there's only one
thing that matters. That's our relationship with
Christ. Nothing else matters. He was talking about how you
reminisce. The older you get, the more stories
you tell. You know, you forget you told them, and that's why
you tell so many. You do. You know, I've heard that 50
times. My dad has told me about selling that farm 1,000 times,
how he regretted it. I'm like, I got it. You know,
I got it. I know. I've heard that enough. But he was talking about, well,
I should have done this. I said, that doesn't matter.
That doesn't matter. What matters is my relationship
with Jesus Christ right now. Paul said, forgetting those things
which are behind, put them in the grave, forget it. It's my
relationship right now. It's not yesterday. Twenty years
ago, it's right now. Salvation is looking to Christ
right now. And tomorrow, if tomorrow comes,
it'll be right now. And that's how we live our lives.
Right now. Looking to Him. And these people, when they heard,
they followed after Him. It wasn't easy. They followed
after Him on foot. And I've learned this. It's interesting
how people who have a need have an ear. You know, if you got a real need,
if you have a real problem, if you have, let's say you have
cancer, and someone says, and you hear
someone talking, you can hear them talking to someone else,
and they're talking to someone else. I know a doctor that they have come
up with a cure, and I'm telling you, he is outstanding. They've
got your attention. You're not even paying attention
to what's going on over here. They got your ear. He said some things
that got their ear. Now the multitude following most
of that multitude was lost and stayed lost, but there's a few
in there that believed. There's a few in there that was
his sheep. And it says here in verse 14, And I like this. I wish I could
preach this as what's really here. And Jesus went forth. That's God. That's God coming
forth from that desert place where it's just dry. It's just
a desert place. It's an empty place. He took
him to an empty place. And He's taking that multitude
to an empty place because they're going to realize there's only
one person in that empty place that can feed them, that can
meet their need. There's one person that can meet
our need. But until He takes me and you to an empty place,
we'll never know it. And we'll never know Him. And
we'll never know our need of Him. And we'll never know how
empty we are. And we'll never know what an
empty place we live in. This world is an empty place. It is. But the Lord Jesus Christ here
says, "...went forth, and He saw a great multitude," thousands,
thousands. Our Lord never turns away those
who need Him. If you and I have a real need
of Him, He never turns us away. Never. He went forth. He didn't try to hide. He didn't
hide from the multitude. Anyone ever call you and you
see who it is and you don't answer it? You and I hide from people
now, we do. He said, I'm not going to answer
that, I don't want to talk to him. But our Lord saw this great multitude
and most of this multitude later on said, crucify Him, crucify
Him. And yet here the God of heaven
and earth goes forth And He has compassion. It says He was moved
with compassion toward them. His compassion, the Scripture
says, fell not, they are new every morning. We cannot wear out His compassion
because they are infinite. They are infinite. And I brought this out with Jacob
this morning. He made himself available to
them. He made himself accessible to that multitude. And he says he's moved with compassion. This shows his character. This
is the character of our Lord. You know, some see God as this
hard, austere person. Remember that man whom the Lord
gave a talent to? He's telling this story. This
man was given a talent. Some was given five, another
ten. And this man with the talent went and hid it in the ground.
He said, I knew you were an austere, strict, hard man. That's the
way he saw God. But you know how we see God,
the believer, those whom God saves? One full of compassion,
meek and lowly. He makes Himself known to us
that way. We see not only a God who is a consuming fire, we see
God who is mercy and grace and delights to show it. God delights
to show mercy far more than you and I will ever delight to have
it. He felt their need. He felt the
need of that crowd. You know, the Scripture says
His mercy is over all His works. That sun shines every day on
the just and the unjust. It shines on your house who believe
as well as on the house of the guy who wanted to break into
your house. His rain falls on the just and
the unjust. The garden of those who hate
God produces just like the garden of those who love God. Now there
is a day of reckoning. That day is coming. But God's
mercy is over all His works. It's over all of His creation. And He's compassion here. Listen,
He was moved with compassion. There's one thing about the Lord
Jesus Christ, our God, When He's moved with compassion, He does
something about it. He doesn't say, I feel sorry
for you, I feel so sorry for you, I feel so bad for you. But
our Lord is able to do something about it. The first thing He
does here, He says He healed their sick. That multitude brought
their sick. And there's something interesting
here. First of all, this shows His power to save. Not just to
heal the body, because if the Lord heals my body, I'm going
to get sick again in this flesh. Now, in this flesh, Lazarus,
come forth. He raised him from the dead,
but he had to die again. What he's showing here is his
power to save his deity. This is God. Only God can feed
5,000. You see, there can be no trickery
here. You see these guys on TV, they put their hand on somebody's
head and say, be healed, and they'll act like they're walking
around and all. I'll tell you what, let one of them take a
loaf, five loaves of bread and two fishes and feed 5,000. Do
that. Let's see that one. No trickery
in that. That's of God. That has to be of God to see
that, to feed 5,000. And there's something else I
see here. He healed their sick before He fed them. Spiritual
healing before feeding. Because you're not going to eat.
You're not going to eat. If God doesn't heal you spiritually,
you're not going to eat of the bread of life. You have no taste
for it. You're not hungry for it. until
He heals you and me of our spiritual sickness, we'll never hunger
and thirst after righteousness." And He said, those who hunger
and thirst after righteousness shall be filled. He's got to
create a hunger and a thirst, and He has to do that by healing
us spiritually. If you hunger and if I hunger
after righteousness, true righteousness, His righteousness, That's spiritual
health. You're healthy spiritually. You're
sick if you don't. You're sick if you don't. And when it was evening, this
shows his long suffering. Can you imagine? They got in
a ship and he's teaching his disciples, comforting his disciples. And this multitude, he sees this
multitude and he goes forth. He makes himself accessible to
them. And all day long. People can wear you out. I know when I go to conferences,
by the time the end of the conference, I am wore out." And you are too,
you know that. And all day long, he's dealing
with the sick. I mean, that alone wears you
out. Really, it wears you out. One
after another, sick and a problem and problems and problems and
sickness and problems. All day long, into the evening
this goes on. This shows our Lord's long suffering. He didn't stop and he didn't
punch out at four o'clock. He didn't have office hours. I'll tell you what his hours
was when the sun was up and when the sun went down. Continually. Continually been about his father's
business. He worked tirelessly, tirelessly. His disciples came to him. saying,
and they were tired too, they were hungry and the multitude,
and I don't know, maybe they're using the multitude as an excuse
here, I don't know, to take a break here. But His disciples, they
came to Him and they said, this is a desert place. Now they're
going to get a lesson. Now they're going to get a lesson.
The Lord is going to now bring the lesson home. You know, one
thing about our Lord, He's always teaching. He's always instructing. He never says a word that's not
infinite wisdom in it. There's not instruction in it.
And His disciples come here and they say, this is a desert place
and the time has now passed. Yes, I have to say, this is a
desert place. This world is. It is. And they recognize it. And here's what their attitude
is. Send the multitude away that they may go into the villages
and buy themselves food. That's a poor request. I guess
if you look at it with human reasoning, it's understandable. You know, it's
late and the multitude's hungry and there's no food out here.
It's a desert place. They can't buy what they really
need. They can't buy food out here. But what they really need
is out there. Him. Him. And our Lord tells them, He said,
They don't need to leave. You don't need to send them away.
Jesus said to them, They need not depart. There's 5,000 men plus the women
and children. They don't need to depart. You feed them. You feed them. You have what they need. Give you them to eat. Give them
something to eat. You feed them. And here is a real test for his
preachers. You feed the sheep when they
show up. You feed them. I have a responsibility here
to feed the sheep. The Lord said, feed my lambs,
feed my sheep. We're not just conducting a service
on Sunday and on Thursday. And we all go home. No, it's
my responsibility to feed the sheep. The sheep show up, they've
got to have something to eat, and Christ is sheep food. The
bread of life is sheep food, that's what their food is. And
our Lord makes them realize their responsibility to feed the sheep,
feed the multitude. And they say to Him, we have
here but five loaves and two fishes. How are we gonna do that? All I have here this morning
is his word. That's all I have. That's all you need. All you
need is his word. All we have is but five lows
and two, what are these? What are these? This is just
a lunch for us. Here's what he makes them to
realize, first of all, and this is one thing that I think every
preacher has to realize before they can ever really preach.
Their inability. Their inability. The Lord has
to make me realize my inability. Paul said this, who is sufficient
for these things? Who is sufficient to handle matters
of life and death? Who is really sufficient? He
made them realize their inability. And at the same time, He's going
to make them realize His ability. Now listen, if this Word is left
in my hands only, I can't do anything for you. But now, if
the Lord takes His Word, and gives it to you, you will
leave here fed. You will leave here nourished
spiritually. You'll leave here nourished and fed. So here's
what He says to them to do, and for me, and for you when you
sit down and read God's Word, and for you as you sit there
and listen, bring them here to Me. In your hands, you're right. You can't feed 5,000 in your
hands. In my hands, the whole multitude
can be fed. It doesn't matter if it's 5 million.
The number doesn't matter. Not when it's in His hands. Not
when it's in His hands. This is the key. You see, the
Lord Jesus Christ is the bread of life. And if He blesses His
Word, You will get what you came for
this morning. You'll be fed. And our Lord in verse 19, He
commanded the multitude to sit down on the grass. He didn't
invite them to sit down, did He? He's the Sovereign. He's the Sovereign. The blessing,
the food is in His hands. And He commands 5,000 people,
men, of all ranks, rebels, I mean
rebels, there's rebels in that crowd. And he says, sit down. And you know what happens? They
all sit down. They all just sit down. Because
where the word of a king is, there is power. That's what the
word of God says. Where the word of a king is,
there's power. And when the king commands, To sit down. They sit down. They sit down. And here's another thing I see.
There's order. Order in the service. It's not
to be chaotic. If the sheep are gonna be fed,
we're not gonna have this chaotic service going on. I remember
when I was just a boy, now this is before dad understood the
gospel. But I was just a boy. I can remember
people walking up and down the aisle, just shouting and carrying
on. I remember specifically one lady fainting and fell in the
aisle. One guy, he would get up and
testify every time, and it would go on. He'd go down the aisle,
and he'd go up this aisle, come around, go back down that aisle.
And it was a circus. It wasn't a worship service.
It was a circus. There's order. There's order. There's order. Now that doesn't mean you can't
say amen. That doesn't mean you can't say
amen. Men are women. I know the Lord taught us that
the woman is to keep silent, that she's not to usurp authority
over the man in teaching in the church, in teaching men, in teaching
the adults, because the man represents Christ, he represents the church.
But that doesn't mean she can't say amen as well as the men do. Here in our Lord, look, He takes
the means, and here it's His Word. He took the five loaves
and the two fishes, and looking up to heaven, and notice what
it says here, He blessed. He blessed. He's God, He can
do it. He blessed, and He break. Little
can be much. if the Lord blesses it. You say,
I don't have enough here to give. I don't really. Remember that
woman who gave a penny, the Lord says she gave all. You know,
he recognized that. He recognized it to the point
that he had it written in his word. That woman had that cruise of
oil, never went out, did it? Took care of Elijah, never went
dry. Much, little is much if the Lord
blesses it. But notice he says here, he break
the bread. He could have just blessed the
whole loaves and just give them loaves, couldn't he? But this
breaking of the bread represents his sufferings. The breaking
of the bread represents Christ and Him crucified. This is how
you're going to be fed when Christ and Him crucified is preached. And He gave the loaves to His
disciples and the disciples to the multitude. I pray that's
what He's done this morning. I pray He's given me this message
and then I've given it to you. God is a God of means. If you're
going to hear from Him, you're going to hear through a preacher.
You're not going to hear voices somewhere out there in a closet
or someplace. You're going to hear a preacher.
You're going to send a preacher. That's what you're going to hear.
It's our business to preach and to break the bread of life. And when he did this, now when
the Lord took the bread, when He blessed it, it says they all
did eat and were filled. They had all they wanted. Is
Christ enough? Is Jesus Christ enough? Is the
bread of life enough? He is for the sheep. He is for the sheep. All of them are filled. When
Christ feeds, all are fed. When Christ is the meal, the
sheep are fed. And they took up of the fragments
that remained 12 baskets full. They started out saying, you know, we only got a few loaves
here and a couple of fishes. But when it was over with, they
took up 12 baskets. The Lord blessed so abundantly
that they, and he cleaned it all up too, he didn't leave a
mess. He didn't leave a mess. He cleaned that place up. When
that multitude left, you couldn't tell they'd been there. And they that had eaten, who
are about 5,000 men, besides women and children. Our Lord, our Lord is enough,
isn't He? He's enough for me to feed the
sheep with, He's enough. We don't need entertainment.
We don't need to have a band up here. Christ is enough. Hollywood can
entertain sinners on their way to hell. I'm not. I'm not. I'm going to feed you Christ
until we leave here. Until God takes us home. And
I pray. And you pray. Lord, bless the
Word. Bless your Word. Feed me today. Feed me from your Word. And if
you really mean that, you'll go home fed. You'll go home rejoicing. You'll go home satisfied and
full. It'll like make your day. It'll just make, that's what
will make our day. All right.