And with me, if you will, to
John chapter 6. John, the sixth chapter. Of all the miracles
performed by our Lord Jesus, the feeding of the 5,000 by the
Sea of Galilee is the only one that's recorded by all four gospel
writers, Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. were all for inspired
by God the Holy Spirit to give us varying details of this tremendous
miracle. Of all the Lord's great works
performed in this world while he walked here in the flesh,
none was done so publicly before so many witnesses as the feeding
of the 5,000 with two small pieces of fish and five small loaves
of bread. That fact tells me that there
must be something unique, something distinctly important and instructive
about this miracle. My subject this morning is calculating
without Christ. You will understand why I've
chosen that for my title as we read the text. Calculating without
Christ. John chapter six, verse one. After these things, Jesus went
over the Sea of Galilee, which is the Sea of Tiberias, and a
great multitude followed him. They followed him because they
saw his miracles, which he had done on them that were diseased. And Jesus went up into a mountain,
and there he sat with his disciples. And the Passover, A feast of
the Jews was nigh. When Jesus then lifted up his
eyes and saw a great company coming to him, he saith unto
Philip, whence shall we buy bread that these may eat? And this
he said to prove him, for he himself knew what he would do. Philip answered him, 200 penny worth of bread. is not
sufficient for them, that every one of them may take a little.
One of his disciples, Andrew, Simon Peter's brother, saith
unto him, there is a lad here which hath five barley loaves
and two small fishes, but what are they among so many? And Jesus
said, make the men sit down. Now there was much grass in the
place, so the men sat down in number about 5,000. And Jesus
took the loaves, and when he had given thanks, he distributed
to the disciples, and the disciples to them that were set down, and
likewise of the fishes, as much as they would. When they were
filled, he said to the disciples, gather up the fragments that
remain, that nothing be lost. Therefore, they gathered them
together and filled 12 baskets with the fragments of the five
barley loaves, which remained over and above unto them that
were eaten. Then those men, when they had
seen the miracle that Jesus did, said, This is of truth, that
prophet that should come into the world. Those men observed
this, and they said, this certainly is the Messiah. There's no question
this man is that prophet of whom Moses and the prophets spoke,
who comes to speak to men, not as a man speaking to men, but
as a man who is God speaking to men. that prophet who has
come not only to reveal God but to deliver the people of God
and redeem them from all their sins. After these things, the
text begins. That refers to everything that
has transpired at least from the beginning of chapter 5. Our
Lord there healed the impotent man. but he healed the impotent
man on the Jews' Sabbath day and the Jews raised a terrible
fuss about that and raised what persecution they could against
the Lord Jesus because he had healed this man on the Sabbath
day. And the Lord Jesus then gave
a lengthy discourse in that fifth chapter in which he clearly described
his deity demonstrated that he is without question the Christ,
the Messiah, the son of God, that one to whom God has committed
all life and all judgment so that he and he alone has power
as God to give eternal life to whom he will because this man,
the son of man, is himself God, the son of God. Though he left
Jerusalem, the Lord Jesus when he had finished performing this
great miracle and he described to these people his deity, his
glory as God, they believed him not. They despised the light
that God calls to shine in their faces. They turned their backs
upon the revelation of God. And so the Lord Jesus left them.
He just left them. Left them to what? left them
to themselves, left them to their empty, meaningless, useless,
religious tradition, their meaningless, empty, useless, religious practices,
their meaningless, useless, empty pretense of righteousness. He
said, if it's what you want, you can have it and take it to
hell with you. He left them. He left them. Oh, what a warning. What a warning
to every religious ritualist who trusts in himself that he
is righteous. And yet, though our Lord left
them, a great multitude followed him because we're told in verse
2, they saw his miracles. I would have been there with
them. I just, I had to acknowledge, I'd have been there with them.
They saw this man raise up an impotent man. They saw him heal
blind men. They saw him give hearing to
deaf men. They saw him perform mighty miracles
and they followed him just like multitudes do in our day. They
were stirred by what they saw by what touched their emotions,
by those things that they looked at with excitement and they wanted
to see more and have more excitement and be stirred more and more
by these things. Why on this earth did they follow
the Lord Jesus across the Sea of Galilee? That was not an easy
thing to do. He got in a ship with his disciples
and left them and they saw which direction he was going and they
jumped in the ship and followed after him. Why? for the very
same reason that people all over the world gather in stadiums
and coliseums in huge mega churches all over this country and they
follow preachers and evangelists and faith healers and miracle
workers because they want more excitement. They want more to
please their eyes. They want more to stir their
emotions. because man is a beastly character
who lives for nothing but his lust unless God intervenes. They followed the Lord Jesus,
but though they followed him, they weren't interested in him. They had no interest in trusting
him or believing him, though they acknowledged truly this
man is that prophet. They acknowledged it, Larry.
They said, this has got to be the truth. This has got to be
the light. This has got to be the Christ.
But they believed him not. They believed him not. Oh, most
people these days who are excited about religion and excited about
their way of religion and excited about defending religion. have
no interest at all in believing on the Son of God, no interest
at all in casting the hope of their souls upon the merits of
a crucified Redeemer, no interest at all in following Christ as
the Lord and King of all. Then in verses three and four,
we see that our Lord knowing these disciples as in John chapter
2 when there were many who said we believe him and the Lord Jesus
didn't believe them. He didn't commit himself to them
because he knew what was in them. Here in verses 3 and 4 of John
chapter 6, the Lord Jesus withdrew himself even from this crowd
that followed him across the sea. He took his disciples because
he was weary with their unbelief, weary with their horrid unbelief. And he took
his disciples and went up into a mountain, found a quiet, secluded
place where he could be alone with his disciples. The Lord
Jesus was fed up with their self-righteousness and their religious traditions
and their religious talk. I get so sick of religious talk,
don't you? I get sick of it. You go to Wal-Mart
and give somebody a dime for a pack of toothpicks. Well, I'm blessed, blessed the
Lord. I get sick of it. Sick of it. Oh, Brother John, you ought not
be so hard. You can't imagine how sick I
am of it. Sick. The Lord Jesus said, I've
had it. He goes up into a mountain with
his disciples. to secluded spots. And the Jews, Passover was ahead. The Passover, God's feast, Murrow. God's feast. But the spirit of
God inspired John to call it the Jews Passover. Because God's
feast had degenerated into nothing but the Jews traditions. The
Jews' Passover was at hand, and the Lamb of God was in their
midst, and they knew it not. The Paschal Lamb, who is about
to die in the room instead of his people fulfilling everything
the Jews' Passover had typified when it was the Lord's Feast,
was standing in front of them, but they didn't know it. They
had no interest in those things. All right. Let's look at six
things here. First, I call your attention
to our Savior's tender care for the needs of men. After a while, the Lord appears
to have come down from this mountain. You know, you get so sick of
religious nonsense, you think, well, I'm going to just hide
from folks. I don't want to be around it anymore. You don't
want to be around it, but you got to come down from the mountain
sometime. And he came down from the mountain. And when he did,
he looked at these people. Five thousand men. That doesn't include women and
children. Five thousand men. That's a huge crowd by anybody's
estimate, a huge crowd. He looks at them and sees that
these folks had followed him from Jerusalem over the Sea of
Galilee. And this great multitude is still
sitting there at the foot of the mountain, waiting on something
from him. Matthew tells us when he saw
them, he had compassion on them and healed their sick. The master
then puts a question to Philip. Strong, strong test. He knew
what he was going to do in verse 6, we're told that, but to test
Philip, to test him, to prove him, he said, Philip, see these
folks? Whence shall we buy bread that
these may eat? Where should we go to get bread
to feed all these people, these 5,000 men beside women and children? and Philip was a man much like
you and me. He looked at the crowd. He, uh, just a minute,
Lord, looked in his pocket. Peter, what you got? John, what have you brought with
you today? He said, Lord, If we had 200
penny worth of bread, we couldn't give every man just a little
bite. We couldn't give them all just a little bite. How often in our daily trials,
in our difficult situations, we calculate the need and say, we can't do that. We
can't go there. We don't have the means. Can't
do it. How often when seeing a work to be done for Christ
over the souls of men, we start calculating the need and draw
back. Philip began to calculate, but
he calculated his own resources. He calculated his own abilities.
And looking at the need that was before him, the feeding of
these 5,000 men, he said, impossible. Impossible. I don't have the
money and I don't have the ability. All of us together don't have
the money and don't have the ability. We can't do that. Imagine talking about little
in the presence of God Almighty. Talking about little in the presence
of Him who owns all things and rules all things. What is our
emptiness, our poverty, our feebleness compared with His fullness? What
is our emptiness compared with His greatness? Instead of looking
to Him, Philip was like you and me. He looked to himself and
said, we can't. And I want to tell you a little
something about unbelief. Tell you something about unbelief. It's like griping. It's like
griping. It's horribly contagious. Horribly
contagious. You hear one fellow murmuring
and griping, you'll soon hear 20 murmuring and griping. And
then you'll hear 100 murmuring and griping. And you find one
speaking with unbelief, expressing unbelief, declaring the impossible
in the face of things that just can't seem to be any way to accomplish. You'll find more following his
example. The next thing you read about Andrew. Andrew was the
first of the disciples. He had been a believer longer
than any of the others. He had known the Lord Jesus longer
than any of the others. Andrew, however, in verses eight
and nine, expresses the very same thing. Look at this. One
of his disciples, Andrew, Simon Peter's brother, saith unto him,
there is a lad here. Lord, don't misunderstand Philip.
He's not saying we don't have anything. He doesn't want to
have anything. Oh, no, no. There is a lad here who has five
barley loaves and two small fishes. Lord, you promised that you'd
take care of all our needs. And there's a little boy over
here who's got just about enough to give us all a snack. He's got just about enough to
feed all 12 of your disciples if you send this crowd away.
He's got just about enough that we won't have to go away hungry
if you send this crowd away. He's got five barley loaves,
two small fish, but what are they among so many? Andrew and Philip only expressed
verbally that which Mark tells us all the disciples agreed to. It seems that they had forgotten
what they had seen. They forgot the things they heard. They forgot the things that they
had learned and forgot them quickly. They saw the Lord Jesus turn
water into wine. They saw Him heal an impotent
man who had been crippled for 38 years. They had seen these
things. They had heard His instructions.
They had watched Him and learned from Him. But they forgot. They were temporarily blinded
by their unbelief to the glory of Christ and His power as God
our Savior. There's a boy here with these
five pieces of bread and two little fish, but what's wrong
here? There's just one problem. In
all their calculations, they calculated without Christ. They were looking at the problem
and not the problem solver. They were looking at the burden
and not the one who carries the burden. They were looking at
all the difficulties and not the one who overcomes the difficulties. God forgive me how often I follow
that example. Is anything too hard for the
Lord? Is anything? They sounded just
like the children of Israel. Turn back to Psalm 78. Let me
show you. They sounded just like the children
of Israel in the wilderness. How often we do. They sounded
just like the children of Israel in the wilderness. And that which
is expressed here is the reason God left them in the wilderness.
It's the reason God buried them in the wilderness. Psalm 78 verse
19. Yea, they spake against God. Well, Brother Don, I wouldn't
do that. I'd do it all the time. You speak against God's providence,
Wes Rosenblum, you speak against God. You speak against what God
brings to pass in your life. Ron, would you speak against
God? They speak against the Lord.
They said, Can God furnish a table in the wilderness? Behold, he
smote the rock that the waters gushed out and the streams overflowed. What reasoning? It's that unbelief
never makes any sense. It never makes any sense. Now
we know, we know there was a rock following us there and God spoke
that rock and caused a river to gush out of that rock and
it followed us through the wilderness. But don't tell us he can give
us bread in the wilderness. Can he give bread also? Can he do that too? Can he provide
flesh for his people? Therefore the Lord heard this
and was wroth. So a fire was kindled against
Jacob and anger also came up against Israel because they believed
not in God and trusted not in his salvation. The birds without barns or storehouse
are fed. From them let us learn to trust
for our bread. His saints, what is fitting,
shall ne'er be denied, so long as it is written, the Lord will
provide. No strength of our own nor goodness
we claim, yet since we have known the Savior's great name, in this
our strong tower for safety we hide. The Lord is our power. The Lord will provide. If the
Lord God If the Lord God, Jesus Christ our Redeemer, if he, in
order to feed a multitude of reprobate men. These folks, these folks were
not believers. And the great majority of them
never became believers. These were reprobate men. These
were fellows on their road to hell. If the Lord Jesus, performed
such a miracle to feed these folks. Reckon he won't feed you? Reckon he'll let you go without?
Reckon he will deny you any good thing? You who are bought with
his blood, saved by his grace? Oh, no. Turn to Philippians chapter
4. Turn there and look at it. The prophet said concerning those
who trust the Lord, he shall dwell on high. His place of defense
shall be the munitions of rocks. Bread shall be given him. His
water shall be sure. This is what Paul says in Philippians
4.19. These Philippian saints had sent
Paul a gift while he was in prison. Of all the believers, these folks
at Philippi, and of all the churches, they were the poorest. They were
the poorest. They, uh, but they sent Paul
a gift. I have no idea what the gift
was. Paul doesn't tell us. He, uh, he received some bounty
from them by their hand of their pastor, Paphroditus. The pastor
was going, just like I went down to, uh, Jackson, Missouri, and
you folks sent a gift down there by your pastor. That's just exactly
what happened here. They, uh, they, some of the ladies maybe
baked Paul some cookies. I don't know what they sent him, but
he was in prison and they sent a gift. Whatever the gift was,
something useful and needed at the time. And Paul knew it cost
him dearly. Now watch what it says. But my
God shall supply all of your need. Now underscore this next
word, according to. Not out of, according to. According to. If I supply your
needs according to my abilities, your needs might not be taken
care of. They just might not be. But if
my name were Rockefeller, and you knew that I was kin to that
fellow who's in the Senate from West Virginia, and I promised
to supply all of your needs according to my ability, not out of my
ability, but according to my ability, if you believe my word,
you'd never have another thought about your needs. Well, my name's not Rockefeller,
but I have access to his bank account. My name's not Rockefeller,
but everything he has is mine to use as I need it. My name's
not Rockefeller, but everything he has, he has pledged to me
as I need it to care for me, and I believe him. Listen to
me. My name is Christ. and my God shall supply all my
needs, temporal and eternal, physical and spiritual, all my
needs today and all my needs tomorrow, according to his riches
in glory by Christ Jesus. Second, our Lord chose to use
these same disciples to feed this crowd. How patient he is. Like as a father pitieth his
children, so the Lord pitieth them that fear him. He knoweth
our frame. He remembereth that we're just
dust. These unbelieving disciples who so quickly forgot their lessons,
who so quickly forgot their experiences. The Lord Jesus doesn't even give
a hint of rebuke to them. Isn't that amazing? Not one word, David, to correct
them, to reprove them, to chastise, not a word. He doesn't even mention
it. Rather, he said, Y'all make these fellas sit down.
Mark tells us that they were required to sit down in order,
in companies, in ranks. And he proceeds to perform the
greatest of his miracles using these poor, weak, unbelieving
disciples. And he used them just as if they
had believed him perfectly. Use them just as if they've been
perfectly obedient in believing Him. They sat down in ranks by
hundreds and fifties. Let me just give you four things
I see here. I'll give them to you quickly. The Lord Jesus told
His disciples to seek these people in an orderly manner because
our God is a God of order. What does that mean? That means
all this whoopee religion you see going around you ain't God's
religion. That means all these folks jumping
around in church and dancing and clapping their hands and
waving their arms. In fact, that ain't God's stuff.
That means folks just speaking wherever they will and jumping
up and down. That's not God's way. That's not God's way. You
mean, Brother Don, God's not in all that religion? You heard
me right. No, no. God is not the God of confusion.
He's the God of order. In God's house things are done
decently and in order. Second, our Lord required these
people to be seated. He maketh me to lie down in green
pastures. He leadeth me beside the still
waters. How come you require them to
be seated? For this reason, if we feed on the bread of life,
All human activity comes to a halt. All the doings of men stop. Third, our great God and gracious
Savior, though He doesn't need us, condescends to use insignificant,
weak, worthless things such as we are to perform the greatest
works accomplished on this earth by God himself. How astounding
is his grace. Our Lord standing before the
tomb where Lazarus is buried and he's about to raise Lazarus
from the dead. He's about to just speak a word. Lazarus, come forth! He knows
what he's there to do. And do you know what he said
before he spoke to Lazarus? He said, y'all take away the
stone. What a strange thing. Surely,
if he can raise the dead, he can cause that stone to roll
away without doing anything. Sure, all he's got to do is say to
the stone, be rolled and roll. All you've got to do is command an
earthquake and roll the stone away or just wheel it away. If
he can wheel life, he can wheel the moving of a stone. But he
condescends to take hands like these and put them on a rock
and with great effort roll away a stone to expose the dead to
his life-giving voice. Oh, God, give me some stones
to push. Oh, what a privilege. What a
privilege. I can't give life to the dead,
but I can move rocks. And he condescends to use us
to do what he's given us the ability to do. Here's the fourth
thing. Our God accepts and uses miraculously
the most insignificant gifts we put in his hands. He accepts
and uses miraculously five barley loaves. and two little fish and refuses the gifts of the
richest Pharisee and the richest Sadducee and the richest doctor
and lawyer. He took the loaves and fishes
and he used them. He didn't score those loaves
because they were few. He didn't scorn those fish because
they were small, but rather he takes the small and weak things
and uses them. Here's the third thing. Our Lord in verses six, chapter
six, verses 11 and 12, used his servants to distribute
the bread to these hungry souls. And that's a pretty good picture
of the work of the ministry. The Lord Jesus took the loaves
and the fish and then he gave thanks. As you know, I don't
ever pray in a restaurant. That's not because I'm ashamed
to. And it's not because I'm afraid or embarrassed. I don't
ever do it because I don't ever want to act religious. I'm not
in control of things in a restaurant, but you give me control anywhere.
You give me control anywhere. If I receive a morsel from God's
hand, I'll lift my heart and lift my voice publicly and lead
the people around me to lift their hearts and lift their voices
publicly to acknowledge that this is God's gift. And we give
thanks. We often say, say the blessing
and reveal our papal tendencies. I've been asked by folks, have
you blessed the food? When our Lord blessed the food, he blessed
the bread. He just gave thanks. It wasn't
somehow making it to be blessed. The bread is bread. before you
give thanks for it and after you give thanks for it. But we
bless God for the bread and give him thanks for it. And then he
distributed it to his disciples. He said here, Andrew, Philip,
take this. John, take this. Peter, take
this. He distributes it to them. And
the disciples took the bread he gave them and passed it out
to the people and fed them. Let us never despise the means
God uses. He has ordained the feeding and
care of his sheep by faithful men whom he's gifted for the
work. Go back to John 6 again and you'll
see that these disciples, they didn't make the loaves and fish
to increase. They didn't multiply them. All
they did was receive them at the hand of the Lord, and as
they received them, they gave them. I can just picture. I can just picture that they
walk over there, got some more bread. Pass it on. These folks need some more fish.
Just keep passing it out. How'd they get that? If they
didn't multiply the loaves, if they didn't multiply the fishes,
how is it that they increased and multiplied? John Trapp pointed this out.
I thought it was fabulous. He said, by a strange heavenly
kind of arithmetic, the loaves and fishes were multiplied by
division and increased by subtraction. Isn't that good? Isn't that good?
God's gifts grow in the hands of those who use his gifts for
the benefit of others, especially for his people. It was our Savior's
almighty power that provided an unending supply of food. It was the work of his disciples
simply to receive it and distribute it. That's my work. That's my work. That's the work
of every gospel preacher. The preacher must seek bread
and seek it earnestly with prayer and diligent study. Deacons were
ordained in the church for this purpose so that the pastor could
give himself to study and to prayer and not to mundane things. He could give himself to concerns
about this bread and not about material bread. That's the reason
God ordained the deacons. The preacher then faithfully
distributes the bread among hungry souls. All right, back at our
text. Here's the fourth thing. This
is an undeniable display of divine omnipotence. Our Lord Jesus took five barley
loaves and two small fish and fed 5,000 men. That's a minimum, Joe, of 20,000
people. That's a minimum of 20,000 people. Now, Brother Don, you're exaggerating.
If you got 5,000 men, I'll guarantee you got at least one woman and
two children represented by each one. 5,000 men. He does this miraculously. by
creative power. When he healed the deaf and the
blind and the lame and the dumb, when he healed them, even when
he raised the dead, he was but restoring something that was
formerly there. He was using material already
there to cause this man to be healed or this woman to be healed.
But when he takes the loaves and fishes, and keeps multiplying
them and multiplying them and multiplying them. He creates
what's not there. He kept creating bread and kept
creating fish until everybody had all they wanted. The miracle
ought to be specially instructive to us. To your pastor, to you who join
me in this work, seeking the salvation of God's elect. Christ
our Savior is God able to save to the uttermost all who come
to God by Him. He creates that which did not
exist before. He creates life in you that was
not there before and makes you new creatures in Himself. Here's
the fifth thing. Look at verse 12. They were filled. They were filled. I am enduring a very sad time
for me. Very sad time. Looks like it's
going to be this way the rest of my life. I can't ever eat until
I'm full again. The doctors messed me up. And
I remember what it's like to eat. Oh man, just had biscuits
and gravy and grits and go sit down in the chair and won't go
back to bed. Just wonderful feeling. Now, just a bite or two too much
and I feel like I'm just gonna pop. Just can't do it anymore. These folks were filled with
good. Filled not to hurt, but filled
until they were satiated. filled until they had had all
they wanted. Everybody there had all the fish
sandwich he wanted for the day. Everybody. And then there were
12 baskets full left over. What's that mean? In him who
did this miracle dwelleth all the fullness of the Godhead bodily. And ye are complete in Him. I'm going to tell you as honestly as I can speak, Christ
is all I want. I've got everything I want, everything. all the righteousness I want,
all the forgiveness I want, all the acceptance I want, all the
holiness I want, all the God-likeness I want, I have Christ. I'm full, completely satisfied. That which satisfies God satisfies
me continually. One more thing. The Lord commanded his disciples,
gather up the fragments that remain. Let nothing be lost. Sadly, the commentators, about
all of them, said the Lord is teaching us here to be frugal.
You know what? I have found that not many folks
need to learn how to be tight. Not many need to learn how to
do that. We're pretty good at that by nature. I just doubt
that's what he's saying. It is true the liberal soul is made
fat by giving. But the Lord's teaching something
else. He's teaching us that nothing
be lost. Read Hebrews chapter 2. We won't
look at it now for the sake of time. How shall we escape if
we neglect so great salvation? See that you hold fast the bread
of life, the gospel you've learned, so that you don't lose anything. Don't lose anything. Hold fast. Hold fast to Christ Jesus the
Lord. And with all that, I say to you,
hungry souls, come eat this bread, eat and live forever. Look at chapter six, verse 47.
The Lord Jesus says, verily, verily, I say unto you, he that
believeth on me hath everlasting life. I am that bread of life. Verse 50, this is the bread that
cometh down from heaven that a man may eat thereof and not
die. Eat, eat, oh friends, and never
die. Amen.