I hope the message will be a
blessing for you this evening, because it was certainly a blessing
to me in preparing it. And there's just one phrase here
in all these verses that I'm going to read here in Luke 9-10-17,
that there's a whole message on it, and God willing, soon
I'll preach on it. But in Luke 9-10, and the apostles,
when they were returned, told him all that they had done, and
he took them and went aside privately unto a desert place belonging
to the city of Bethsaida. And the people, when they knew,
followed him, and he received them, and spake unto them of
the kingdom of God, and healed them that had need of healing.
And when the day began to wear away, then came the Twelve, and
said unto him, Send a multitude away, that they may go into the
towns, and country round about, and lodge, and get victuals,
for we are here in a desert place. But he said unto them, Give you
them to eat. And they said, We have no more
but five loaves and two fishes, except we should go and buy meat
with all this people. For they were about five thousand
men. And he said to his disciples, Make them set down by companies,
by fifties in a company. And they did so, and made them
all set down. Then he took the five loaves
and the two fishes, And looking up to heaven, he blessed them
and break, and gave to the disciples to set before the multitude.
And they did eat, and were all filled. And there was taken up
the fragments that remained of them, twelve baskets." I've got
my title for my message there in verse 13, where he said unto them, Give
you them to eat. Give you them to eat. Our Lord
Jesus has sent his disciples out, remember, at the beginning
of Luke 9. He sent his disciples out, and
they went out preaching and healing and preaching the kingdom of
God, traveling, healing. And they'd been working very,
very hard. And you remember, Herod had heard
of the Master and was so perplexed because he thought that one of
the prophets or John the Baptist had been risen from the dead.
And hearing of the things that our Lord Jesus Christ was doing,
And so he took his disciples aside to rest, there in verse
10. He took them aside to rest. And
they came to him and started telling him all that they had
been doing, all that they had done, how many devils and how
much healing and how much preaching. And they were just, I think they
were overjoyed and were telling him all the things that they
had done. They were so thankful and so blessed by the things
that God enabled them to do that they were very encouraged. And
they began to tell him all that they had done. And so he took
them, he took them aside, and privately into a desert place.
Now in other places it says they took a ship and went across.
But I tell you, they got so busy at times, our Master and his
disciples did, that they didn't even have time to eat. Look over
here in Mark with me, chapter 8. Mark chapter 8. They didn't even have time hardly
to eat sometimes. Now, sometimes we may get real,
real busy and put off eating till later, but I ain't never
been so busy that I ain't gonna stop to eat sometime. But these
were so busy here in Mark 8.31. Look what our Savior says here. Well, I said, did I say Mark?
Well, I'm in the wrong place then. Let me look again. Let me find it. Just give me
a minute. I wrote down the wrong place. Nope. Anyway, I'm going to tell
you what it says. It says they were so
busy and were so taken up with the things to do that they did
not have even so much time as to take a rest or to eat. And I thought, I'll find it.
But he took them aside privately, back over here in our text. He
took them aside privately. And as he took them aside privately,
he took them aside to rest. They needed rest. Everybody needs
to rest. You've got to have a time to
rest when you work hard. And I don't know about I know
a lot of preachers, you know, that Henry Mahan says now, if
he knew then what he knew now, he'd take at least three weeks
or a month every year and go somewhere and get out and relax
from the preaching. Relax from the pressure of it.
But some can do that, some can't. I know Mr. Spurgeon did. He went
once a year and he took a month. Martin Lloyd-Jones went once
a year, he took a month, but he took his disciples aside privately
because they had been very busy, not even time to eat, just peeling,
and crowds pressed them everywhere they went. And you know how hard
it is to be sociable all the time, to be around a group of
people all the time. Well, that's because we're so
constantly with so many people around him, so much work to do,
so much preaching to do, so much healing to do, and just crowds
all the time. So he took them apart. And all
of us, all of us need to be taken apart and get apart with the
Lord privately. Every single one of us as believers
need to do this. We need to get aside with our
Lord Jesus privately. All of us have a great need to
be alone with the Lord. We all need to take time to get
alone with Him. Several reasons why we need to
meditate on Him. When we hear something, we need
to meditate on Him. You know, get your coffee and sit down
and meditate on Him. Get your Bible and sit down and
meditate on Him. Meditate on His goodness. To
think about God and what David just said, O Lord, according
to your goodness and love and kindness, think on me, remember
me. Think about His greatness. How
great is the Lord Jesus Christ! How great is God Almighty! How
great is He in His power! How great is He in His grace!
How great is He in His love! Oh, to meditate on Him, and then
to think, and to meditate, as we said before Him, along with
Him, on His great salvation that He accomplished for us. What
a salvation that we have! A salvation that we have absolutely
nothing to do with. No product of us whatsoever. We didn't think of it, didn't
desire it, didn't want it, didn't know anything about it, and still
yet he came and brought salvation. Oh, to meditate on that, and
oh, to get along with him, to converse with him, to talk with
him. Talk with him. Tell him about
ourselves. Tell him about our troubles. Tell him about our
heartaches. Tell him about our fears. That's what they did.
They came and told him all that they had done. That woman who touched the hem
of his garment, she told him all the truth. And oh, to expose
ourselves. Talk with him. Converse with
him. Tell him ourselves. Tell him everything that's going
on with us. Expose ourselves to Him. Just lay ourselves bare.
Expose our fears. Expose our wants. Expose our
needs. Expose our desires. Just lay
ourselves out. And then come before Him and
get along with Him privately to confess some things. I don't
know about you, but I have to confess things. I have to confess
how weak I am. How little faith I have. I have
to confess how weak and weaned my love for Him is. I have to
confess, beloved, that I don't have the heart for Him that I
should have. I have to confess that I'm not
as committed as I should be. Oh, multitude, not a husband,
not a father, not a priest, confess our weaknesses. And then we shall
always, always, I do, have sins to confess. pride, self-righteousness,
idleness, slothfulness. Oh, sins, sins, sins, sins, sins. So get along with the Lord privately. You know, turn off the television,
turn off the radio, Sit down with the Lord. David
went, you remember I preached here a few, a couple of years
ago where David went in and sat, sat before the Lord. Be a wonderful
thing to do. Sit before the Lord. Then look
what happens now. So he took these men apart to
this city, a private place outside of Bethsaida. Desert place. Secluded place. And the people,
when they knew it, when they found out who he was, followed
him. Now, they went across on a boat.
These folks went all, walked all the way around that lake,
Sea of Galilee. And they followed him. That's
a good thing to do. That's a good thing to do, to
follow him. That's a wonderful thing to do, is to follow him.
And when they knew who he was, when they knew it, they followed
him. And look what he did. This blesses my heart. Oh my.
And they called him. Now he's got a picture of this. Him and his disciples are alone.
They need rest. They want some privacy. They
want some quietness. They want some peace. They don't
want no crowds. That's why they're separated.
And then all of a sudden, here's this great company of people.
They call him. Have you ever thanked the first
thing you said, folks? I'm sorry, I don't want to be
rude, I don't want to be ill-mannered, but we're here to get some rest.
We're here to be alone. To have some privacy. You're going
to think that's what he said, but what does he say? And he
received me. And he said, he got all these
fellas, and here they come, here comes a big crowd. He no doubt
heard them coming a long way off. In fact, you're going to
find out there's over 5,000 of them. That's how many people
come at this time. 5,000 walked around that lake
to find him, to follow him. And here's what he did, he received
them. He went out and just welcomed them, received them. Joyfully,
I tell you again. And then not only did he receive
them, he began to preach to them. He began to preach to them of
the kingdom of God, of the power of God, of the rule of God. Not
about laws and ceremonies and rituals. And what's this? And
this is what I love. And you know, he spake unto them. And here's what they were doing.
They was there to learn of him. You know where you find the rest
of that? Learning of him. You, where you get rest at, learn.
The more you learn of Him, the greater your rest will be, the
sweeter your rest will be. And, O beloved, they were learning
of Him as He spake unto them of the kingdom of God. And this
is the thing that a whole message needs to be preached from this
right here. And heal them that have need of healing. I love this verse. I absolutely
love this verse. Heal them who have need of healing. I can find myself right there. You can write down there, He
healed Donald Bell that had need of healing. He healed this sinner
who had need of healing. Put my name there instead of
heal them, heal me. Huh? Or who did He heal? Those who received. Who did He
heal? Those who had need of Him. Who
did He learn of Him? Those who had a need of Him.
Those are the ones that found healing. And what kind of healing
did He give them? Well, I don't know what all the
healings was, but I know some things we need a healing of.
We need a healing of Adam's sin. Oh, we need a healing. The old-timers
called it original sin, where sin originated from. It originated
with one man. And yet we inherited it from
Him, and we can trace our lineage back. We're shaped in iniquity
and conceived in sin. And, O beloved, we need healing
of Adam's sin. By one man's disobedience, we
were made sinners. By one man's obedience, many
were made righteous. We need healing of Adam's sin.
And then we need healing of our own sin. All of us have sins,
personal sins, besetting sins. sins that's peculiar to our nature
and our Constitution. All of us do. Yours might be
different than mine, but we got them. We got Aether's anger,
his pride, his impatience, his negativity, his grumbling, his
complaining, Self-righteousness, there's a besetting sin according
to our nature, slowly something about our nature, that we have
that's a besetting sin. And, beloved, we need healing
of that. And how often do we need healing
of it? Every day. And what are you going
to do? Lord, I'm coming! I need healing! And, oh, beloved, and we confess,
and we confess that we have need of healing. Oh, don't you all
confess that you have need of healing? That's why we come to
Him. We have a need. And oh, beloved,
when we read of our Lord's dealing with people in need, and here
are these people. He's alone, trying to rest, and
this great multitude comes out to Him. But instead of being
angry and impatient and hard, whenever people, sinners, came
around Him, we always see His gentleness. We always see His
condescension. He doesn't tell them we came
here to be alone, but he went out and received them and spake
to them. Always, always sees gentleness. Always see him coming down. You
never, never see him dealing with people according to what
they deserve. Never. He received all of them,
spake to all of them, and did good to all of them. But there's
a serious problem now. Watch what happens. And when
the day began to wear away, days, you know, they evidently started
out, got there that morning. They labored all day and it was
getting, the day began to wear away, it was getting on up toward
the evening, it was getting time to, for supper time. And when
the day began to wear away, the twelve got together and they
went to the Lord Jesus. All twelve of them evidently
got together and they went to the master. And they said unto
him, send them of Jude away. Send them away. Huh? That they may go into the towns
and countries, may go to Maseda and the country and the farms
and villages about and get them something to eat, get them a
place to stay. But we're out here in a desert place. There's
no places down here. There's nothing out here for
them to eat. There's no place out here for them to stay. And
it's getting close to evening. It's time you sent these fellows
to the house. Send them away. Huh? Oh my, but watch what our
Master said. But he said unto them, Give ye
them thee. They had no food. They
probably just took whatever they needed when they went out to
hunt. Give ye them thee. What? What's what they said? And they said, We have no more
but five loaves and two fishes. What? Thieves. All these people
with five loaves and two fishes, and if we can't feed them, and
watch what he went on to say, except we should go and buy meat
for all these people. Only way we're going to be able
to feed them, we've only got five loaves of bread here and two
little fishes. And if we're going to feed these people, we're going
to have to go buy some food. We're going to have to go buy
them. So they're in a serious problem right here. Here you've
got over 5,000 people hungry, You got five fishes or five loaves
of bread and two little fishes and these fellas said send them
away. And the Lord Jesus turned around to him and said, instead
of sending them away, give them something to eat. You give them
something to eat. Oh, they began to reason naturally.
We only got five loaves of bread and two fishes. If we're going
to feed them, you're going to have to come up with enough money
for us to go buy food for them. And they began to reason naturally,
which when you reason naturally, you know all you're doing? Manifesting
unbelief. That's all it is. To make nationals
unbelieve, ain't it? That's all it is. And oh, they
began to reason. Down in verse 14 it says, For
they were about five thousand men. That's men. That's not counting
the women and children. Huh? Not counting the women and
the children. Oh, it was about 5,000. How can
we feed so many? These many. You see, these disciples,
these twelve, they were occupied with circumstances. They were
occupied with things they could see. Huh? You know, they'd already forgot.
They just got through telling the Lord all the things that
they'd done. They had themselves had to perform miracles. And
they'd been with Him all day watching Him perform miracle
after miracle after miracle after miracle. saw him healed person
after person after person. Now you keep Luke here and go
over to John chapter 6 with me just a minute. John chapter 6
and verse 6. Oh my, they were grieving with
circumstances. They'd already forgot that they
themselves had performed miracles, that they'd been used to the
Lord, what the Lord had been doing all afternoon. Cannot the
same Savior that made the body, cannot He feed the body? And
then our Lord already preached to them and told them, He said,
if my father feeds the sparrows, not one of them falls to the
ground without my father's knowledge, without my father's knowledge.
Are ye not worth more than many sparrows? And oh, look what it says here
in John 6, in verse 6. One of his disciples, Andrew,
Simon Peter's brother, saith unto him, it's the same situation.
There's a lad here which has five barley loaves and two small
fishes. What's this? What are they among
so many? Well, if it's left up to me and
you, there'd just be five loaves of bread and two fishes, but
look back over there at that. What are they among so many?
Israel asked this question of Moses when they was in the wilderness.
They began to murmur and complain. They said, Oh, our women, we
were back in Egypt eating leeks and onions. And they asked, Moses says, Can
God furnish a table in the wilderness? Well, he did. Fed them 40 years. Furnished a table every day.
Sent them food from heaven. It's called angel's food. gave
them water out of a rock, and everywhere they went for those
40 years, that rock went back with them. Oh my, what matters how many
loaves of bread there are? What matters how many fishes
there are when the Lord Jesus is there? Huh? And then He says
to them, you give them to eat. You give them to eat. Why did
he say to them, give you them to eat? Well, I think there's
a couple of reasons. One was to not be so quick to
shake off the responsibility. The first thing they said to
our master was when he came there in verse 12, they came and said
unto him, send them all to eat away. Send them away. Now, the
Lord turned around and said, you give them to eat. You know,
that was bad to do this. These men were really bad to
do this. Here they said, send them away. You remember when
that Syrophoenician woman came to the Lord Jesus and kept following
Him. And finally, they said to Him,
send her away. She troubles us. When bombardment
began to cry out for the Lord Jesus Christ as He was walking
by, you know what they said to Him? Shut up and hold your peace. You're making too much noise.
And look over here at Luke 18. Luke 18, verse 15. You know, why did He say, Oh,
don't be so quick to shake off your responsibility? They should
have said, Master, we, you know, these people are hungry here.
What are we going to do to feed them? But they said, first thing,
instead of saying that to them, they said, send them away. Let
them go feed them for themselves. Let them do the best they can.
Let them find their own place to stay. Let them find their
own food to eat. Instead of saying, Master, you're here and all these
people are hungry and they're tired. And they're weak. They're like sinners. They're
empty. They're enabled. They don't have
no power. They don't have no way. They
don't have no place to go. But you think that's what they
said the first thing they said? Just send them away? In verse 15 here, Luke 18, it
says, And they brought unto him also infants. Now, these infants
here are small, small children. That he would touch them. But
when His disciples saw it, they rebuked Him. Can you imagine that? Somebody
bringing their baby for the Lord Jesus to touch Him? To be with Him? Lord, here's
my baby. Here's my little girl. Here's
my little boy. And somebody said, take that baby and get out of
here. We ain't got time for babies. We ain't got time for kids. Why
are you children of Damascus doing this? But Jesus called
them unto Him and said, Suffer. You allow these little children
to come unto Me, and don't you forbid them, for such is the
kingdom of God. These old fellows are horrible. See why we so desperately need
to be along with the Master. Another reason why that He said
give you them to eat is to try them. To try them. Try their
faith. See what they're going to do.
See how they're going to react. And oh, they began to make all
kinds of excuses, had carnal reasoning. No faith involved
at all. And look what he says here now.
In verse 14, for they were about five thousand men. He said to
his disciples, make them set down by fifties in a company.
So that's what they done. He gave a command. Go out and
make them set down. Set these people down. Fifty over here. Fifty up there. Fifty over there. And here you got all of them.
Five thousand men. So you've got a hundred groups
of 50 here, here, here, and the other group of 50 over here,
group of 50 over there. That's two companies of Marines. That's a whole legion. Roman
legion. Set them down. And then the kids
and the women. There are all these people out
here in these groups of 50. They're not sitting down in uniform
robes. No, no, 50 of y'all get on this
side, 50 of you get over here, 50 of you get over there. And oh, this is what's amazing to
me. And it says in verse 15, that they did so, and made them
all sit down. You notice how Lord Jesus didn't
rebuke them? He didn't rebuke them. He didn't
chide them. He just told them to go make
them sit down. Make them sit down. Oh, boy, we don't act... If it had been me in a situation
like that, I don't tell them how I'd act. But that's why He's
the Lord. And that's why we have need of
healing. That's why we have need of saving. That's why we have
need of being along with Him. Because we wouldn't act it this
way. We'd act it like them. But He acted like He always does.
Like the Savior, so gentle, so gracious, so good, so loving. And oh my, make them sit down.
And I'm sure they're thinking to themselves, why? There's nothing
to feed them with. But our Lord has spoken. God
has spoken, and that's enough. He commands we obey Him. Why
mustn't Adam eat of the forbidden tree? Because God said not to
eat of it. That's why. Why should Noah build
an ark when there hasn't been any sign of rain or flood? Because
God told him to. And the Lord said, make them
sit down, so make them sit down. Oh, beloved, we must sit down
if we're going to be fed. The activities of the flesh,
it's got to stop. The activities of the disciples,
flesh has got to stop, that carnal reading has got to stop, and
these men and women, their carnal activities, their flesh has to
stop. Sit down, be quiet, be still. And I'll tell you this, we have
to be made to sit down. If we sit down, we have to be
made to sit down. Ain't that right? The Lord has
to make us sit down. maketh us to lie down in green
pastures. We're not going to sit down until
He sets us down. Isn't that right? We're not going
to be quiet, we're not going to be still until He sets us
down. And oh beloved, here's the solution
to so little food for so many. In verse 16, look what happens.
Then he took the five loaves and the two fishes, Oh, he took
that bread and he took those two little fish. And the scripture
says here that looking up to heaven. Another place you know
in John 17 where he lifted up his eyes to heaven. And he did this not for his sake,
but for those that were there. He knew what he was going to
do. He knew what his father was going to do. And he lifted up
his eyes to heaven and he blessed. Blessed them. This word blessed
means to give thanks. You know, when I pray and you
pray, we say, Lord, we bless you. We give thanks unto your
holy name. Your name is above all names.
Oh, we give thanks unto you. We give praise unto you. And
that's what our Lord does. Blessing God and blessing the
food and giving thanks for this food. And then watch what happens. He began to break it. He began
to take that bread and break it into small pieces. started
filling up baskets. He began to take that fish and
break it up into small pieces. And those fellows would run out
there and go among the people, let them take a basket and run
over there with them. He'd come back and he'd still
stand there breaking the same bread, breaking it, breaking
it, breaking off the fish, give them the basket and they'd run
out and start feeding. And here's the thing, beloved.
While he's standing there breaking, When he's divided, when he's
subtracted from it, every time he breaks a piece off and subtracts
from a piece, it's multiplied. God's way of arithmetic is altogether
different. When we take something from it,
it's gone. But when He takes something from
it, it just starts multiplying. It starts multiplying. And He breaks it. And then what
He said to His disciples, He took the bread, and break and
said, take ye, this is my body which is broken for you. Oh,
he didn't rain down manna from heaven. He could have. But he
used what was there. He used the means that was there.
And what gave value to this bread? Christ did. What gave this fish
and bread make them useful? Christ made them useful. How
made these men useful? Christ made them useful. Huh? And He blessed and gave thanks.
And then what happens? And gave to the disciples. He
started turning around and gave them to the disciples. And to
set before the multitude. Oh, beloved, listen, the disciples
gave to them only what the Lord had given. They received from
the Lord's hand and just couldn't give what He gave them. Nothing
more, nothing less. Then they take it. And that's
why, oh, if I could learn this, not you, if I could learn this,
take from the Lord's hand and give you no more than what He
puts in money. That's what they did. They put bread and fish
in their hands. What did they give the people?
Bread and fish. That's why we got to get it from
the Master's hand. If it comes from His hand, it'll
feed somebody. It'll feed somebody. And they
received from Him. His hand gave to them. And what's
what it says in verse 17? And they began to eat. Oh, they
began to eat. I wonder what them disciples
thought, you know, when every time our Lord picked up a loaf
of bread, break it in about eight or ten, twelve pieces, put it
in a basket, take one of them fishes and break it up into all
kinds of bite-sized pieces, and start passing it around. Every
time it went up her hand in another basket, you just can't hardly
imagine what was going through their mind. Because they just
got through saying, Well, we got here five loaves of two fishes,
and what are they among so many? Huh? Oh, for all this people, they
didn't eat. Who ate? The hungry ate. Who ate? Those that were present
ate. You can't eat. Nobody that wasn't
there didn't eat. If you're going to eat from the
Lord's table, His fish and His bread, you're going to have to
come where He puts it out. Isn't that right? And, oh, beloved,
who didn't eat? Those that were in need. And
watch this now. I love this. And were all filled. 5,000 men, counting women, they
were all filled. That means they got full. They
were satisfied. They didn't want no more food. You better eat another. I've
had all of them. Want some more bread? I've had all I want. Want
some more fish? Don't need any more. And this is all these people. And they were all filled, all
satisfied. Now watch what happens now. And that was taken up as
fragments that remained to them twelve baskets. Started out with
one basket and ended up with twelve. J.C. Ryle says that that is a basket
for each one of the disciples. He provided the meal for all
of them. He gave all of them a basket. That's why they had all been
satisfied, all been filled. And our Lord Jesus Christ, not
being wasteful, He took it up. And here's the thing about it.
He started dividing, and the more He divided, the more He
multiplied. Now, the Lord Jesus could have just given them just
enough to fill them up, and that would have been it. Not a basket
left, not a piece of fish left, not a piece of bread left. But
that's not the way our Master does things. That's not the way
He does things. One thing about our blessed Lord
and God Almighty is He is not niggardly. He is not stingy. No, no, no. Not only does He
always give enough, But in fact, he does exceedingly, abundantly,
above what we can even think or ask. Let me show you that
and then I'll be through. He could have gave them, look
over in Ephesians 3. He could have gave them just enough, just
enough. But that's not the way he does
it. And if we realize, a lot of times we think, you know,
we're just barely, barely making it. That's our estimation of
it. But if we just stop and consider, we're doing a heapside board
just making today. Look here at Ephesians
3.20. Now, unto him that is able to do exceeding abundantly above
all that we ask, or think, Now we can ask for a lot, and we
can even think of a whole lot more. But whatever you can ask for
or think about, according to His mighty power that worketh
in us, He does abundantly and above that. Ain't that right? Exceedingly abundantly above.
All that we ask, all that we think. Whatever we ask for, He
always gives more. Whatever we think, He always
gives more. And unto Him be glory in the church by Jesus Christ,
world without ages. Throughout all the ages, world
without end. Amen. Amen. O Savior, Savior, Savior, our
Savior Divine, Jesus lover of our soul. Lord, we come to give you thanks
for how you always feed us. Oh, you give us bread, you give
us fish, you give us food, you give us water for our souls when
we're thirsty, give us light when we're in the darkness, give
us peace when fears arise, give us comfort When we're troubled,
oh bless your holy name. How gracious, how merciful, how
kind, how gentle, how full of compassion and mercy and love
you are towards us, towards your people on this world. And oh
Father, bless these dear saints of God who's gathered out here
this evening. Those who are hurting in their bodies, strengthen their
bodies. Those who are hurting in their souls, O Lord, be their
comfort, be their strength. O Father of mercies, given of
abundance of mercy. And O blessed, blessed Savior,
again, do for our children, grandchildren, what only You can do. We ask
for these blessings, these mercies, and give You thanks for all of
them. In Christ our Lord's name, Amen.