Thankfulness Abounding in Desolate Places Manuscript

SERMON TITLE: Thankfulness Abounding in Desolate Places
TEXT: Mark 6:30-44
SPEAKER: Matt Ginter
DATE: 11.21.21

You can find the sermon notes here.

It is good to be with you this morning. My name is Matt, I pastor at the University of Findlay; my wife and I attend regularly at North Main (where, this very morning, students from the University of Findlay are leading worship). I don’t want to take away time from the Word this morning, but I’d be remiss not to share a quick word of thanks for the church’s continued support of ministry at the university. We are blessed to continue to see hundreds gather for worship each week on-campus, digging into God’s Word at a variety of Bible studies and engaging with mentoring, discipleship, and evangelism. It is an absolute blessing to see God’s kingdom advancing among the student body. Thank you for your support and encouragement, and we would solicit your continued prayers.

Share quick story: I was supposed to preach way back on Apr 18-19, 2020. It’s been awhile and I don’t know if you remember but things got a bit…topsy turvy; Josh reached out and—given the general uncertainty about everything—asked if it would be alright with me if we rescheduled to later in the year. “Sounds great, no problem,” I replied. Everything basically shut down in March/April 2020; the world ground to a halt and no impending public appearances on the horizon for me, I decided to do what any sensible person might in that situation: I shaved my head. I always wanted to know what it would look like, but was always too scared to actually go through with it. Lo and behold, barely had last follicle been shorn from my (what turned out to be somewhat oddly shaped) head than Josh got back in touch with me. Where I had interpreted “later in the year” as November, Josh was proposing May 17, 2020; one month later than originally scheduled. I found myself googling, “how fast does hair grow back?” I’m sure the video’s still out there. If you go back and look closely, my hair is in that awkward “early Chia Pet” growth stage. All that to say: it was a pleasure to share from God’s Word remotely with you all back in May 2020, and—if it’s not too bold—it is even better to be with you in person to share today. And I, for one, am thankful for better decision making in the weeks leading up to this particular opportunity to share.

Speaking of thankfulness, something’s coming up later this week. I can see some of you nodding, smiling, you know what I’m talking about; big day, seems like happens every year last full week of November. That one special day each year we can proclaim just how thankful we are…to live in the state of Ohio and not that state up north. Saturday, November 27, noon kickoff, the #? ranked Buckeyes bound to destroy #? Michigan… Ok, not the actual ‘big day’ coming later this week. Thanksgiving Day. Thursday. We traditionally tab the Sunday before as Thanksgiving Sunday, and if you’ve graced the doorway of a church on any previous Thanksgiving Sunday, it is likely you’ve heard things like ‘every day should be thanksgiving day’ or ‘don’t let the busyness of the holiday keep you from pausing and giving thanks’ and so on. Good messages. True. Run the risk of feeling a bit cliched, though, right? That we as Christians should be thankful—give thanks—isn’t really the question; it’s fairly clear in Scripture. I Chronicles 16:34, " Oh give thanks to the Lord, for he is good; for his steadfast love endures forever!" Psalm 50:14, “Offer to God a sacrifice of thanksgiving.” I Timothy 4:4, “Everything created by God is good, and nothing is to be rejected if it is received with thanksgiving.” I Thessalonians 5:18, "Give thanks in all circumstances." And on and on. Even the grumpiest among us would likely concede that we should be thankful more often than we are. The difficulty lies in the execution. How do we give thanks? When? And where? What should it look like? We’ve compartmentalized it to a single day, a short season—we isolate a spirit of thankfulness to exceptional circumstances of holiday and family—that we are not well equipped to practice it every day. What would it look like to grow in a spirit of thankfulness? Well…how did Jesus engage with giving thanks? When? Where? What did it look like? What can we learn from Him in this area?

We’re going to turn to a particularly fascinating instance of thanksgiving in the Gospels. A familiar story, perhaps; a story that might feel a bit of an odd choice for a Thanksgiving Sunday. It’s the story of the feeding of the 5,000. In the days ahead, I’m guessing some of you are staring down some pretty substantial meal prep: juggling grocery lists, decoding prep times, cleaning the house, polishing the silver and the like in anticipation of a big Thanksgiving dinner. It’s a lot! Even with days to prepare and plenty of adequate pre-planning, the holidays can leave you feeling stressed, overwhelmed. Imagine, though, instead of days and days to stress and prepare, imagine you found yourself with absolutely no prep time whatsoever; imagine Thanksgiving Day somehow just snuck up on you out of nowhere and you had to try to pull something together with what you have on hand. How does the prospect of constructing a spontaneous Thanksgiving feast with only the supplies you naturally have on-hand strike you? Anxiety inducing? Hands trembling a bit? Nerves on edge? I don’t doubt some of you would excel under such circumstances; that you’re well-stocked, ready for any emergency. Someone springs a last-minute Thanksgiving feast request on you, you’d just crack your knuckles, whisper under breath, “I’ve been waiting for this moment my entire life,” and get to work. I’m sure that’d be some of you! But the majority of us, a last minute expectation to feed the masses with what we have on hand would likely not go well. For my own part, a surprise feast at my house would consist of a delightful spread of Pringles, Pop-Tarts, and an assortment of flavors of Mountain Dew Kickstart. It is, admittedly, something of a silly scenario. You’re not likely to ever be called upon to feed the masses at a moment’s notice. But the hypothetical situation does highlight a very real truth: unexpected demands on our time or resources can leave us feeling woefully inadequate…AND such situations do not seem ideal breeding grounds for a spirit of thanksgiving. Demands are going to be made of Jesus’ disciples’ time and resources in our text this morning. They will be painfully aware of their inability; their inadequacy…AND Jesus is going to teach them a lot about giving thanks even in such less-than-ideal circumstances. Let’s jump into the Scriptures together…

We’re going to be in Mark 6, starting at verse 30. We’ll walk through the passage this morning in a way similar to how we often walk through passages in the ministries on the University of Findlay campus: we’ll read a verse or two, pause for clarification and reflection, then read further. Now we could have chosen to read this same account from any of the four Gospels (Matthew 14:13-21; Mark 6:30-44; Luke 9:10-17; John 6:1-15). The feeding of the 5,000 is one of the few accounts—outside of the crucifixion and resurrection—to show up in all four Gospels. The Sermon on the Mount doesn’t (only Mt, kinda in Lk), the Transfiguration (not in Jn), Jesus raising Lazarus from the dead (only Jn), Jesus celebrating the Lord’s Supper (not in Jn), even the Christmas narrative—Jesus’ birth (only Mt and Lk)—none of these show up in Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. But the feeding of the 5,000 does. There is something special about it, what it tells us about who Jesus is and what He can do; what it indicates about us and the ways it challenges us. All four Gospel writers found it worth including. It was apparently a message worth repeating then; worth diving into now. Let’s pick up with verse 30 in Mark 6…

30 The apostles returned to Jesus and told him all that they had done and taught. ‘The apostles returned…’ Just for some context, where did the apostles ‘return’ from? If we glance back to verses 7-13 we see that Jesus had paired them up and sent them out without him, to teach and preach and heal and cast out demons – to do exactly what He himself had been doing so far. They did just that, and here we find them returning to Jesus in (what I think is) absolutely adorable fashion. “They told him all that they had done and taught.” Might be thinking, that doesn’t seem overtly adorable; why is that adorable? Have you ever interacted with little kids just home from school or summer camp, excited and wanting to share about what just happened? Have you ever gotten the 9 year old’s rundown of an event? Just one long run-on sentence with names and places that don’t really know but you almost feel like you have to pretend you’re tracking with everything they’re saying. You’re just standing there nodding, the child prattling on, “…and then we went swimming and I didn’t want to do a cannonball because I thought I would get water up my nose but then Donny did a cannonball and his splash wasn’t very big but Suzie said she thought it was really cool that he did one so I thought I could probably do one and I did and my splash was way bigger but I did get water up my nose and I think it came out my left ear but I’m not sure it’s the same water but the splash was SO big and now Suzie’s my girlfriend…” When Mark 6:30 says the disciples came back to Jesus and told him all they had done and taught, I’m just imagining Peter and the rest coming back to Jesus with the same child-like sense of wonder and enthusiasm. Can you just imagine Peter running up to Jesus, sharing everything, “…and then I was telling them about how if their right hand causes them to sin they should cut it off and throw it away just like you said, Jesus, I told it to them exactly the same way and their eyes got SO big and I did that whole dramatic pause thing you did to us and I could just tell they’re all standing there thinking like ‘is this dude serious?’ and then I dropped the truth on them just like you, with that quiet loud voice, ‘For it is better that you lose one of your members than that your whole body go into hell.’ Word.for.word.ahh, you should’ve seen it…”

Whether they were specifically filled with child-like excitement or not, the text does make one thing fairly clear: they were tired. Teaching and healing had tuckered them out, so Jesus says to them, verse 31, 31 “Come away by yourselves to a desolate place and rest a while.” For many were coming and going, and (*Mark adds detail not in other Gospels) they had no leisure even to eat. Have you had those days where you are just so busy—everything piling up, one thing after another—that you don’t even have time to stop and eat? This is what the disciples are experiencing in our text; Jesus recognizes this exhaustion and directs them to a time of solitude (“come away by yourselves to a remote place…rest…”). It was necessary that they relocate; Mark notes that “many were coming and going,” there were crowds of people all about them. It seems their ministry had been so effective, in some ways, as to draw people back to themselves; back to Jesus. People were coming to them, looking for more. So, at Jesus’ prompting, 32 they went away in the boat (*across Sea of Galilee) to a desolate place by themselves. This action, initiated by Jesus, should serve as something of an implicit note of correction to some of us with our workaholic tendencies and cluttered calendars. Don’t get me wrong, the disciples have apparently just been working very hard, putting in long days, expending a great deal of energy. But they, like any of us, are not expected to draw from an empty well. Jesus is directing them to a healthy rhythm of work and rest in their lives, directing them to times to refresh and recharge. And this is hardly some new-fangled teaching he’s putting forth. Rather, Jesus is pointing back to the creation rhythm, to a pattern of working and resting modelled by the triune God in creating the cosmos (6 days work, 1 day rest); a pattern woven into us from the very start. So Jesus seeks a quiet place for them to rest, but—alas—it would not be…

33 Many saw them going and recognized them, and they ran there on foot from all the towns and got there ahead of them. The same crowds back in v 31 who had been ‘coming and going,’ milling about Jesus and the disciples, these crowds saw them get into a boat and set out across the Sea of Galilee. Recognizing where they were headed, the crowds “ran there on foot…and got there before the boat landed.” How fast did they have to be travelling…?! Starts to feel like a bad high school math problem: if Jesus and His disciples are sailing at 5mph across the diameter of the Sea of Galilee, how fast would 20,000 people need to be traveling on foot to traverse 43% of the circumference of the same body of water to arrive before the boat? I have absolutely no idea! Not sure it really matters, when it comes down to it. What’s important to note here is the powerful effect that Jesus and the disciples have had on the crowds. The people are drawn to them, to their teaching, to the miracles—the signs and wonders being performed—and they’re being drawn not just casually, there’s a longing, a desperation to be near and to hear, to see God at work, to such an extent that they outrace a boat.

Put yourself in Jesus and His disciples’ shoes (er, sandals) – you’re exhausted, you set out in a boat destined for a desolate place, for some time away from the crowds…only to see the very people you were trying to avoid waiting for you on shore; even eagerly expecting you. If I’m Peter, exhausted and hungry, and I see this waiting for me on the shore, my immediate thought would be, “Nope. Can’t do it. Turn the boat around. Let’s just…drift…” I think I’d be irritated, to say the least, frustrated, feeling overwhelmed, maybe a bit hopeless… But not Jesus. Look how he responds. 34a When he went ashore he saw a great crowd, and he had compassion on them, because they were like sheep without a shepherd. Jesus welcomes the crowd. Any shepherds in the audience? Yeah, not likely, not sure what I expected…maybe you have experience with sheep; interact with students at UF who work with sheep and they love to talk about just how unintelligent they are. Left to themselves, sheep are disorganized and directionless, easily distracted and easily scared, prone to wander. They desperately need someone to lead them. This is what the crowd looked like, gathered on the shore. In fact, this is a common image—“sheep without a shepherd”—for God’s people, used throughout the Old Testament. Don’t think we’re so different today. Have you ever felt like a sheep without a shepherd? Disorganized? Distracted? Scared? Desperate for someone or something to give you clear direction? We all cling to someone or something to shepherd us through life. Some of us look to our jobs, some to our families, some to relationships… What do you look to to give you a sense of meaning and purpose? Of belonging? Who or what shepherds you? Jesus sees the people in our text this morning, lost and scared, waiting on the shore, and has compassion. And 34b he began to teach them many things…

35 When it grew late, (*apparently Jesus taught for some time) his disciples came to him and said, “This is a desolate place, and the hour is now late. 36 Send them away to go into the surrounding countryside and villages and buy themselves something to eat.”  This all feels like the disciples’ attempt at a polite way to wrap things up… One of those not-so-subtle cues to get guests to leave; you know you’ve done it. Somebody’s been at your house a bit longer than you’d prefer; you wait for a lull in the conversation; slap your knee gently, say something like, “Ope, well, don’t wanna hold you up, sure you have places to be…” That polite, midwestern passive aggressiveness. Disciples are being even more direct. “Jesus, it’s late, we’re tired, still hungry [remember: they didn’t have time to eat!]; the crowd’s probably tired and hungry too. Why don’t we call it a night, let everyone track down something to eat…Taco Bell drive thru is probably still open…” Joking aside, it all seems sensible enough, right? If the disciples had more time or energy, I’m sure they would have been glad to continue blessing the crowd, teaching and preaching and loving and serving, but they’re tapped! They’ve had enough! Surely Jesus would understand and agree…

37a But he answered them, “You give them something to eat.” John’s Gospel adds a unique detail here. John 6:6 tells us that Jesus said this—instructed His disciples to feed the crowd—but then adds that he said it to ‘test them because He knew what He was going to do.’ So He knows He’s going to (spoiler alert) miraculously multiple food to feed the crowds…but He doesn’t tell them. Why not just tell them? Why string things out? Why not jump in with a quick word of reassurance, “Guys, calm down. No worries. I’ve got this. It’s gonna be…so cool, you won’t believe it.” He doesn’t do that. Why doesn’t He do that? He knew what He was going to do and didn’t tell them back then…and He does the same thing at times with us even today. Why does God allow us—even want for us—to step into unknown circumstances when He knows what’s gonna happen? Why doesn’t He just tell us? Jesus made this impossible request of His disciples that day—“you give them something to eat”—without telling them what He planned on doing because He knew that they would learn more about both themselves and about Him by experiencing what was to come next. And He does the same with us. Tests are rendered pretty meaningless if we demand access to an answer key before taking them. Times of testing expose what we know and we don’t; where we can learn and where we need to grow… And this is a test for the disciples. How will they respond to this demand of an impromptu meal for 20,000?

37b They said to him, “Shall we go and buy two hundred denarii worth of bread and give it to them to eat?” A denarius was equivalent to a single day’s wage; 200 hundred denarii, then, would be more than half a year’s wages. They think that Jesus is asking them to plop down, on the spot, more than half of their gross annual income to feed the assembled crowd. How would you respond if Jesus was sitting beside you this morning, nudged your elbow, said somewhat off-handedly, “Hey, I think you should feed everybody in this room.” Put yourself in the disciples’ shoes. How would you respond. Blank stare? Would you say the same as the disciples, “Jesus, umm, bank account’s pretty…low, not sure I can really manage that.” Or…no? Would you look at Jesus and say “No…? Can I say no, I’m not really sure how this works…” It’s a small detail, but notice: Jesus never said, “Go buy 200 denarii worth of bread.” He simply said, “You feed them.” The disciples assume that this can only be accomplished by spending 200 denarii (they presumably don’t have). It seems they have completely failed to see the difference here between Jesus’ request of them and their (somewhat misguided, though understandable) interpretation of His request. How often do we struggle in the same way? How often do we struggle to tell the difference between God’s good instructions for us and our misinterpretations of what He requires? They can be, at times, very different things. The disciples are overwhelmed at the perceived request. But Jesus redirects the conversation back to His original request. “Feed the people,” He said. “We don’t have money,” retorted the disciples. “No, no, I’m talking about food,” Jesus says…

38a He said to them, “How many loaves do you have? Go and see.” The disciples, remember, didn’t have any food for themselves. Any loaves of bread to which they might have access would need to be found amongst the crowd. We are indebted again at this point to John’s Gospel for some additional details. John 6:8-9 tells us that Andrew—Simon Peter’s brother—had found a young boy in the crowd with five barley loaves and two fish. That’s it. That’s all they could find. The same detail, though less specific, is shared here in Mark’s Gospel. 38b When they had found out, they said, “Five, and two fish.” Five loaves and two fish. Hardly enough for 20,000 people. But it’s probably even worse than we might think. We hear ‘two fish’ and our thoughts might jump to images of decently large fish – king salmon, thirty lbs, three feet long. We hear ‘five loaves’ and what do we think of? Stacks of packaged bread at the grocery store, 5 24-slice loaves…split between 20,000 people…that’s 166 people per slice of bread... Again, not enough food. What’s more, neither king salmon or pre-sliced loaves of bread would even have been the case two thousand years ago. The portions they had, though, are far smaller than we might initially imagine. Remember where we are: in a desolate place beside the Sea of Galilee. The Sea of Galilee, at the time, housed, give or take, 18 different varieties of fish. The most common type of fish? The type that a young boy would most likely have: tiny little sardines. Easily pickled, preserved. Inches long; ounces in weight. Two small fish. And the loaves of bread – the Greek word used here denotes ‘barley,’ cheap bread, a staple for the poor. While we think of loaves as large, sliced, these would likely have been flat, round cakes; small enough that one person would typically eat several barley loaves during a meal. So five barley loaves and two sardines, the young boy had brought just enough for himself; this was the ancient Middle Eastern equivalent of a ‘Lunchables.’ The apostle Andrew has confiscated a little boy’s Lunchable he brought from home…

So things don’t seem to be going well. This is one of those instances where we, knowing ‘the rest of the story,’ run the risk of doing ourselves a disservice; we risk not appreciating the tension, the uncertainty, that certainly would have been mounting for the poor disciples. Nothing at this particular point in the interaction between Jesus and His disciples would have given them the impression that this was all going to turn out well in any possible way. Everybody’s tired. It’s getting late. No one seems to have money or access to food. None of this seems like fertile ground for thankfulness; in fact, it seems the opposite is more the case with some passive aggressive grumbling from the disciples (and potentially from the crowd as well). Not feeling like an ideal situation for thanksgiving, but Jesus rises above the grumbling…and, in typical fashion, does something completely unexpected but perfectly suited to the situation.

Five loaves and two fish in hand, 39 he commanded them all to sit down in groups on the green grass. 40 So they sat down in groups, by hundreds and by fifties. To us, here, today, this likely does not seem a terribly important detail; if we’re honest, it sounds a bit like the beginning of an awkward icebreaker at a church picnic. But the Gospel writer’s language here is very intentional; this detail, this moment, these instructions, it might very well have sparked memories of something significant for the disciples. Three times already in the passage (vv 31, 32, 35) we’re specifically told that Jesus, the disciples, andthe crowd are in a ‘desolate’ place. They are far from civilization, in the countryside. They are—to borrow typical Old Testament language—in the wilderness. And here’s Jesus, their good shepherd, making them lie down in green grass; organizing them in groups of 50s and 100s just like Moses had done for the Israelites in the wilderness a thousand years before (Exodus 18:21, 25). The stage is set…

41 Taking the five loaves and the two fish, he looked up to heaven and said a blessing and broke the loaves and gave them to the disciples to set before the people. And he divided the two fish among them all. 42 And they all ate and were satisfied. 43 And they took up twelve baskets full of broken pieces and of the fish. There’s an Old Testament account—found in II Kings 4:42-44—probably not well known to us; the disciples, maybe the crowd, likely would have been familiar though. In II Kings 4, the prophet Elisha faced with a crowd of hungry individuals, a hundred in total…and only twenty loaves of bread and a sack of fresh grain with which to feed them. Similar to what we find here in Mark 6, Elisha took what was available, blessed it, promising that it would feed everyone present…and it did with some left over. We find Jesus doing the same here, but with far more people, way less food, and far inferior quality food. He is the true and better Elisha. Jesus took the little they had available and ‘said a blessing’ – “God is great. God is good. Thank You Jesus for this food.” Ok, probably not that. But there is a good chance He would have shared the typical Jewish prayer of blessing over food: “Blessed are you, O Lord our God, King of the universe, who brings forth bread from the earth.” Mark’s Gospel states that Jesus ‘said a blessing;’ John (6:11) states the same, but phrases it in a slightly different manner: it says that He ‘gave thanks.’

He gave thanks and everyone ate. Verse 44 tells us that 44 those who ate the loaves were five thousand men. You may have caught, throughout, I kept referring to 20,000. Maybe this felt odd. Why does he keep talking about feeding 20,000 when it’s called the feeding of the…5,000? Matthew’s Gospel (14:21) makes it clear that there were women and children present beyond the 5,000 men. So…15,000? 20,000 total in the crowd? Whatever the number, it is absolutely incredible given that the local towns of Capernaum and Bethsaida would only have had 2,000-3,000 inhabitants each at the time. And they—the 15,000, the 20,000 present—they all ate to their fill, from five loaves and two fish after Jesus gave thanks…AND there was extra, leftovers, to share beyond. How, then, should we give thanks? What do we see Jesus modeling?

Jesus’ thankfulness is not dependent on circumstances lining up the way He wants. He gives thanks before anything particularly miraculous has even happened. How often do we only give thanks when our “cup runneth over”? When things are abounding and plenteous and bountiful and we just can’t help but praise God? Jesus doesn’t wait for His cup to run over here. He’s giving thanks for the cup. More so, He’s thankful to know the One who can fill the cup. His thankfulness is multiplied as the cup fills, to be sure, but it is not dependent on the cup being filled. His thankfulness is grounded in knowing the Father. True, enduring thankfulness is grounded not just in what God does for us, but in who He is. If we’re being brutally honest, how often do we only express thanksgiving to God when we feel, by our circumstances, that He deserves it? How often do we withhold giving thanks to God until we get what we want? Until we get what we think we deserve or need? “God, I know You’re good and everything and I’m thankful, but I’d really be thankful if You gave me a…” Jesus flips this on its head. “Father, this seems impossible, but with You all things are possible, and I am so thankful You are who You are regardless of what comes next…” We can give thanks in all circumstances because our thanksgiving is not grounded in the circumstances themselves but in the perfect nature of a loving God who transcends every circumstance. In what is your thankfulness grounded?

(transition) The impact, the power, of a thankful spirit. A spirit of thankfulness frees us to love and serve God and neighbor; thanksgiving releases and multiplies blessings. Thanksgiving can take the little we have and use it to great impact. A thankless spirit, a possessive spirit, will limit blessings in our lives and the lives of those around us.

Look at what Jesus is modeling. Before He gave thanks? Not enough. After? Enough, more than enough. Does it mean that every time we pray over a small amount of food it will supernaturally multiply to feed the masses? No. But does it mean that when we humbly present our requests to God and offer up even the little we have, that when we do that with thanksgiving and faith, that He can take it and us it in ways beyond what we could conceive or imagine? Absolutely.

The disciples saw an impossible situation. Too many people, not enough money, too little food. All reasons to grumble. All reasons not to be thankful. They didn’t think five loaves and two fish could ever be enough. How often do we do the same thing? How often do we look at what we have and think, “If only I had more money, more time, more anything, then I could do something with it for God. But I don’t…” Left to ourselves, to our finite, fallen, self-serving, self-justifying selves, we can never muster enough time or money or energy; we’ll always fall short. But with God, there is no such thing as ‘not enough.’ He is the God who ushered the cosmos into being by a single word. He took five loaves and two fish and fed a multitude. He took twelve ordinary men and used them to turn an entire world upside down. He worked through the death and resurrection of an unassuming carpenter to redeem the lost, forgive sins, and reconcile a dying world to Himself. Who are we to say of anything, ever, that it’s ‘not enough’ for God to use? We need to stop instructing God on how much is ‘enough’ for us to be willing to serve and bless our neighbors and start looking and listening and trusting as He calls us and provides and multiplies… In the economy of His mercy, there will always be enough

This Thanksgiving, bound to be met with unexpected demands on your time or resources; bound to feel woefully inadequate and disinclined to give thanks. When circumstances leave us feeling like don’t want to give thanks, remember…

Close with reference to Mk 14:22; Jesus taking bread and blessing it, breaking it in pieces and giving it to the disciples…