"Jesus on the Hillside of Need" - a sermon by Louise Johnson
Luke 9:10-17
10 On their return the apostles told Jesus all they had done. He took them with him and withdrew privately to a city called Bethsaida. 11When the crowds found out about it, they followed him; and he welcomed them, and spoke to them about the kingdom of God, and healed those who needed to be cured.
12 The day was drawing to a close, and the twelve came to him and said, ‘Send the crowd away, so that they may go into the surrounding villages and countryside, to lodge and get provisions; for we are here in a deserted place.’ 13But he said to them, ‘You give them something to eat.’ They said, ‘We have no more than five loaves and two fish—unless we are to go and buy food for all these people.’ 14For there were about five thousand men. And he said to his disciples, ‘Make them sit down in groups of about fifty each.’ 15They did so and made them all sit down. 16And taking the five loaves and the two fish, he looked up to heaven, and blessed and broke them, and gave them to the disciples to set before the crowd. 17And all ate and were filled. What was left over was gathered up, twelve baskets of broken pieces.
There were at least five thousand, some newly healed of wounds and demons, all of them gathered on a hillside as the day’s light fades. Can you imagine? The smell? The noise? The need? Both evening and hunger are setting in quickly.
So the disciples call a meeting to address the situation.
[Call up “disciples.” Members of the assembly come to the front for a meeting]
Louise: “What are we going to do? We need a plan.”
Winston: “You know just recently I read a book about another group of disciples who addressed a very similar situation.”
Amy: “I think we just have to be practical here. There is no way we have enough food and it is getting late. I don’t think we have any option, but to send them on their way.”
Craig: “OK, you know, I think if we all work together, we can figure out a way to do this.”
Mark: “Let’s form a taskforce and study the root causes of the situation, find out how we got to this point in the first place, and then draft a recommendation to the church council.”
Louise: “Look, the ways we have done things in the past are just not going to work here. We need to launch a pilot project to test our assumptions.”
[End of meeting; participants return to seats]
“Send the crowd away, so that they may go into the surrounding villages and countryside, to lodge and get provisions; for we are here in a deserted place.”
That’s what the disciples finally decide. Understandably. For what are a couple of fish and five loaves of bread in the face of 5000 hungry souls? What choice do we have when our resources are so unbelievably low and the need is so unbelievably great? These days in the church, this seems to be the story all around. We need more money. We need more leaders. We need more congregations. We need more volunteers. We need more people in worship. We need. We need. We need. And it is no exaggeration. The statistics paint a pretty clear picture of our own little hillside of need and the diminishing resources we have to address those needs.
And I suspect you have a few resource-to-need discrepancies in your own life. What are they? Is it a hillside of papers, tests, and tasks and a few meager hours left in the day? Is it a hillside of debts and family need and a few measly dollars left in your checking account? Is it a hillside of grief and a fleeting whiff of joy? Is it a hillside of fear and a dearth of love? Is it a hillside of guilt and a full dose of cheap grace? What are your resource to need discrepancies?
For those of us who have been called to the work of ministry - and by that I mean the baptized, not only those in degree programs or under calls from the church - for those of us called to ministry, these discrepancies are our constant companions. There will always be more needs than you can address with the resources at your disposal. I promise. Even if you happen to land in a wealthy ministry site that has plenty of staff, a growing endowment, and a balanced budget, you only need turn your eyes toward any number of war-torn, conflict-ridden, resource-poor places on our planet to remember the hillside experience. It is the life of the disciple to be constantly engaged with more needs than what we can humanly address.
And so the disciples say: ‘Send the crowd away, so that they may go into the surrounding villages and countryside, to lodge and get provisions; for we are here in a deserted place.’
And then they say: ‘We have no more than five loaves and two fish—unless we are to go and buy food for all these people.’
And Jesus says: ‘Make them sit down in groups of about fifty each.’
And then he takes what little the disciples had to offer - their shortage, their weakness, their inability, their “lack of,” their “not enough,” their “too little” - their five loaves and two fish and he looks up to heaven for a blessing. A blessing from the One who created something out of nothing, who put flesh on dry bones, planted new life in an old woman’s womb [shades of a sermon by Nadia Bolz-Weber on the Feeding of the 5000, Patheos Website]. He looked up to heaven, blessed the “too little” and broke it and laid it out for the disciples to give to the crowd. And they did. And all were filled. And there were twelve baskets left over.
But God is not done yet. The 5000 fed and the 12 baskets left over are a foretaste of the feast that is to come. This miracle is the mustard seed, the salt, the light, the leaven of the Lenten season. It is a small reminder of what God can do so that on that day, on another hillside, when it looks like all is lost, that death has won, that there is no reason for hope, that we recall just what God can do with nothing.
I like Isaiah’s vision of it best:
On this mountain the Lord of hosts will make for all peoples a feast of rich food, a feast of well-aged wines, of rich food filled with marrow, of well-aged wines strained clear. And he will destroy on this mountain the shroud that is cast over all peoples, the sheet that is spread over all nations; he will swallow up death forever. Then the Lord God will wipe away the tears from all faces, and the disgrace of his people he will take away from all the earth (Isaiah 25:6-9).
President Louise Johnson
Wartburg Theological Seminary
10 On their return the apostles told Jesus all they had done. He took them with him and withdrew privately to a city called Bethsaida. 11When the crowds found out about it, they followed him; and he welcomed them, and spoke to them about the kingdom of God, and healed those who needed to be cured.
12 The day was drawing to a close, and the twelve came to him and said, ‘Send the crowd away, so that they may go into the surrounding villages and countryside, to lodge and get provisions; for we are here in a deserted place.’ 13But he said to them, ‘You give them something to eat.’ They said, ‘We have no more than five loaves and two fish—unless we are to go and buy food for all these people.’ 14For there were about five thousand men. And he said to his disciples, ‘Make them sit down in groups of about fifty each.’ 15They did so and made them all sit down. 16And taking the five loaves and the two fish, he looked up to heaven, and blessed and broke them, and gave them to the disciples to set before the crowd. 17And all ate and were filled. What was left over was gathered up, twelve baskets of broken pieces.
There were at least five thousand, some newly healed of wounds and demons, all of them gathered on a hillside as the day’s light fades. Can you imagine? The smell? The noise? The need? Both evening and hunger are setting in quickly.
So the disciples call a meeting to address the situation.
[Call up “disciples.” Members of the assembly come to the front for a meeting]
Louise: “What are we going to do? We need a plan.”
Winston: “You know just recently I read a book about another group of disciples who addressed a very similar situation.”
Amy: “I think we just have to be practical here. There is no way we have enough food and it is getting late. I don’t think we have any option, but to send them on their way.”
Craig: “OK, you know, I think if we all work together, we can figure out a way to do this.”
Mark: “Let’s form a taskforce and study the root causes of the situation, find out how we got to this point in the first place, and then draft a recommendation to the church council.”
Louise: “Look, the ways we have done things in the past are just not going to work here. We need to launch a pilot project to test our assumptions.”
[End of meeting; participants return to seats]
“Send the crowd away, so that they may go into the surrounding villages and countryside, to lodge and get provisions; for we are here in a deserted place.”
That’s what the disciples finally decide. Understandably. For what are a couple of fish and five loaves of bread in the face of 5000 hungry souls? What choice do we have when our resources are so unbelievably low and the need is so unbelievably great? These days in the church, this seems to be the story all around. We need more money. We need more leaders. We need more congregations. We need more volunteers. We need more people in worship. We need. We need. We need. And it is no exaggeration. The statistics paint a pretty clear picture of our own little hillside of need and the diminishing resources we have to address those needs.
And I suspect you have a few resource-to-need discrepancies in your own life. What are they? Is it a hillside of papers, tests, and tasks and a few meager hours left in the day? Is it a hillside of debts and family need and a few measly dollars left in your checking account? Is it a hillside of grief and a fleeting whiff of joy? Is it a hillside of fear and a dearth of love? Is it a hillside of guilt and a full dose of cheap grace? What are your resource to need discrepancies?
For those of us who have been called to the work of ministry - and by that I mean the baptized, not only those in degree programs or under calls from the church - for those of us called to ministry, these discrepancies are our constant companions. There will always be more needs than you can address with the resources at your disposal. I promise. Even if you happen to land in a wealthy ministry site that has plenty of staff, a growing endowment, and a balanced budget, you only need turn your eyes toward any number of war-torn, conflict-ridden, resource-poor places on our planet to remember the hillside experience. It is the life of the disciple to be constantly engaged with more needs than what we can humanly address.
And so the disciples say: ‘Send the crowd away, so that they may go into the surrounding villages and countryside, to lodge and get provisions; for we are here in a deserted place.’
And then they say: ‘We have no more than five loaves and two fish—unless we are to go and buy food for all these people.’
And Jesus says: ‘Make them sit down in groups of about fifty each.’
And then he takes what little the disciples had to offer - their shortage, their weakness, their inability, their “lack of,” their “not enough,” their “too little” - their five loaves and two fish and he looks up to heaven for a blessing. A blessing from the One who created something out of nothing, who put flesh on dry bones, planted new life in an old woman’s womb [shades of a sermon by Nadia Bolz-Weber on the Feeding of the 5000, Patheos Website]. He looked up to heaven, blessed the “too little” and broke it and laid it out for the disciples to give to the crowd. And they did. And all were filled. And there were twelve baskets left over.
But God is not done yet. The 5000 fed and the 12 baskets left over are a foretaste of the feast that is to come. This miracle is the mustard seed, the salt, the light, the leaven of the Lenten season. It is a small reminder of what God can do so that on that day, on another hillside, when it looks like all is lost, that death has won, that there is no reason for hope, that we recall just what God can do with nothing.
I like Isaiah’s vision of it best:
On this mountain the Lord of hosts will make for all peoples a feast of rich food, a feast of well-aged wines, of rich food filled with marrow, of well-aged wines strained clear. And he will destroy on this mountain the shroud that is cast over all peoples, the sheet that is spread over all nations; he will swallow up death forever. Then the Lord God will wipe away the tears from all faces, and the disgrace of his people he will take away from all the earth (Isaiah 25:6-9).
President Louise Johnson
Wartburg Theological Seminary
