John
6:1-21, Ephesians 3:14-21
Is the glass half
full or half empty? We probably all know what the “right” answer is. Half full, of course. Because half-full people are thought to be
optimistic. They seem to bounce back
relatively easily from setbacks. They
are grateful and generous. One study
suggests that they are even healthier and wealthier. Goodness!
Who wouldn’t want to be one of them?
But honestly, if you put a glass in front of me that’s filled halfway, I
can’t help myself, I tend to focus on all that space that’s not filled up. And in my head I think, half empty. But at least I’m in good company for it seems
that at least two of Jesus’ disciples think the way I do.
In our reading
today we hear the well-known story of Jesus feeding the 5,000. The Gospel of John tells us that when Jesus
looks upon the mass of people he turns to Philip and asks, "Where are we
to buy bread for these people to eat?"
Now Philip had been at this disciple thing for a while. He probably had some idea how Jesus worked
with miracles and all. I wonder if
Philip might have known the “right” answer to Jesus’ question - something along
the lines of, “I don’t know where to buy enough bread, Jesus. Why don’t we offer what we have and trust
that God will work it out?” Instead,
though, whether Philip knows what the right answer is or not, he clearly cannot
help himself. His focus is on the
overwhelming need in front of him so he responds, "Six months' wages would
not buy enough bread for each of them to get a little." Then Andrew jumps in with his own answer,
"There is a boy here who has five barley loaves and two fish.” Now if Andrew had just stopped here it would
have been a win. But he doesn’t, he
continues, “But what are they among so many people?" Both speak from a glass-half-empty point of
view, a sense of scarcity - that there just isn’t enough, in this case, not
enough money or food to meet the need.
But Jesus doesn’t
lecture. Rather he shows rather than
tells. After everyone is seated Jesus
takes the seemingly meager offering of the boy’s bread and fish, gives thanks,
and passes it out. 5,000 people eat to
the point that not only are their stomachs are full, but there are leftovers to
boot. Yet as amazing as this event is,
it is more than just a miracle story that we are supposed to “ooh” and “aah”
over from the sidelines. There’s more
going on here than just a feeding to behold.
At the heart of this story, Jesus is trying to shift the disciples - and
us - from one way of seeing and experiencing the world to another - from what
feels like a natural view of scarcity to a truer vision of God’s abundance.
Because what
lasts from this miraculous feeding is not the full stomachs but the good news
that in Christ and with Christ there is always enough. In fact, there’s more than enough. But I don’t think that I mean that all the
problems of scarcity in our world can be solved by simply lifting our hands to
the sky and whatever we need, God will make magically appear. What I am saying, though, is that divine
abundance is seen and known in our lives and in the world when we offer
whatever we have, no matter how meager, for God’s purposes. Take note - in our gospel story this morning
Jesus doesn’t make something out of nothing.
He uses what’s offered. Without
the boy’s food, nothing happens. So
too, on many occasions, without the offering of our gifts, our resources,
ourselves, nothing happens. If we
operate with a sense of scarcity, nothing happens, and the flow of God’s grace
in our lives is constricted. But if we
are willing to take what might feel like a risk and trust in God’s abundance,
giving thanks for whatever we have, God will take it, no matter how small, and
turn it into something we can share. For
God says to us over and over again, “Just give me what you have and let me
worry about the distribution issues.”
So is the glass
half full - does God’s abundance really abound?
Or is the glass half empty - that as nice as it sounds, there’s just not
be enough to go around? It’s one thing
to know the right answer and another thing to be able to live it especially in
a world that’s constantly sending out messages of fear and insecurity. How then can our minds, hearts, and spirits
let go of a sense of scarcity and operate from a place of boundless mercy and
grace?
Honestly it’s a
challenge. It was for Jesus’ disciples
long ago and it is for us today. Our
only hope is constant, sustained conversion.
I mean that’s why we come here Sunday after Sunday, isn’t it? To be refreshed and renewed in a love, a
grace, an abundance that we already know, but want to know, need to know, more
fully and deeply in our lives? It’s the
ongoing personal experience of the unconditional, unearned, boundless love of
God has the power to transform us. Our
reading from Ephesians calls it being “rooted and grounded in love.” And the writer goes on, “I pray that you may
have the power to comprehend, with all the saints, what is the breadth and
length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ that surpasses
knowledge, so that you may be filled with all the fullness of God.”
God is always
opening her life, his life up to us. And
being filled with that fullness of God, that divine abundance, was Jesus’ way
of being in this world. And he wants it
to be our way as well. So let me ask
you, what would you do if the fear of scarcity didn’t hold you back? What is you knew there was enough - enough
love, enough resources, enough opportunities, enough hope - what might you be
willing to offer to God to share? What
would your life look like if you lived with a sense of God’s abundance? I mean, that what God wants for you and for
everyone - to know abundant life.
Because it’s really not about the glass being half full or empty. Rather it’s trusting that with God the glass
will always be refilled.
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