Compassion and care for those who stay with Jesus

Sermon for Trinity 7

Romans 6:19-23  +  Mark 8:1-9

In today’s Epistle, you heard the apostle Paul talking about sin and grace. Sin characterizes the life of all men by nature. Sin characterized the life of all Christians before we became Christians. Sin. Lawlessness. Unrighteousness. Shameful thoughts, words, and deeds, leading to more shameful thoughts, words, and deeds. It’s the worst kind of slavery, because those who live for unrighteousness are trapped in sin and shamefulness that finally leads to death, both temporal and eternal. The wages of sin is death. But you have been called away from that, called to repentance, and Baptism, and faith in Christ Jesus, called to serve as slaves of righteousness, slaves of the God of grace, in which is the only true freedom. Under grace, we live each day under the umbrella of God’s forgiveness, where we’re also taught to leave sin and shamefulness behind, to live according to the truth, to live according to love (as God, who is love, defines love). Under grace, eternal life isn’t earned—not by us, anyway. It’s given away! It’s a gift! The gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus, our Lord.

It’s all grace. It’s all gift that we see in today’s Gospel of the feeding of the 4,000. In this text, Jesus isn’t dealing with sin. He’s simply dishing out grace, free gifts, refreshment in the desert, compassion and care for those who had left their everyday lives behind for a few days to stay with Jesus. And that’s what you can count on, too. Compassion and care for those who have turned away from sin so that they might stay with Jesus.

The feeding of the five thousand had already taken place some time before today’s account. There were about 4,000 people there in the desert, in the wilderness with Jesus. They had followed Him for three days around the Sea of Galilee to this place in the middle of nowhere, leaving homes and jobs behind in order to learn from Jesus, who, as Matthew tells us, had healed many of their diseases. Matthew also tells us that the people responded well to those miracles. They “glorified the God of Israel,” which was exactly the point of all those miracles, that the recipients of God’s grace in Christ might glorify God for sending Jesus to them, and that they might eventually recognize Jesus as the Son of God and their Savior from sin and death.

Before dismissing the crowds so that He could move on from there, Jesus looked out at these people who had followed Him, sinners, all of them, but sinners who had listened to Him, who had glorified God because of Him, sinners who had come to trust in Him. And how did He view these people, who now, after three days, had no more food with them? Jesus called his disciples to him and said to them, “I have compassion on the multitude, because they have already stayed with me for three days, and they have nothing to eat. And if I send them away to their homes without eating, they will faint along the way, for some of them have come a long distance.”

Was Jesus unaware of the sins these people had committed in the past? Was He unaware of their sinful nature that still clung to them, that they were still imperfect, weak, and flawed because of that sinful nature? Obviously not. Jesus knows all things. He knows what is in a man, as John says in his Gospel. But grace means that God still wants those people to be with Him and to have eternal life. Grace means that God did what had to be done for that to happen, namely, He gave (or, at this point, would give) His Son into death for their sins. And now, God views those who stay with His Son Jesus, not with anger, not with disappointment, but with compassion.

Those people stayed with Jesus in a much different way than the Israelites “stayed with Moses” as they were leaving Egypt. After the mighty deeds God had done for them through Moses, it only took three days for them to start whining and complaining about the lack of provisions there in the desert. First it was a lack of water, which God miraculously provided for them. And then, a little while later, “What are we supposed to eat out here in the wilderness? You brought us out here to starve us to death, didn’t you? It would have been better if we had stayed as slaves in Egypt!” Those people longed for their former slavery, and it didn’t end up well for them. That whole generation died in the wilderness because, while they stayed with Moses physically, they didn’t stay with God in their hearts.

Many people are like that. Most don’t become Christians at all. Some do, but still long for their former lives as slaves to sin. Their hearts aren’t actually with God. “God owes me,” they think. “He owes me for the good I’ve done. He owes me for coming to church. He owes me for the simple fact that I exist. I have a right to be provided for! I have a right to a good life on earth, a right to food, a right to health, a right to wealth. And if I don’t get it, I’ll show God! I just won’t believe in Him anymore! Then what’ll He do?” Don’t imitate such people! Instead, imitate the crowd in our Gospel who simply stayed with Jesus and glorified God for Him. They didn’t even notice that they didn’t have food at the moment.

But Jesus did. And that’s the same Jesus who has called you to follow Him throughout your life, to turn away from sin each day, to live under His grace, and to live for righteousness. His heart always goes out to His people. And how could it be otherwise? He has called us members of His own body. As Paul pointed out to the Ephesians, For no one ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it, just as the Lord does the church. For we are members of His body, of His flesh and of His bones.

But it goes beyond loving His members, cherishing His members, having compassion for His members. There is tangible care there as well.

When Jesus told His disciples about His compassion for the multitudes over their lack of food, the disciples immediately despaired. Where could anyone get bread to satisfy these people here in the wilderness? Why didn’t they remember the feeding of the five thousand? Why didn’t they just turn to Jesus to provide the solution to the problem He had raised? As it turns out, they often forgot. They often missed the point. They were often slow to learn. Aren’t you glad Jesus chose flawed men like that to be His disciples and to spread the Gospel throughout the world, to sit with Him at His right hand and at His left in His kingdom? God wants us to understand that there’s hope for us, too!

As it was, Jesus used those men to “help” Him with this miracle, even as He would use them to “help” Him with the building of the Church. It was Jesus’ power alone that performed the miracle, that created the gifts, but He used the hands of these men to distribute the gifts. He took the seven loaves of bread they had with them and the few little fish they had. He gave thanks to God the Father for these little gifts. And then He multiplied them into such abundance that there were still seven large baskets of leftover pieces after all the people had eaten. But, again, the people didn’t eat directly from the hand of Jesus. He gave the food to His disciples, who then passed it on to the crowds.

That was a direct pattern for the Lord’s Supper, where ministers take bread and wine, in Jesus’ name, bless them, and distribute them to God’s people, along with the very body and blood of Jesus, given and shed for the forgiveness of sins.

It’s a semi-direct pattern for how Jesus cares for His Church in general through the flawed men He has called to shepherd His people, calling on these men to give out, at the proper time, the spiritual food, the Law and the Gospel, the counsel and the encouragement that each one needs.

And then there’s the special care that God provides for His people who have stayed with Him in every way that we need, seeing to it that all things work together for good to those who love Him. That doesn’t mean we’ll have it easy. It doesn’t mean we’ll have a comfortable life. It does mean that God will use all things in heaven and earth as His ministers to distribute His gifts to His people, to get us through this life with our souls and our salvation intact.

Since our Lord, our Savior, the Head of the body that is the Church, has this kind of compassion and care for His members, you’re free to move on. Move on from worrying about earthly needs. Move on from being focused on earthly needs. Instead of slaving away for your meals, instead of slaving away to improve your earthly life, and certainly instead of slaving away to serve sin, do as Paul told the Roman Christians to do: Spend your time offering your bodies as slaves to righteousness, to the things God has commanded. Spend your time being imitators of God, as dearly loved children. You are dearly loved by God, and that’s what He wants you to see in today’s Gospel, so that you can say and know with the Psalmist, Surely goodness and mercy will follow me all the days of my life, and I will dwell in the house of the Lord forever. Amen.