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[ Silence ] >> Speak now to our hearts the word of hope, of truth, of faith in life. Amen.

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And when they had eaten their fill, Jesus told his disciples, "Gather up the fragments left over, that nothing may be lost." [music] with fragments from the five barley loaves

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left by those who had eaten. When the people saw the sign which he had done, they said, "This is indeed the prophet who has come into the world." Twelve baskets full. Twelve baskets full.

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The miracle of the feeding of the 5,000 occurs when Jesus is nearing the close of a busy day in his ministry, A day that had been filled with many unscheduled appointments. The crowd had constantly increased. Jesus was pressed by the clamor of the crowd.

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wanted to hear his teaching and to benefit from his healing. Those who were in that company had taken much of the energies of the Master, so much so that Jesus finds it necessary to slip away from the multitude.

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He withdraws from the crowd in order that he might be alone. There are times when we need to be all by ourselves. times when we need to be in solitude, times when we need to withdraw

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in order to secure strength for resuming our tasks. There are times when it is necessary to withdraw in order to avoid conflict. Jesus withdraws to avoid a head-on collision with the religious authorities because the time of the final conflict has not yet come. Now when the crowd discovers that Jesus has slipped away,

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He has entered a boat and traveled to the other side of the Sea of Galilee, some four or five miles, they follow Him. The crowd follows him on foot, journeying about nine miles around the top of the lake.

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And they meet Jesus on the other side, and they remain with him until very late in the evening. The people are hungry. They are in a desert place. They have no stores open, no bakery nearby. They are far removed from commercial activities. And the people are hungry and tired. Now those are two things that when you put them together, they have a rather

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strong effect on our lives. It's bad enough to be hungry. But when you are both tired and hungry. Now that is double jeopardy. So here they are. They have followed him, they are tired, and they are hungry. And this is sort of an emergency situation. If you had anyone to come to dinner that you didn't expect. And sometimes you just sat there hoping that

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they would go and they remained. I've had that experience. I think I may have told you earlier in our life, married life, when we had bought just two pork chops, one from our wife and one for myself and I had a good friend to come and he was expecting I guess to have dinner and we only had two pork chops. So we tried to wait until he

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left. And that's the way it is many times when an emergency comes upon us, an emergency situation for which we are not prepared. We try to find some way to escape, to get around it without actually dealing with it. This is an emergency and one of the Gospels, well the other Gospels, this text is taken from the Gospel of John,

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the Synoptic Gospels give us a little more light on the situation. Because the disciples go to Jesus. They go to Him and they give Him some advice. They say, "Now Lord, you know, it's late and the crowd is dead. Just dismiss them. Pronounce the benediction and let the crowd go home." That was their solution. That's often our solution. You know, we often

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would not actually deal with the situation, meet it head on. But this is not the way of the Master. Jesus has compassion on the crowd and he turns to one of his disciples, Philip. And no doubt he selected Philip because they were in the area of Bethsaida. And Philip was from that area and so since Philip was from that area he was well acquainted with

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the possibilities of gaining food in that area. And so Jesus asked Philip, he says, "Philip, where may we go to buy bread?" That's the question he asks. And the Bible tells us that he asks Philip this question not because he did not know what he was going to do. The Bible says Jesus already knew what he was going to do, but he asked this in order to

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test Philip. And that's the way a teacher does many times. Jesus is the teacher, Philip is the student, and so he asks Philip the question in order to test him, in order to test his faith in that circumstance. Where shall we go to buy bread? That's the examination question. And Philip says, "Well, it would take far more money to feed this crowd than

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we've got. We don't have very much in the treasury. Our treasury has just a small amount in it. We couldn't begin to feed this crowd. Philip begins to sort of computerize what it would take. In other words, according to the standards of that day, it would take six months' pay in order to feed that crowd. Not really feed them, but just for them to get

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a bite. And this is really what Jesus asked Philip. He asked him where could they get bread and Philip begins to tell him how much it would cost to feed the crowd. So the real examination of his faith that the teacher had sort of asked the question in order to receive an answer to, Philip flunked. He didn't pass the test. So Andrew comes, another disciple,

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So, Andrew comes, another disciple, and Andrew has already surveyed the crowd and he finds there a youngster that has five barley loaves and two fish. But Andrew said that's all the food we have, very limited food supply available. But what is this?

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Among so many people, more than 5,000 are gathered here and all the food we can find in this desert place. Five barley loaves and two fish. is so little and how can such a little bit really serve such a huge crowd? Well, Jesus

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says bring it to me. Bring it to me. Although your your resources are meager, although you only have a little and we have a great task before us, what you have

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bring that to me. May not be very much, but bring it to me. And they bring it to Jesus and he

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lifts up his heart, so to speak, in prayer to the Father. And after the prayer of thanksgiving, there is the breaking of bread. And he says to his disciples to have the men to sit down.

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They sat down in companies. Men in that day were regarded as the head of the families. So the men are told to sit down. There's an orderly arrangement.

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They had to sit down. They sit down on the grass. And the disciples come to Jesus and they receive the food from Jesus

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and they go forth and they serve the crowd. Everybody has a place that they may sit, so to speak, at the table. If you may think of the table that they have,

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the grass, sort of like a picnic, all seated on the grass. But there's place for everybody. The choir's just sung, "There's Room at the Cross."

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No matter who was in that crowd, all ages, men, women, children, a place for everybody. And no matter how tired and how hungry you are, gather yourselves together, sit down in companies.

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There's a place for everybody. You know, in life so often we feel that there's not a place for us. Sometimes we feel that we get pushed back.

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I remember I used to feel at home as a little boy, my grandmother, whenever company came to eat, we always had to wait and eat in the kitchen. And you know, sometimes they ate it all up, you know,

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and they'd have to prepare something else for us, and we'd be quite hungry. And sometimes life is like that. It seems that the others that receive preferential treatment and sometimes even in the family,

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we may feel that we are pushed back. And life seems to give what it has to offer to us after so long a time. We have to eat in the kitchen. And sometimes when we had chicken and the preacher came and they ate up all the choice pieces

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of the chicken we always would be left with the neck and the feet. The neck and the feet. That's why I have never liked chicken neck, chicken feet since that time. The neck and the feet. And yet as Jesus has them to sit down, there's a place for everyone. They all sit down, the disciples receive from the master and they deliver to the people. He took those

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limited human resources that were available and being blessed of God they are distributed the crowd. Well, each person that sits at the table is fed and they have enough. Enough. They have enough. There needs to satisfy everything that they need is provided. Every person who sits at the table and the The gospel serves the need of everybody.

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Some of us may have different problems, some of us have different backgrounds, but all of us may sit at the table and receive that food that God has prepared because there is that nourishment in that food that meets every need that every person may have. That's the command and so they all eat and they are all filled.

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They are all filled. They are satisfied. But the thing I want to talk about a little more here is that when they had all had their needs satisfied, The writer here tells us that there were 12 baskets full gathered because Jesus said to them, "Now go and gather up the fragments."

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Gather up what's left. Gather up the scraps. The leftovers. Gather that up.

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And they gathered up the leftovers and they had 12 baskets full. Let nothing be lost. Not be wasteful. all the needs satisfied, and twelve baskets full left.

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We're told that the Jewish people had the practice of carrying a basket in which they would have enough food for a day's journey. So each of these disciples had his basket. And no doubt, that basket were empty.

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But when that blessing occurred, when that miracle was performed, not only did every person, some 5,000 and more, have needs satisfied, but there is enough left that every disciple, those who are serving, can gather up and have not only each basket full after having had every

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person's needs met. They couldn't forget that. That here with Jesus that which was so little, that which was so insignificant had been taken and blessed by His Spirit and in being blessed by His Spirit not only did the The crowd receives satisfaction, but there is enough left. Oh, there is enough. God has enough salvation.

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God has enough, not only of his grace, enough of his love. God has enough of his love so that every child can get all that he needs, and there's enough left over.

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There's enough left over for everyone else. God has enough to supply all of our needs. and God can take such a little and do so much with it. He can take just a little faith, just a little faith that you have in Him. It may be just a little, but if it's genuine faith, if you trust in Him, God can take that faith and He can use that faith in your life so that He can remove mountains that may be before you. just a little. That widow that was visited by Elijah, she only had a little

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oil, but when she placed her faith in the word of the Prophet and did what the Prophet said, she found that there was more oil there, more oil each time she went back when she had just a little meal in the barrel when he said prepare the first cake for me and when she obeyed that word and she went back and she

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found that there was more than more than that somehow when we give ourselves to the Word of God to doing what God says and we become channels of his grace God God blesses our lives, demagnifies our influence for good so that we find ourselves being lifted above ourselves and doing those things that we never dreamed we could do. Twelve baskets

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full. Each disciple has a basket that he could carry with him. Twelve baskets full. He not only had a full stomach, but he had enough in the basket to give some to somebody else. And that's the way it ought to be with our faith and our religion. We ought not have to be so selfish that we only have enough for ourselves. It's not enough for us to be

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satisfied with our religious experiences, but we ought to have the overflow in our lives that would make us be possessed with a divine discontent. We go forth to share it with someone else. We ought to have not only the word of God in our lives,

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but we ought to be able to carry that word to someone else. And so there is that in that basket that can be carried. And there is that spirit within them that carries them and strengthens them all along the way.

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There is that bread, bread enough and to spare. That's what God does. What are your needs today? Well, you may be tired.

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You may be weary of the struggle of life. You may have been on this journey a long time and it's evening in your life. It's always evening when we think of our relationship

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to Jesus Christ. we are that eschatological community. It's even time, late in the evening. And so Jesus provides us with that last meal,

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the last meal, that supper time. You don't need to eat anymore after that. That's the last meal. And whatever you need, everything is right there

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in that meal that'll carry you through the night. And we find ourselves in the night right now. Sometimes there are difficulties, there are dangers, there are hidden fears, but somehow if God has fed us

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at his table, we can go through the night. - Yes, sir. - Can go through the night. Bread, yes, bread enough and to spare.

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- Yes, sir. - Don't have to worry about how we're going to make it. God has provided bread enough and to spare. Oh, look at the record, if you will,

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And you'll see those children as they come out of Egyptian bondage, and as they cross the Red Sea, and as they begin that journey in the wilderness, and they cry out for bread, and Moses goes to God, and God rains down manna each day, and said, "All you have to do is go out and gather it, so there'll be enough for every day.

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And on the sixth day, there'll be twice as much so that you won't have to worry about the seventh day. You can get all you need on the sixth day to carry you through the seventh day. And he says, "No, no, no, no, no, no.

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Don't worry about, don't worry about each day because I'm going to provide every day. You'll have enough to carry you through that day." So if you try to get more than you need, it won't keep. You know what you do when you try to get bread and keep it too long?

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You know what happens to it. It molds. It just won't keep. It becomes stale.

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And God wants our lives somehow to be so rich in Him that every day of our lives will be a fresh experience. For His grace is new every morning. Bread enough and to spare.

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miracle that occurs in a desert place at an odd time under impossible circumstances God provides enough and to spare brain in a desert place in the midst of a world where there seems to be mountains of meaninglessness.

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God provides meaning in such a world. In a world of unbelief, God provides belief, faith in such a world. God gives us what we need, bread to eat,

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and to spare. Bread of heaven, bread of heaven. "Feed me till I want no more." And the word comes back,

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"There's bread enough and to spare." Well, maybe some of us have been in a far country. Maybe we know something about what it means to be in a strange place and to be tired, to be hungry.

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The prodigal son knew what it was like. And he found himself down there in a pig pen. But when he came to himself, he realized one thing, that in my father's house, there's bread.

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In my father's house, there is a banquet prepared for me that I can enjoy life, that I can live life to the full. There's bread enough, and to spare. So he goes home, and when he gets home,

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the father sees him afar off. And the father runs and embraces the son. And as they embrace themselves, then the father says to the servants, "Kill the fetid bastard." "Have a banquet for this boy, for my boy was lost, but now he's found!"

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And that son is joyful because he discovers that which has come to him in the moment of crisis, and in his father's house, has bred enough. And where are the bachelors degrees? Where are the bachelors degrees?

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I'm gonna ask you what kind of degree. Do you have a degree? I'm talking about have you eaten out of a spiritual school? Have you had a holy sacrifice, so to speak, in your life?

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Have you somehow feasted on the Word of God? Yes or no? Sometimes nobody else is going to have to really feast on the Word of God. We don't have bread in use, and students just walk

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through the high seas of life. And then I would like to ask the question, do we have some bread in the basket? Because we don't want charity.

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We don't want charity! I would like to have some bread in our basket! And we are working to make the charity safe right now. Well, a basket is good.

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Every disciple has his basket. Yes, sir. Not only does he eat as a form of charitable, but he has bread.

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[INAUDIBLE] Hold me with my power. We invite you to come this morning. As we extend the invitation to accept Jesus Christ

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as your Lord and Savior, and we invite you to unite with the family of God here at Eastern where we can all come together at the Father's table. We invite you to come now as we extend the privilege of church

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to the Spirit-Sensed Church. [inaudible] [MUSIC] [ Music ]

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[MUSIC] ♪ I am weaker, God mighty ♪ ♪ Hold me with a powerful hand ♪ ♪ Spread my family ♪

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♪ Meet me still I want no more ♪ ♪ Spread my family ♪ [Music] ♪ We feel thy warmth, O Lord ♪

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♪ O, midnight, thou great star-spangled ♪ ♪ Whence the healing waters flow ♪ ♪ Let the fire be loud and clear ♪ ♪ In the open air, it is true ♪

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♪ Strongly livered ♪ ♪ He has still the strength and the cheer ♪ ♪ Strongly libered ♪ ♪ He has still the strength and the cheer ♪

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[MUSIC] [MUSIC] ♪ Let me through the ♪ ♪ Sweating blood ♪

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♪ Let me sleep on ♪ ♪ In the sun ♪ ♪ Strong the praises ♪ ♪ I will ever give ♪

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to me. All the praises I will ever give to thee.

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[ Applause ] >> We come now to commune together at the Lord's table. Jesus provides Himself as the food, His body, His blood, are symbolic of that food that we need to make the journey.

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We need the strength of His Word. We need the wine of his spirit, his blood. And as we come to this table, we're told that first of all we should examine ourselves. Philip was asked an examination question,

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and this should be for us a time of confession, asking God's forgiveness. It is only through His forgiving love that we are privileged to sit at His table.

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May we bow our heads As Deacon Shirley Gray leads us in the communion prayer. [ Silence ] [ Silence ]