Recently, I came across this
list of the top ten things you never hear in church.
10. Hey – it’s my turn to sit in the front row!
9. Pastor,
I was so enthralled, I never noticed your sermon ran 25 minutes over time.
8. Personally,
I find witnessing much more enjoyable than golf.
7. How
long is the waiting list to serve on session?
6. I’ll
be the permanent nursery volunteer.
5. Isn’t
it great to have the children running around the church?
4. I
LOVE it when we sing songs I’ve never heard before!
3. Since
we’re all here, let’s start the service early.
2. Pastor,
we’d like to send you to this Bible seminar in the Bahamas.
1. Nothing
inspires me and strengthens my commitment like our annual stewardship drive![1]
We always hear a few groans
when stewardship time comes around. It seems, to many folks, like a necessary
evil. We wish we didn’t have to sully ourselves with this distasteful topic of
money, but, alas, we do. If we want to pay the bills, we do.
If we want to do any
ministry, we do. If we want to do any mission, we do.
If we want to be the
church, we do. So, let’s talk about it.
A pastor stood before her
congregation and said, “I have some good news and some bad news. The good news
is that the church has all the money it needs.” Everyone cheered in great
relief. Then the pastor said, “The bad news is that it’s still in your
wallets.” Stewardship Sunday is one of those days when the church has the
opportunity to really see clearly that the church does not consist of
buildings, denominational logos or anything else, as much as the church is all
of us. Look around you, the folks sitting beside you, in front of you and
behind you; when you think of church, this is what it is.
The story we read today is
a familiar favorite – the feeding of the 5,000. This is a story that appears in
all four of the gospels, something that is noteworthy. The notion of the
abundance of God’s provision is so central to the gospel message, so crucial to
our faith, each one of the gospel writers made sure to include it. In fact,
Mark included it twice. Really.
Jesus and his disciples
have been traveling and teaching and their following has been growing. Shortly
before this, Jesus has sent out his disciples to travel the countryside, without him, to spread the message far and wide. They return to him,
feeling high on their success. But Jesus sees that they need to be brought back
to their center of gravity, so he leads them to a boat, to go and have some quiet
time to themselves.
But the quiet doesn’t last
for long. The hungry crowds, hungry for the message, follow them, they will not
leave them alone. So, the time they had in the boat will have to be enough to
refresh them, as they went ashore and continued teaching these sheep in need of
a shepherd.
The time grows late and the
disciples remind Jesus that he will need to let the people go so they can go
find something to eat. I suspect the disciples are as thoughtful as they are
because they, themselves, want to go get something to eat. But Jesus says to
them something shocking: You give them something to eat.
These people don’t need to
go away. You feed them. Well, his disciples balk, as you would expect. There
are thousands and thousands of people here. The text says there were 5,000 men,
so this would almost certainly mean that there were also thousands of women and
children. I’ve been to some large banquets, but never anything like this.
These disciples haven’t a
clue as to how they are supposed to take care of thousands of people, and I can
sympathize with their feelings. They have never been asked to do something like
this before and they don’t know how to begin. So Jesus helps them out. He says,
“How much do you have? Go and see.”
Go and see. Take stock of
your resources. Look in every corner and find out how much there is to work
with. Go and see; you will probably be surprised.
Initially they found five
loaves of bread and two fish. But as they went about the process of feeding the
crowd, it is quite clear that much more food became available. The story
doesn’t tell us exactly where it came from and how it happened, but we know
that much, much more was “found,” because many thousands of people were fed and
satisfied, and there were 12 baskets of crumbs left over.
Let’s consider this miracle
for a moment. We generally assume that Jesus created this abundance of food out
of thin air, because … well, because he’s Jesus. But look at what else was
going on.
We shouldn’t ignore the
fact that Jesus put this task in the hands of his disciples. If he was
intending to produce tons of bread out of thin air, why not just do it? Why
enlist the disciples to take over the job? If, on the other hand, he wanted to
create a different kind of miracle, a miracle of generosity and compassion and
trust, this was a way to do it.
Jesus said to his disciples
you are responsible for this. Go and see what you have to work with.
Go and see.
A story has been told about
Tony Campolo, a very well-known and highly regarded Baptist pastor, writer,
speaker. He was invited to speak to a Christian women’s organization. There
were about 300 women there. The president of the organization got up to make
some remarks, and before she introduced Tony she read aloud a letter from a
missionary. The missionary wrote about an emergency situation, and said they
needed about $4000 to address this problem. Everyone was very moved by the
letter. The president turned to Tony and said, “We need to pray that God will
provide the resources to meet this need. Brother Campolo, will you please pray
for us?
Tony said, no, he would
not. Now, Tony Campolo is known for being blunt even to the point of being
offensive (as all good preachers should be!); even knowing that, these women
were shocked. The president said, “I beg your pardon?” He said, “I won’t pray
for that. I believe that God has already provided the resources and that all we
need to do is give. Here’s what I will do. I’m going to step up to this table
and give every bit of cash I have in my pockets. And if you all do the same
thing, well, I think we will see that God has already provided the resources.
The president laughed
lightly and said, “Okay, I think we get the point. You want to teach us that we
should give sacrificially.” But Tony said, “No, I’m trying to teach you that
God has already provided for this missionary. All we need to do is give it.” He
had $15 dollars on him, so he put that down on the table and deliberately
looked at the president. Hesitantly, she opened her purse and took out the $40
she had inside and placed it on the table. Then, one by one, the women in the
room all came up and put their money on the table. When the money was all
counted, there was more than $4000.
Tony said, “God, who always
supplies our needs, had already provided for the needs of this missionary. The
only problem was we were keeping it for ourselves. Now, we’ll pray; let’s say a
prayer of thanks to God for his provision.”
Go and see what you have.
Go and see what God has already provided. Go and see and give.
Today we will present our
pledges for next year; we will thank God for God’s faithful provision and we
will ask God to bless these pledges and all the gifts we bring. Your Stewardship
Team has asked you to consider increasing your pledge by 5% over last year.
Each year, since I have been your pastor, we have asked you to consider
increasing your pledge. Why? Because we can never rest on our good deeds, but
always ask ourselves, “What has God provided? What do I have to share?”
Some of us will increase
our pledge this year by 5%; some will increase it by a greater amount, some a
little less. Others will not change the amount of their pledge, and some may
decrease their pledge. Each of us is simply asked to go and see what we are
able to give. There is no shame in doing what you are able to do, whatever that
is.
Each year since I have been
your pastor, Kim and I have searched ourselves and asked what we can give.
Knowing each year that it would be impossible for us to outdo God in our
generosity, we have increased our pledge by 10% or more. This is what we have
been able to do. Some are not able to do that, but some are able to do more
than that. It is for each one of us to go and see what God has provided for us
to give.
You have all heard about
that beloved church member, Someone Else? Someone Else has been relied upon for
many, many years to step up and do what is necessary when others of us don’t
want to do it – to speak up when others were afraid to, to fill the need when
others didn’t care to. Dear, dear Someone Else. But Someone Else will not be
with us forever, and we must learn to step up in place of Someone Else.
The disciples out there in
the wilderness with Jesus and thousands of hungry people were hoping that
Someone Else would take care of things. But Jesus said to them, “You do it.”
And then, “Go and see what you have.”
Let us be thankful today
for the generous way God has provided for us. And let us, each one of us, give
in accordance with the blessings we have received.
Photo Credit: By marya from San Luis Obispo, USA - day in the life: lunch money, CC BY 2.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=6052794
[1]
This, and other stories shared today, come to you courtesy of the internet,
preacher’s best friend.
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