Thousands of people were following Jesus to hear him preach, but thousands of poeple bring there own problems. They might not get tired, sick, or weary, but eventually they always get hungry.
With this background we begin with the reading of Mark 6:35-37
By this time it was late in the day, so his disciples came to him. “This is a remote place,” they said, “and it’s already very late. Send the people away so they can go to the surrounding countryside and villages and buy themselves something to eat.” But he answered, “You give them something to eat.” They said to him, “That would take eight months of a man’s wages! Are we to go and spend that much on bread and give it to them to eat?”
In the middle of nowhere, a remote place, how do you feed more than 5,000 people? The disciples have a suggestion.
Send the people away. It doesn’t have to be our problem, they think. Let them buy something for themselves. Actually, I get it. There seems to be no other solution.
But Jesus has another idea. He tells the disciples, “You give them something to eat.”
Do you see the cycle?
They say, Let them go somewhere to eat. In other words, let’s duck this problem.
Jesus said, “No, You handle it.”
There are a two great lessons to learn from this story.
#1. Handle your problems.
If you ignore them, they won’t go away. They will get bigger.
I once knew a man who would, when a problem arose, would retreat into his bedroom until the problem went away. You may have some form of that yourself. They #1 way of hiding is to retreat into tomorrow. Tomorrow I will handle it. Then tomorrow there will be another tomorrow. Your may think the problem goes away because it seems to settle down, but unhandled, unresolved problems are usually still lingering just beneath the surface of life.
#2. God always has a plan, even if you don’t know it.
“You give them something to eat” must have seemed ridiculous to them. They didn’t have enough resources, or so it seemed to them. The only ridiculous thing was for the disciples not to understand that when Jesus told them to do something, he would always provide the resources for them to do it.
God still works in that way. Once you know what God wants them just do it. He will help!
Lonnie Davis