Words of Jesus Podcast - Incorporate Christianity into Life

Episode Date: April 14, 2023

It takes the revelation of the Spirit of God to understand the message of Jesus.  We tend to try and simplify; to segregate “church-life” from “real life.” This segregation leads to a lukewarm Christianity. Important matters are discussed and resolved when we spend time with one another. Proverbs 27:17“Iron sharpens iron; so a man sharpens the countenance of his friend.”***Ch. 36 - Jesus Feeds Five ThousandMatthew 14:13-23; Mark 6:30-46; Luke 9:10-17; John 6:5-15When the apostles, whom Jesus had sent forth to spread the word, returned, they told him all that they had done and taught.            Because so many people seeking Jesus were always coming to him and his disciples, giving them not even leisure to eat, Jesus said:            “Come ye yourselves apart into a desert place, and rest a while.”            They went with Jesus privately by ship to a quiet and unpopulated place in the neighborhood of the city of Bethsaida.            The people saw them going. Many followed and others, who guessed their destination, ran afoot out of their cities and arrived before Jesus and the disciples. About five thousand men, besides women and children, came to the desolate place.            Jesus, seeing them, as sheep without a shepherd, had compassion on them, and he healed their sick and began to teach them many things.            When the day neared its end, the twelve apostles came to Jesus and said:  “Send the multitude away, that they may go into the towns and country round about, and lodge, and get victuals; for we are here in a desert place.”           Jesus replied:            “They need not depart; give ye them to eat.”            Philip, the disciple, said:            “Two hundred pennyworth of bread is not sufficient for them, that every one of them may take a little.”            Another disciple, Andrew, Simon Peter’s brother, said:            “There is a lad here, which hath five barley loaves, and two small fishes. But what are they among so many?”            Jesus said:            “Bring them hither to me.”            Then he instructed his disciples to organize the crowd, saying:            “Make them sit down fifties in a company.”            Jesus took the five loaves and the two fishes, looked up to Heaven, and blessed them.He broke the bread and gave it and the fishes to his disciples to distribute among the multitude. Everyone ate and was filled.            When all had finished eating, Jesus said:            “Gather up the fragments that remain, that nothing be lost.”            Therefore they gathered the remaining fragments and, with what was left over, filled twelve baskets....

Think Red Ink Ministries presents The Words of Jesus series with Don C. Harris Hello my friends, I'm Don Harris of Think Red Ink Ministries. Our goal here is to reinforce Christianity with the wisdom and words of Jesus, which, incidentally, are recorded in your Bibles in red ink. Do you know what Jesus said, what Jesus did, and what he said to do? This series is based on the words of Jesus, his life, his friends, his ministry, and his relationship to his Father as recorded

in the four Gospels. Delving to mysteries that have been hidden, not from us but for us, in the words of Jesus. Well today we're going to deal with chapter 36 of our little book, The Words of Jesus, and this is the subject of Jesus Feeding the Five Thousand. When the apostles whom Jesus had sent forth to spread the word returned, they told him all that they had done and taught. Because so many people seeking Jesus were always coming to him and his disciples, giving them not even leisure time to eat, Jesus said,

Come ye yourselves apart into a desert place and rest a while. They went with Jesus privately by ship to a quiet and unpopulated place, the neighborhood of the city of Bethsaida. The people saw them going. Many followed, and others, who guessed their destination, ran afoot out of their cities and arrived before Jesus and the disciples.

About 5,000 men men besides women and children. They came to this desolate place. Jesus, seeing them as sheep without a shepherd, had compassion on them, and he healed their sick and began to teach them many things. When the day neared its end, the twelve apostles came to Jesus and said, Send the multitude away, that they may go into the towns and country, and round about and lodge and get vittles,

for we are here in a desert place. Jesus replied, They need not depart. Give ye them to eat. Philip the disciple said, Jesus replied, Simon Peter's brother, said, There's a lad here that has five barley loaves and two small fishes, but what are they among so many? Jesus said, Bring them hither to me. Then he instructed his disciples to organize the crowd, saying, Make them sit down in fifties in a company. Jesus took the five loaves and the two fishes,

looked up to heaven, and blessed them. He broke the bread and gave it and the fishes to his disciples to distribute among the multitude. Everyone ate and was filled. When all had finished, Jesus said, Gather ye up the fragments that remain, that nothing be lost. Therefore they gathered the remaining fragments, and what was left over filled twelve baskets. Then Then all had seen, when all had seen this miracle, they said, this is of a truth, that prophet which should come into the world. Thereupon Jesus, seeing that some among them wished to make him a king, straightway entered

the boat with his disciples and crossed to the other side when he was alone he went into a mountain to pray this is probably one of the most famous miracles that jesus ever performed it's probably one of the most well-known uh among even the you know the slightest of uh of familiarity with the Scriptures of Jesus feeding the 5,000 and subsequently the 3,000. And so it's kind of held its place as a marker in Jesus' ministry and is used in a lot of situations as a metaphor and it's preached on in so many different directions.

That a little bit becomes a lot when Jesus has it and that he cares about us and he cares about our little growling bellies and all these things, they're fine. However, I think that if we examine the words of Jesus here, which is what we do here, I think we can see within him a concern about the power, the authority, the thought pattern, the responsibility of his disciples. Now, by that I mean that the disciples had concern about the multitude, and he was telling Jesus, we need to send them where they can get what they need.

Jesus was making it very clear to them, or trying to, that we have what they need. And the only thing that you and I are going to have to do is to discover, one, what do we have to give them? And when we decide what we actually have to give them, there can be supernatural power applied to that and make it sufficient. And in this case and in the other case, it'll be sufficient and more than sufficient. I think that the understanding that we should have in the ministry as ministers, as Christians in general,

we should realize that there is an all-sufficiency in Christ that we need to be very much aware of and that we need to utilize on their behalf. I talk a lot about the insufficiency of man to handle everyday life. And it is a real concern. Because you see people whose lives are really, wow, they're just really a mess. And you want to help. And so you see, okay, in this particular case, you have the disciples saying, if we send them away,

then if they're away from us, they can find lodging and something to eat, a place to sleep, and these kind of things. The only thing that they're actually mentioning are the physical needs of the persons who have... You look at the fact of the matter. Let's see if we can put pants on this scripture just a minute. When we have 5,000 men beside women and children, when we have this many men, I assure you there were men there. I mean, agriculture was not an industry per se in those days.

Of course, there was such a thing as people making and selling food in the shambles and these kind of things. However, in most cases, if you didn't involve yourself in agriculture, the chances are you weren't going to eat the next day. Somebody had to gather. Somebody had to plant.

Somebody had to cultivate. Somebody had to water. That's the way these people essentially went to Publix or went to Safeway or whatever else we do today. In the time that they lived, if work in this area wasn't done, then they actually did without. So for us to gather, say, 5,000 people in downtown whatever city in order to have a little seminar or to have a little teaching convention or whatever,

for us to do that is hardly even a blip on our radar as far as interrupting our lives. But you have to understand that 5,000 people that would walk away from the daily tasks that were required for life was quite a thing indeed. It wasn't that the men all left and left their women and children at home to do the work. These are whole families that came. And so there was a lot of abandoned farms, if you will. They're not farms of course. That's their household. They're not farms, of course.

That's their household. That's the way they lived. But there were a lot of homes that were essentially abandoned to hear what Jesus had to say. And this was a concern. And it occurred to the disciples that, you know, this is not necessarily good. These people are going to be hungry, and they're going to faint on their way home.

We need to do something. Let's send them to the nearby town and, you know, let these people go. Now, this is not so uncommon. We do have an inordinate amount of concern about our well-being, about what we wear and what we eat and these kind of things that Jesus told us you really shouldn't be so involved and so concerned about these things that our Father knows you have need of these things and here he proves it. Now if you remember when Jesus was at the home of Mary and Martha and Lazarus, Martha was the kind

of person who tried to make sure that all areas of hospitality were covered. She wanted to make sure that everything was just so. Which, by the way, I really appreciate. I don't think that she was suffering from um you know uh in in the way we talk about things like this the unappreciated housewife um no no she was she was doing a wonderful thing now mary had a little bit different attitude mary was she was um i i, I don't want to be, I don't want to necessarily try to defend this statement.

If you don't agree, it's okay. But I happen to believe that Mary was a little more spiritual than Martha was. They both had, you know, these are all great characteristics. However, one was getting in front of the other, and it wasn't that Mary came to Jesus and said, you know, Martha's just way too busy. She needs to come and sit here and listen to what you have to say. But we do find that Martha was concerned that Mary was there

listening to what Jesus had to say, and she wasn't helping. Now, what is that? What is going on there? Well, when a person involves themselves in learning, sitting at the feet of Christ, you know, when Jesus says, learn of me, learn of me um i think that a lot of people read that that uh you know you know come to me and my burden is light and you know the the load that i carry is is is not that difficult i want you to learn of me i think that in our vernacular and and we translate, mentally translate what we read in King James, I think a lot of times we think that learn of me means to learn about me. But really, if you understand that

17th century Elizabethan English, you'll understand that Jesus was saying, you need to learn from me. Learn of me, and I need to be your teacher, which is absolutely foundational as far as our ministry is concerned and what we talk about. But Mary was trying to do that,

and Martha was concerned about it. I want you to see that it was not the other way around because when a person emphasizes the spiritual, they are in a different frame of mind than people who are emphasizing the physical. If you are involved, and it's not that one is wrong or one is right or one's better or one's worse. It's really not a matter of that.

It's just different. And, you know, it's not like, you know, what's best, daylight or dark? Well, it depends on what you're doing, doesn't it? You know, if you're trying to sleep, it's hard to do that out in the sun. You know, with the sun burning through your eyelids, it's hard to do that in the light sun. You know, with the sun burning through your eyelids, it's hard to do that in the light. So, you know, night's better. But if you're trying to work, then day's better.

It's not that one is bad and the other is good. It's not that one needs to be sought and the other neglected or refused or rejected in any way. We really need to back off on some of our attitudes about life, about learning, about our Christianity, about spiritual things. You have to understand that the spiritual complements the physical. The physical, in many cases, complements the spiritual.

Our physical existence Jesus using the the agricultural terms to explain spiritual principles They all should work together My father used to have a saying of Somebody being so heavenly minded. They're no earthly good this is very very true now you cannot say that about mary sitting at the feet of jesus and and we're gonna we're gonna cover that in a in a in a subsequent show uh so you know we'll we'll get there but i think that um in this particular situation where Jesus feeds the 5,000,

the disciples were in the Martha mode and Jesus was in the Mary mode. And when we are dealing with things spiritual, many times the physical, it might nudge us from time to time. It might tell us, you know, that we're physically tired or somehow fatigued in our spiritual pursuits or understanding of spiritual things, our Bible studies and our Bible reading times, our times of meditation and times of prayer. And the physical might nudge us from time to time,

but when we get in the center of the Martha mode, the spiritual starts to become almost unimportant. It's almost like we say to the Lord, you know, I got it from here. I can do this from here. But I encourage you to try to co-mingle these things because they belong together. The spiritual part of our life

is the essence of our physical life. The responsibility that we show on a daily basis to our physical life can very well translate over into our spiritual life and we need not separate these things I think this is one of the dangers of well I'm sure it was the Catholic influence that started the idea of coming to Mass on Sundays

and the priest standing before. These are all copies of ancient Israel. And I'm sure they had good intention that we should all go in and read our daily missals or whatever, catechisms or whatever, readings or whatever we need to do in order to be good Christian, Catholic, slash Christian, Catholic, I don't know. And we have developed an idea

that church needs to come out of the home, people need to come out of the home. People need to come out of the home and become a part of a church atmosphere. Now, nothing is necessarily bad of itself, but mankind does have a tendency to try to simplify things so that he can accomplish whatever it is he's trying to accomplish well if we can take our spiritual life and turn it into only one-seventh of our physical life many people are satisfied doing that because we live in a physical body we like being in control

we like you know handling things in our life. And the spiritual need not occupy any more than that one-seventh, I guess is the proper way of saying it, one-seventh of our week. So 52 times a year we go to our churches and we get our spiritual food. Look, I just want you to know that that is a recipe for lukewarm Christianity, ineffective Christianity. It's just, you know, you might say, well, it's better than nothing. I don't know that it is, to tell you the truth. I'm not really sure that it is better than nothing because it segregates.

It builds a wall between Sunday and Monday. And even if you're one who keeps the Sabbath day, look, you keep the Sabbath day seven days a week, you're destroying the Sabbath day and yourself. You just can't do that the things have purpose and they have place however if your spiritual life only consists of of you know these several hours and that's the that's the other problem isn't it because even people who keep uh sunday as the sabbath they don't even keep it as the sabbath uh it's like um you know if you if you get up and you go to church in the morning

you're done you're all finished even the catholics well i mean i'm not picking on catholics i mean they're i don't know that cath Catholics are any better or worse than any other organized religion denomination. But, you know, they make a way so that you can go to Mass on Saturday night and you're done. You don't have to go back. You know, it's fine. It counts, as they may say. And I'm really afraid that people who do go to church on Sunday and they feel like that they have done their duty. Listen, I dare you, I double dog dare you to find where going to church is some requirement

that you'll find in your scriptures. Church should be an outgrowth of the physical world, not the spiritual world. Our congregating together, perhaps on a weekly basis, perhaps it's on a Sabbath evening, perhaps, I mean, the feasts of the Lord that are ignored today are wonderful times for us all to get together and do very physical things. We have feast, we eat, we talk, we party, we play horseshoes, or we do whatever we want to do in these areas of fellowship, which are extremely important in our spiritual life. And there is just nothing better, absolutely nothing better than for a bunch

of god's people to come together and and and enjoy one another's company in a physical way and then have that spirit of god come and as as the quakers use a beautiful, wonderful term that I think has been long since forgotten, and I think it ought to be used today. And the Spirit of God come and cover a meeting. I don't know if you've ever been there or not. I don't know if you've ever experienced this or not. But it's a beautiful thing. It does not come because, well, it's time for the Spirit to cover us.

It doesn't come because, you know, we've for the Spirit to cover us. It doesn't come because, you know, we've all met here, and this is what time we always meet. What it does is, is it comes where there's that sense of unity and that sense of camaraderie. It's the sense of sameness that we all have. I get hungry. You get hungry. We all have the same physical needs. Well, let's use them to our advantage, shall we? I think that that fellowship is a very, very important part of our spiritual life. And to segregate, to separate the so-called spiritual into a particular day or into a particular act, I think is a mistake. Now, you know who's going to resent that time of covering? Who's going to resent

that time that perhaps the meal that was prepared hasn't been uh properly appreciated it's going to be the people who are in the center of that martha mode and uh the opposite i think you'll find that the opposite is almost never true so we need to have this time of spiritual now this is not necessarily on sunday not necessarily on the sabbath day i argue with people all the time they say oh i think we should worship god every day well i do too i do too but the the sabbath has nothing nothing in the world to do with worship he doesn't say thou shalt worship me one day in seven.

He doesn't say that at all. He says don't work on this day. Well, when you don't work, you know what starts to occur to you? Rest. It starts to happen to you. And it naturally flows into fellowship between friends, people of like mind. And when people like this get around

people start confiding in one another they start talking about certain things and then the spiritual part of mankind which has been nurtured by that time every day you spend before the lord people help one another iron starts to sharpen iron countenance of one man starts to sharpen iron. Countenance of one man starts to sharpen the countenance of another man. And it just happens. And in many cases, covered by the Spirit of the Lord, a physical thing like a dinner or like a game of horseshoes or whatever else. I'm just throwing stuff out here. But there have been many a spiritual question answered

over a game of checkers. Not necessarily just one guy that you happen to elevate above all the rest of them standing up and barking at you or even giving you a lovely PowerPoint presentation or whatever else. I mean, I'm all for teaching. I like teaching as long as it's kept, you know, in its proper compartment that Jesus Christ is our teacher,

that we're not just mouthing or mimicking or parroting what other people say. But these kind of things can be very, very good if we are balancing this Mary and Martha thing. I'm telling you that an organized, daily, weekly on time kind of a thing, you're just not going to find that in the scriptures.

You're just not going to find it. Matter of fact, as time goes on, we're going to talk about the kind of meeting that the scriptures talk about. There's a modern day idea, relatively modern idea of the way a meeting is supposed to take place that is laid out almost word for word perfectly in the scriptures. But I dare you to find your service in here. I dare you to find where they, you know, they all meet at a certain time and that they sing a song and they take up

an offering and they pray on time and that they do all these things in all these organized and scheduled and programmed manner. I'm just afraid that we're cheating ourselves here. And if we mentally push our spiritual empowerment off into one place in our life and it's not commingled with the rest of our life on a daily basis, you're going to find that your Christianity is very, very ineffectual. And I just think, I think that it's a mistake. I think that Jesus in this particular situation shows that we have a responsibility to tell people the truth. We have a responsibility to preach to them the gospel. But we also have a responsibility to see to it that their physical needs are met.

And if you'll do it this way, you're not going to just meet their needs. You're going to exceed their needs. I think it's just so clear in this story. All right, our time is gone for now. But I sure do appreciate you taking time to listen to the show. I'd love to hear from you. Would you do something for me? I'd appreciate you just taking the time as you walk by your computer to stop and write an email to don

at thinkredink.com. I'd love to hear about your comments. If you have questions about whatever, contact the station, find out our broadcast times, and stay with us. All right, time for us to go. We'll see you next time. Bye-bye. You've been listening to Don C. Harris of Think Red Ink Ministries. Email don at thinkredink.com. That's thinkredc.com. That's ThinkRedInc.com. Join us again for the next episode in the Words of Jesus series. you