Trinity Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.)

Sermons 

Title: "A Fish Story"

Text: John 6:1-15

who is to come into the world!"

People saw the miracle that Jesus performed,

and they believed in him.

They saw him feed five thousand people

with only five loaves and two fish,

and they recognized him for who and what he was.

Jesus fed a whole hungry crowd

with one kid’s lunch!

If I’d have been there,

I’d have believed in him, too!

But I wasn’t.

And I haven’t seen any really good miracles lately …

how about you?

And oh, how this world needs miracles.

We too have hungry crowds

that we don’t know what to do with.

And it’s not a few thousand people,

but a few billion!

We are compassionate people,

and it causes us pain, quite literally,

to see the pictures and hear the stories of starving children and adults …

of dead children and adults,

in the Sudan, in the streets of Brazil, in North Korea,

and even in our own country.

We are Christians …

we want to do something!

But we’re not sure what.

A miracle would sure be nice.

But I wonder if what we need these days

isn’t a different kind of miracle.

The feeding of the five thousand

was more than a simple act of feeding hungry people.

It was also a kind of "proof" to those people

that Jesus was who and what he said he was.

And it seems to me that we must do the same sort of thing.

In feeding the hungry,

we must "prove," in a sense,

that we are who we say we are.

That we are compassionate.

That we are Christians.

That we are followers of Jesus Christ,

who fed the hungry and had compassion on all who suffered.

In Jesus’ time,

a miracle such as feeding five thousand people

with five loaves and two fish

would certainly have been perceived as unusual.

If it weren’t,

they wouldn’t have bothered to write it down.

But it was by no means unbelievable,

or the people would not have responded as they did:

"This is indeed the prophet!"

Today, with our scientific mindset,

we find it difficult if not impossible

to believe that such things could happen.

Indeed, many of us have a hard time believing

that miracles happened "back then"!

You’ve no doubt heard plausible "explanations"

] of this and other miracles:

When the boy offered to share his lunch,

then everyone else decided they could

share their lunch with one another, too,

and so they all had enough to eat.

Voila! We’ve demythologized it.

A safe and reasonable explanation

that doesn’t interfere with our world view.

But if even we,

who profess to take the Bible seriously,

have a hard time believing that Jesus did miracles then,

how could we possibly expect to believe

that any miracle could happen now?

Even if it did happen,

we’d spend years of time and reams of paper

explaining it,

rather than accepting it, and believing.

And if that’s how we Christians would respond,

how can we expect anything better from anyone else?

No, we need a different kind of miracle.

Now, some of the greatest miracles I’ve seen in recent years,

that have dealt with feeding the hungry,

have come with the banding together of popular musicians

who hope to use their talents to benefit the hungry.

Truthfully, I did get sick of "We Are the World"

after hearing it for the five hundred twenty-third time …

but I must admit it was a huge success

in raising money for Ethiopia.

Millions of dollars for famine relief

were raised through those concert venues.

Now you and I both know

that most of these musicians, agents, entrepreneurs, etc.

are not even nominally Christian.

The same is probably also true for many of their fans

who sent money.

And yet, they are doing the Lord’s work.

And they may be doing it better than we are.

They are coming up with the miracles

that are needed right now.

You see, the problem is not

that there’s not enough land to grow food on.

At least, that’s not the problem yet.

The problem is that the food isn’t

where the hungry people are!

And that we can do something about.

Not always, to be sure;

sometimes, in a few instances,

a nation’s rulers keep the food from going to people

who are perceived as their enemies.

But aside from those cases,

w do have options for acting.

In many ways, all of them very indirect,

we keep food from going where it needs to go.

Our national government

buys up excess grain from farmers,

in order to help them out financially …

But too often, we dump the grain in silos

and leave it to rot,

rather than releasing it onto the market

and depressing prices.

Now I’m not arguing for or against farm subsidies.

I am saying that if we are going to spend all that money –

taxpayers’ money, your money and my money –

that it ought not to be wasted on rotting grain.

And speaking of grain,

do you have any idea how many tons of grain each year

go into making alcoholic beverages?

Or for that matter,

how many millions of acres of land,

in this country and others,

are used for growing tobacco?

Smoking and drinking are not

in and of themselves wrong.

But I wonder whether, at this point in history,

we aren’t indulging ourselves with luxuries

at the expense of our sisters and brothers

who lack even the necessities.

And another thing about grain:

How we Americans love our tender, grain-fed beef.

Especially us Texans!

But did you know

that it takes up to eighteen pounds of grain

to result in one pound of cow?

With the grain that it takes to make you a Quarter-Pounder,

you could have made four or five loaves of bread.

Coffee … the beverage that launches a million mornings …

is grown mainly in Central America.

It’s grown by peasants –

like Juan Valdez in the TV commercial –

on land that used to be their own,

but was expropriated by their government,

and rented back to them.

They are required to grow coffee.

Not food for themselves or their families,

not food for the poor in their cities,

but coffee for export to the United States.

Now that might be all right,

if the farmers who grew it saw any of the profit.

But they don’t.

Their landlord-governments grow rich.

And so do American corporations.

Just imagine what your morning cup of coffee would cost

if Juan Valdez were paid

even the minimum wage for an American laborer.

We benefit

from the poverty of Central American peasants.

South America …

The fishing off its northwest coast

is some of the best in the world.

Many tons of fish are hauled in daily.

But most of those fish

don’t go to feed South America’s hungry.

They come to North America

to be made into cat food.

Now I don’t mean to imply

that America is entirely responsible for the world’s hunger problems,

or even hunger in this hemisphere.

But we are partly responsible.

And by that I mean us,

not just our government,

not just all those other Americans out there …

but us,

coffee-drinkers,

cat-feeders,

tobacco-smokers,

beef-eaters, etc.

We are part of a long chain

linked to poverty in our world.

And we are partly responsible

for the mess we have helped to create.

But even more,

we are responsible for doing what we can

to get our world out of this mess.

Now, I can see the little wheels of cynicism

starting to turn in some of your heads.

Alleviate world hunger?

"That," you say, "would take a miracle."

Precisely.

As a matter of fact, it will take many miracles.

Jesus fed five thousand,

but you can bet there were many other hungry

that he didn’t get around to.

He did what he could,

without becoming paralyzed by what he couldn’t.

We must do the same:

our own small miracles in our own small way.

It has occurred to me just recently

that a part of the miracle of this story

is the response of the child who offered his own lunch.

It’s unlikely that he somehow "knew"

that Jesus would turn that into a meal for the whole crowd.

It’s even less likely that he thought five loaves and two fish

would make any dent in the hunger of that many people.

But he didn’t let that stop him from offering what he had.

He didn’t say to himself sadly,

I can’t make any difference with my little contribution,

so I’ll just keep my mouth shut.

Even less did he say,

this is mine and I don’t have to share it …

why didn’t everyone else come prepared like I did?

He gave what he could,

and didn’t worry about what he couldn’t.

And Jesus took that gift,

and did something amazing with it.

I, for example,

would consider it no small miracle

if each one of us were to leave here today

and do something about world hunger.

And I mean more than just writing a check for famine relief,

or to the Stewpot, or the North Texas Food Bank ...

although those are also good things to do,

to pitch in our own loaves and fishes …

But I also mean, write to the President or your congresspeople

about making better use of the surplus grain we purchase.

I mean, cut back on your consumption of alcohol and tobacco,

and write to the manufacturers and tell them why.

I mean, make an effort to eat less grain-fed beef.

Even better, make an effort to eat less meat.

if every one of us walked out of here this morning

and did one or more of these things.

That’s no fish story!

Because, by taking such steps,

we are not only helping the hungry in a small way.

We are also showing the world who we are.

Compassionate.

Christian.

Faithful followers of our Lord,

who went about doing good.

By this kind of miracle,

not only will hungry people be fed,

but others will see our works,

and believe,

and accept,

and maybe even join us.

We can do miracles.

Thanks be to God!

Amen.