Mark 8:1-4

Passage

While Jesus was still in Gentile land, another great crowd gathered around Jesus.  Once more this crowd has nothing to eat.  So Jesus tells His disciples that He has compassion on them because they’ve been patiently listening to Him for three days without something to eat.  He also knows that if he sends them away now, they just won’t have the strength to make it home.  Once more His disciples ask how it is that Jesus plans to feed all of these people with only a small amount of bread.

Thoughts for Today

First Thought:

This is another great “feeding” miracle.  What is cool about this miracle is that it happens in largely Gentile controlled land.  The feeding of the 5,000 was primarily Jews.  This story is going to involve primarily Gentiles.  I say this primarily to set up several points that I will make tomorrow.  But for today, know that Jesus continues to not be afraid of being “defiled” by the people with whom He comes in contact.  Here is another story where Jesus continues to demonstrate that it is not what is on the outside that defiles!

Do you think you are getting Jesus’ point with respect to interacting with people who are different than you?  Are you getting ready to live out the reality that we are defiled by what is within us not by what is outside?

Second Thought:

Jesus has compassion on the crowd.  They’ve been listening to Him preach for three days.  What I love about this is that Jesus mixed the spiritual with the physical.  Jesus doesn’t go all holier-than-thou and say, “If they were really into God, they would be satisfied with my teaching.”  Instead, Jesus says, “They need substantive food in addition to spiritual food.”  There is a physical and a spiritual compassion at work here in Jesus.

How good are you at recognizing people’s physical and spiritual needs?  How good are you at trying to meet those needs when you see them?

Third Thought:

From time to time, the disciples seem rather dull.  They’ve already experienced one miraculous feeding.  You wouldn’t think that it would take a brain surgeon to think that God might just be able to do it a second time.  But, this is me being able to speak from the vantage point of knowing history.  The truth is that just about everything that God does in my life He has done in the lives of others – many of whom I know!  So you would think that I would be able to tune into God’s plan before it happens.  But the reality is that it just isn’t in the cards for us.  God is so incredible that even knowing how He worked in the past doesn’t really help us figure out how He is planning on working in the future.  He surprises us each and every time.  We’re not really that dull – well, maybe we are.  But really, He is just that amazing.

Do you think if you were in the disciples’ shoes you would have known what Jesus was about to do in this story?  What comfort can you get in your life seeing how the disciples missed Jesus’ plan in this story?

Passage for Tomorrow: Mark 8:5-10