By Rev. Trevor Dearing
At the feeding of the five thousand Jesus took the five loaves and two small fishes from the boy, He blessed them, He broke them and He used them. In our own lives we must give all that we have to Jesus and He will bless all that we have given. We also have to be prepared to be broken by God because only when we have been broken and we have realised that we cannot do it by ourselves, can God take our inadequate life and use it.
We’re going to look tonight at the only miracle recorded in all four gospels.
John 6:1-14
A sign is a miracle, but it is more than a miracle: it is a miracle with a meaning. It’s not only what Jesus did at that time to meet a particular need. A sign has a spiritual message within for Christians of every generation. This spiritual message is about how you can reach your full potential in Christ Jesus. It is about how you can know in your life a magnificent blessing that you have known before. It is about spiritual revival and how to live a productive Christian life. There’s so much in this seemingly simple account of this incident, that words hardly can be found to describe the spiritual lesson that this sign teaches. Tonight I want you to take away four actions which Jesus performed: He took, He blessed, He broken and He used. We do the same thing every time we have Holy Communion. I want to convey to you that this is the central focal act of God in the Christian life, for those who are really willing to yield themselves to Him.
So, what did Jesus take? I’d like you to go in your imagination to a little house in Galilee where a family are getting up in the morning. The little boy says to his mother: “Can I go today mum?” and she asks where he wants to go. So He replies that He wants to go and see Jesus of Nazareth. So his mum replies, asking how long he will be gone and he says that he thinks he will be there all day. Now mum’s always make sure that their sons have plenty of food. So this mum told him that if he was to go all day he would need something to eat. They found five barley loaves and two small fish and he took them with him. So the little boy goes, the day wears on and everyone gets hungry. He also remembers and is very grateful for the food. Just as he is about to take the first mouthful, a man comes up to him and asks for his food. Despite protestations, he gives the man the food because he is told that Jesus wants them. This is the moment where spiritual blessing begins. This is where all that God can give you starts, when you give Him the lot.
I had to learn this lesson myself. At the age of 19 I had just become a Christian, when my minister had said to me that I didn’t know my Bible and told me to go to a Bible School. So I arrived at this Bible School and was going through the door when a great big fellow gave me a great big hug and said: “Hallelujah! Praise the Lord!” and welcomed me. Soon I found myself among forty men I had never known existed, who knew their Bible back to front, preached on the streets, had fellowship meetings and all the time they were talking about Jesus. I wasn’t happy because I thought these people were fanatics. So, I decided to go home at the end of term. In the last meeting of the term the preacher asked if there was anyone who was unhappy in their life as Christian. He said that if you were unhappy it was because you had not fully given yourself to Him. He said you must abandon everything and a become a living sacrifice for Jesus. I realised that I had to do something. I thought that I should run through the door, but then this man, as if he had heard my thoughts, told me not to. He said that I should instead run down to the front; so I did. That day God got all their was of Trevor Dearing. That day I became happy.
Every year Anne and I go back to that college. I go back to the church and kneel on the spot where I had knelt when I was twenty and do it all over again. I never want to do anything else other than surrender everything to Jesus.
So Jesus took all that the little boy had. As He has done for two thousand years, He has taken all for us. For me this meant that I had to become a minister of the gospel. This is not the same for everyone. When you make that act of full surrender God tells you what to do in your life, as long as you don’t count that cross. He took, He blessed. He took the loaves of fish in His hands and gave thanks over them. It is an amazing truth that when I, at the age of 20, knelt in that little church, Jesus put His hands underneath me, lifted me up to the Father and gave thanks for an inadequate life. It is wonderful to be a blessed man, to have so given all to Jesus that He gives thanks to the Father. He gives thanks to the Father for you and for me.
I learnt after some years that the greatest blessing Jesus could give me here on earth was the fullness of the Holy Spirit. God, the first person of the trinity, dwelling in my life. This is the greatest gift: that God should dwell so fully within us that He overflows us. I had a pretty grim king of ministry for a while, with the Methodists. Then Anne got mixed up with the Pentecostals, much to my dismay. I decided that I would never go to a Pentecostal church, even though she went and took the children. She came out and she was so excited about the worship and the speaking in tongues and the healings. So I said that I would go next time. I sat in the back row trying to be inconspicuous. It was a remarkable service; a different dimension of Christianity from what I’d known. Then the pastor called forth the sick and a woman, who had been in a wheelchair for 14 years, was wheeled forward. The pastor then laid his hands forward and said: “I command you to walk in the name of Jesus Christ.” And to my astonishment she got up and began to run up the church.
At the end of the service I went up to the pastor and announced myself as an Anglican clergyman, to which he was not particularly impressed. After I gave him my testimony he said that I needed the baptism of the Holy Spirit. So he took me to the scriptures and asked me if I wanted to receive it, to which I replied yes. He took me to a back room and then he, and four others, began to pray for me, running round me and getting very excited. When they had finished they asked me how I felt and told me that their prayer would be answered. And it was. I began to read my Bible more than ever and praying more than ever. Then one night I knelt down and began to pray. I was so earnest and fervent to receive the baptism of the spirit. Then, all of a sudden, the room was filled with light and I began to speak a tongue I didn’t know. Then a finger reached out and I asked: “Who are you?” and he replied that he was Gabriel and that I was sent to heal the sick. When Anne came in she said that my face was shining, and I told her that I had been to heaven.
That little boy, with five loaves and two fishes, could have given only four of the loaves. Jesus would not have forced him to give all. But what he had kept would not have been part of the blessing. The blessing of God in your life is in proportion to that which you have given Him. Partially given, partially blessed. Fully given, fully blessed. I am grateful that God has taught me about full surrender because since that day I have been fully blessed.
The Evangelical doctrine about what it means to be broken is much neglected in the preaching of churches these days. But, when you give all to Jesus and are fully blessed, you have to be willing to be broken. This is not like when a dog is broken so that it fears its masters, but it is like the taming of a horse that must be broken so that it can obey its master. I’ve counselled hundreds of Christians and they’ve all explained to me how they have gone through a period of brokenness.
To give an illustration: Peter was proud and boastful. He promised to stand by Jesus no matter what. But before the cock crowed He had denied Jesus three times as Jesus had foretold. The last time he denied with the strongest language he could use. Then the cock crew and Jesus turned and looked at Peter. Then Peter went out and wept bitterly. The angels rejoiced because Peter had come to the end of himself and was now a man whom God could use.
God uses all manner of things to break us, to get rid of the flesh and self-importance. If we really put ourselves into the hands of God there will be a time when we know we can’t do it ourselves, when we realise we can’t live this Christian life on our own. Once we are shattered to the core He will be able to use us.
Then Jesus used the food. When He broke the food and used there wasn’t initially incredible large amounts of food. But as they gave away the food it was multiplied more and more until there were twelve baskets left over. This is the key to the Christian life: if you hang on to the Christian life and your blessings for your own satisfaction and gratification, you will lose your blessings. But, give away your blessings, and they will be multiplied.
I’ve been given a gift of healing despite my inadequacies. But I haven’t been given it so that I can say how good I am. I have been given it to give away. Give it away. We worship a generous God who gave us His only begotten son that whosoever believeth on Him should not perish but have everlasting life. But if we want to blessed we have to be giving people because as we give them away they will be multiplied. Give and it will be given to you, running over. Hold on to it and you will lose it.
In the week before Good Friday I always meditate on Him. When you meditate you use your spiritual imagination. All that week I am there watching Jesus hanging on the cross, with such sorrow and love in His eyes. When I was meditating on this years ago, I had a realisation: that if I could offer all the world to Jesus, it would be an inadequate offering compared to what He has given me. And then I realised that I have something far more precious to give him: my life. Your greatest possession is not your house or your car, it is your life. He that saves his life will lose it and he that loses it will save it. I want to ask you a question. You’ve come out on a Friday night to a Christian meeting. Let me take it for granted that you are a Christian and have been baptised in the holy spirit and speak in tongues. What I will not take for granted is that you have given your life. Has God spoken to you tonight about giving your life away to Jesus? Has God spoken to you tonight about giving Him all? Take my life and let it be consecrated unto thee. You must give your life away.
No comments:
Post a Comment