Feeding the Masses

This past week Pastor Doug taught on the miracle of the feeding of 5,000. We looked at it as we continue our summer series on the book of John, but outside of the resurrection, it is the only miracle recorded in all 4 gospels. It is such a familiar story that we almost lose the magic and the mystery behind it. To consider that Jesus probably fed over 20,000 (most scholars estimate that it would have been over 20,000 when you account for the women and children) is incredible! And I think that our sophisticated and advanced mindset is to automatically discount a miracle such as this or explain it in some rational way (everyone must have shared their lunch; there weren't that many people, etc) and yet I wonder if we believe in the idea of miracles such as this happening today?

When I graduated high school my youth group joined several others on a life-changing mission trip to Monterrey, Mexico. There were several 'miracles' that happened on that trip including buses that had stopped just starting again, but the most memorable one was what we call the Coke miracle. After a day of ministry, one of our buses stopped at a roadside vendor to treat the bus to a Coke. The Cokes came in bottles and were cold- both a special treat for our group. The vendor, however, was a few cokes short and we soon realized that the whole group wouldn't get a Coke. Since we're on a mission trip, people begin giving up their Coke so that others could get one. While the leaders passed out the Cokes, they instructed us that we had to return the bottles to the vendor so that he could recycle them and save on some of his costs. When all the bottles had been returned, everyone had a Coke, even though the vendor and the leaders knew they were short for the whole bus! Again, the temptation is to try to explain this or discount it- maybe the vendor miscounted, maybe some on the bus had bottles they passed up, etc. But those on the bus call it a miracle- for what else do you call it?