Jesus Is Greater Pt 1

Lord, comfort us where we need that comfort, Lord, and convict us where there are areas of our lives that need to be surrendered to you. And Lord, we just ask for that overflowing power of your Holy Spirit now to be not only on myself as I bring forth your word, but for all of us as your people as we hear your word. In Jesus name. Amen. You may be seated. And if you would open up in your Bibles to the gospel of Matthew chapter 14. Matthew 14.

The title of this morning's message is Jesus is greater and it's going to be part one because I couldn't quite get it all in the in the same setting. So we're going to take this in a couple of different parts. But as we come into chapter 14, Jesus has just finished really sort of capping off a portion of the gospel of Matthew here because really chapter 13 is sort of the culmination of the rejection of Jesus by the people. And so as we move into chapter 14,

his his ministry continues, but it continues in a little bit of a different light. As a matter of fact, Warren Wiersbe in his commentary said, if I were to title chapters 14 through 20 with anything, it would be the retirement of Jesus because he's always retiring to the countryside to hopefully teach his disciples or to take time to pray or to take time to rest. And so really, this is all in preparation for what's coming with the with the cross. And that sort of is what happens in John chapter 14.

Jesus is going to try to get away a little bit, but he's going to find that there's always work that's there to be done. And so the three areas that we'll look at in John chapter 14 of excuse me, of Matthew chapter 14 of Jesus being greater is we'll see, first of all, that Jesus is greater than grief. We'll see that Jesus is greater than our inability. And we'll see that Jesus is greater than the storms in our life. But for today, we'll cover the first two. And so we start off in chapter 14, verse one with our first subject, Jesus.

Jesus is greater than grief. Notice what it says in Matthew 14, one. It says at that time, Herod, the Tetrarch heard the news about Jesus and said to his servants, this is John the Baptist. He has risen from the dead. And that is why miraculous powers are at work in him. For when Herod had John arrested, he bound him and put him in prison because of Herodias, the wife of his brother, Philip. For John had been saying to him,

it is not lawful for you to have her. Although Herod wanted to put him to death, he feared the crowd because they regarded John as a prophet. But when Herod's birthday came, the daughter of Herodias danced before him and pleased Herod so much that he promised with an oath to give her whatever she asked. Having been prompted by her mother, she said, give me here on a platter, the head of John the Baptist. Although he was grieved, the kingdom commanded it or the king commanded it to be given because

of his oaths and because of his dinner guests. He sent and had John beheaded in the prison and his head was brought on a platter and given to the girl and she brought it to her mother. And his disciples came and took away the body and buried it. And they went and reported to Jesus. As I said, this first section is that Jesus is greater than grief. But if we were to put a non title like that, I want to be Jesus, John the Baptist and Herod, because that really is what this story is all about. And so just

Jesus has been at the work of the ministry and that news of the work of the ministry has been spreading. It's been spreading so much so that Herod, the ruler of the region, has heard about what's going on with Jesus. It says at that time, Herod the Tetrarch heard the news about Jesus. Now the name Herod comes up a lot in the gospels, does it not? But you almost need a program to keep up with all of the Herods because Herod is more than just one person. The first Herod that we read about, we read about early on in the book of

Matthew. Because early on in the book of Matthew, when it was announced that Jesus had been born, remember the wise men showed up because they had followed the star and they were looking for where Jesus was. It says that they first came to Herod. That's who we would refer to as Herod the Great. And if you remember, Jesus and his family escaped to Egypt for a short time until Herod the Great had died. But when they moved back, they decided that they could not come to Bethlehem because his son had taken over for him and they

knew that his son wasn't a very good man. So they settled in Nazareth to fulfill the prophecy that Jesus would be a Nazarene. Herod the Great's son that took over that they were a little bit nervous about was Herod Antipas. That's the Herod we're talking about this morning. Herod Antipas was a man who had great ambition and was pretty paranoid and really not a good human being. None of the Herods are good human beings, okay? You can just know that. You can write

Herod-not good human beings because they weren't. They all did really cruel things. They either had their wives killed or their sons killed or you name it, all kinds of things. Well, this Herod was no different. This Herod had a problem with the flesh. One time when he was on a journey, he, though married, saw his brother Philip's wife and said, ooh, I really like her. By the way, I'm giving the

CliffsNotes version of this. It goes a little deeper than this. He said, ooh, I want to have her. So he comes home, he divorces his wife, seduces his brother Philip's wife, whose name is Herodias, to come and be his wife. John the Baptist hears about this and John the Baptist goes straight reformed on him and just says, you are doing a wrong thing. This is sinful. What you're doing

is evil. Now, we see that what's said here is Herod had John arrested and put him in prison, verse three, because of Herodias, the wife of his brother Philip. For John had been saying, it is not lawful for you to have her. Now, we need to understand that when it says John had been saying, he didn't just say it one time. According to the tense of the Greek here,

it's something that he said over and over and over and over again. In other words, it was the subject of a lot of things that he mentioned. It was the subject of a lot of the things that were brought up because not only was it wrong for him to have divorced his wife, but according to the book of Leviticus, it was wrong for him to have taken his sister-in-law to be his wife. And John had no problem calling out sin. Even when it was

a public leader, even when it was somebody who technically was in power of a fourth of the region, he had no problem calling out sin. Sounds kind of familiar in our world, does it not? We have people in high positions that are living lives of sin. And then you have lowly little preachers who are willing to say that what they're doing is sin. And who knows what that ends up

doing. But I just have to say, when we see sin happening in high places, we need to call it out. We need to say that it's sin. And the things that are happening in a lot of areas of our government right now, they're sin. And they need to be called just that. I think it's terrible that documents were leaked about whatever has taken place with some Supreme Court decisions. But may

I say, I hope that the Supreme Court decides to overturn Roe v. Wade because I think it's bad law think abortion is wrong in general. And I think that it's important that we support these justices that feel like that's the decision that needs to be made, that they need to know that there are people behind them who say what you're doing is the right thing to do, that there is no justification for abortion, and all of the justifications that are made for abortion are simply justifications for sin, and that there is hope for every life, and that there is hope for every mother, and that there is hope for those who even are in situations that feel absolutely hopeless, and that that's what

we as believers need to be saying in situations like this. Well, John was no different. He called that like he saw it, and because he called it like he saw it, he paid the penalty for it. He paid the consequences for it. Notice what it says. It says he had him arrested, and he had him thrown into prison, but notice in verse 5 it says, although he wanted to put him to death, he feared the crowd because

they regarded John as a prophet. You see, he was a little bit scared to actually do anything to John the Baptist because everybody respected John the Baptist. Whether you agreed with him or not, he was a guy that everybody seemed to respect, and so he said, I can't do anything to him because if I take some sort of action against him, that's going to look really bad for me because all of the people respect him, and if you look at other portions of scripture, if you go into the book of Mark and read this exact same story, you actually find that Herod had a certain amount of respect for him. Herod would go and listen to the things that he had to say because he even had a certain amount of respect for him, and so though unwilling to turn from his sin,

he still respected John the Baptist, and yet even in all of his respect for John the Baptist, he still was a man who was still driven by his flesh, and we find that there was an incident that took place. In verse 6, it says it was Herod's birthday. The daughter of Herodias came in and danced before them. And she pleased Herod so much that he promised with an oath to give her whatever she asked.

The daughter of Herodias, most historians believe, was anywhere from the age of 16 to 18 by this point in time, entirely too young to be standing in front of a group of men dancing in an entirely inappropriate sort of way, but there she was doing some sort of a dance that pleased men. What an unfortunate thing that we as men have found ourselves in, in a place where we find that the thing that pleases us the most is the thing that seems to displease God the most, and it causes us to lose our heads, and unfortunately it caused John the Baptist to lose his as well. So she danced for them, and it says it pleased Herod so much he found himself so enthralled with

whatever lascivious thing was going on in front of him that he found himself making somewhat of a rash oath. And as he made this rash oath, he said, He said, He said, I'll give you whatever you want. And Herodias' daughter had already been coached undoubtedly by her mother to say, When this happens, what you're going to do is you're going to ask for the head of John the Baptist on a platter. It's kind of interesting, isn't it, that Herodias knew her husband that well?

Because she knew two things were going to happen that night. She knew that the men were going to sit around and drink, and she knew that the men were going to be pleased by a young lady. She knew that those two things were going to take place at this time. She knew that those two things were going to take place at this party. And she says, When those two things happen, this is what you're going to do.

You're going to ask that he would behead John the Baptist. Can you imagine a 16, 17-year-old girl asking for that? What do you really want? I'd really like the head of John the Baptist on a platter. That's the oddest thing anybody could ever ask for. And yet she'd been coached by her mother. And notice how Herod responds. It says, Having been prompted by her mother, she said,

Give me the head of John the Baptist on a platter. And although he was grieved, the king commanded it to be given. Then, because of his oaths and because of his dinner guests. Notice his first response. His first response is that he was grieved. You can imagine the moment. We've all been there in some sort of a moment where we say something kind of rash. Where we say something that we never intended the consequences to come about.

And he makes this statement, I'll give you whatever you want. And then she tells him what she wants. And then all of a sudden he realizes exactly what he just did. And now he has to live with the consequences. Now at any point in time, Herod, being the man that he was, being the powerful man that he was, could have reversed his oath and said, I'm not going to do that.

I don't care what you think. I don't care what you say. I respect him. I'm not doing that. But you see, Herod had a problem. You know what Herod's problem was? The king commanded it to be given. And because of his oaths and because of his dinner guests, he sent and had dinner. And John the Baptist beheaded in prison. You see, Herod had a problem. He cared what people thought about him.

As a matter of fact, he cared more what people thought about him than what was right. And that's exactly what took place here. You see, he had made this rash oath. And rather than making a decision to say that was wrong, I shouldn't have done that, he found himself in a place where he feared more what people had to say than what God had to say. He feared more what people had to say than what his conscience had to say.

And so he had to go. He had to go through with the oath. And so he has John the Baptist beheaded. And the head was brought to the young girl on a platter, and she gave it to her mother. I think sometimes we sanitize this story just a little bit, and we forget that probably right there in the middle of that party is when this thing was presented to her. What a terrible thought.

What a terrible place to be. What a terrible scene that's painted for us. And so because of this, as Jesus began to really flourish, in his ministry, powerful in speech, powerful in deed, Herod's guilty conscience started to get to him. You see, Herod's guilty conscience started to tell him, is that John the Baptist? Has he come back to life? Many historians believe that John and Jesus may have looked somewhat similar.

After all, I think sometimes we forget they were cousins. And so they may have had a similar look about them. And so as he, from a distance, perhaps has seen Jesus, out walking amongst the crowds and seen some of the things that he's done, he saw and thought, oh my gosh, that's John the Baptist coming back to life. It's amazing what a guilty conscience will do to us, is it not?

It's amazing what a guilty conscience will do to us. And if we allow it to do the work that God intended, it will bring us to repentance. If we prevent it from doing the work that God intended, it will drive us to madness. Well, the story ends like this. Verse 12. His disciples, meaning John the Baptist's disciples, came and took away the body and buried it.

And they went and reported to Jesus. As I started studying this the other day, I started thinking about exactly what John's disciples would have gone through at this point in time. I started thinking about exactly what Jesus would have gone through at this point in time. And I started thinking about the lessons that we can learn from Herod. And so as we wrap up this first little section,

before we get into Jesus feeding the 5,000 in the next portion of what we're going to talk about, I'd like to bring a little bit of personal application to this section. First of all, I think there's a couple of lessons that we learn from Herod here. A couple of the lessons that we learn from Herod here are really warnings for us. The first warning that we have from Herod is that Herod was a man who was guided and driven by his flesh.

Did you notice that everything that Herod has done in this entire story, all had to do with the fact that there was one thing in control of his life and one thing only, and that was his flesh? Why did he take his brother Philip's wife to be his own? Well, because his flesh said, I'm not happy with what I have. I'm going to take that which is not mine because that's what my flesh desires.

Why did he imprison John? Because his flesh wanted to do what it wanted to do and John was getting in the way of that. John was an annoyance to his flesh. Why did he have John killed? Well, because his flesh enjoyed what he saw in front of him and made a rash vow because of it. His flesh caused him to get drunk and his flesh caused him to enjoy the dancing of a 16-year-old girl standing there in front of him.

And he was a man driven by his flesh. And may I say, in the world that we live in today, we are a world driven by our flesh. And if we are to be the men and women of God that we have been called to be, we have to decide something else is going to be in control. Because you see, everyone will serve a master, we just have to decide which one. Will we serve the flesh or will we serve the spirit?

Because there is no such thing as a happy middle ground. There is no such thing as a happy middle ground where, well, I'm just going to kind of be a good person but not really serve the spirit but also not really give in to the flesh. Nope, it's one or the other. And if you make a decision not to serve the spirit, you are making a decision to be driven by the flesh.

But you know, there's a second lesson that we learn from Herod. The second lesson that we learn from Herod is that Herod had an idol in his life. Not just the flesh that he was driven by, but Herod had an idol in his life that I believe that is an idol that many of us, again, in this culture are driven by. You know what idol Herod lived by? He lived according to the idol of popular opinion.

He lived his life based upon the opinion of others. Why wasn't he willing to deal with John the Baptist in the very beginning? Well, because he feared the people. Now, I think after that, he gained a respect for him, but initially it was because he feared the crowd. Why did he go through with his rash oath? Because he feared his guests. After all, he doesn't want to look silly

in front of his guests. He doesn't want to look like somebody who can make a claim but then can't back it up by his actions. You see, he was a man who was guided and driven by popular opinion. He bowed down to the altar of the opinions of others. And brothers and sisters, I think that that's a major problem we have in the church today. Is that we bow down to the opinions of others.

And so we must be aware of that idol in our lives and deal with that idol in our lives because after all, there is only one opinion that matters and there's only one person that we should ultimately care about. And that's what Jesus has to say about us. But the heart of what I wanted to talk about in this first section is how Jesus is so much greater than grief. And so there's two points that I want to make.

And I had her put these up here because I think that they're really important. Jesus knows what it's like to lose. Jesus knows what it's like to lose a loved one. Jesus knew what it was like to lose someone that he cared so much about. This was a somewhat revolutionary thought to me last year. Perhaps it's not to you. Perhaps you've thought about it several times.

But for me, it was a somewhat revolutionary thought that Jesus actually knew even in this way exactly what it was like to lose a loved one. What it was like to lose someone that he cared about. Because we know that it tells us in Scripture that Jesus was tempted in every way that we are and yet without sin. But I think that we forget that in his humanity, he dealt with all of the emotional things that we do and yet he did so without sin.

He did so without losing his head. And Jesus knew what it was like to lose someone that he cared about. You see right here, I think that he and John the Baptist had a decently close relationship. I think that he and John knew each other well because they were cousins. They were family. Family was important in that culture. And they would have spent time together.

If nothing else, they were ministry partners because they were going the same direction. After all, John baptized Jesus. And he knew exactly what it was like to get the news that somebody that he cared for so deeply was killed. Somebody that he cared for so deeply had lost their life. Somebody that he loved was now lost. He knew what it was like to get that news.

And you know what? That tells me since he knew what it was like to get that kind of news, he understands what I go through when I get that kind of news. He understands what it's like to go through the stages of grief. He understands what it's like to wake up in the morning and just have that aching feeling on the inside of him because a loved one is completely gone.

Jesus can understand those things because he's been through those things himself. Jesus understands. One of the things that I'm well aware of on Mother's Day, is that many of us know what it's like on a day like this to have lost someone that we loved. And I want you to know that Jesus understands because he's been there too. But not only that, I'm reminded that John's disciples

took their grief to Jesus. You see, in all of this, and I didn't realize this, I didn't think about this until studying it this time. I didn't think about what John's disciples would have gone through. You see, we don't really talk about them very much because as soon as Jesus hit the scene, Jesus became greater and John became lesser, which is exactly what John wanted to happen and exactly what was supposed to happen.

But John had his own group of followers as well, his own group of men that he mentored as well. And this group of men that he had spent however many years with now have to face the fact that their mentor, the one they love so much, has now been killed. And so they take the body and they deal with the body, but then do you notice, the next thing that they do, it says they went and reported to Jesus. They went and reported to Jesus.

They took all of that grief, all of those emotions, all of those feelings, and they told Jesus all about it. You see, I'm one that likes to read into Scripture in certain places just a little bit, and I think that when these disciples came and told Jesus what went on, they weren't just simply reporters. They were commentators as well. They said, Jesus, we have some bad news.

John died. Herod had him killed. And quite frankly, we don't know what to do now. We believe in you, but he was our mentor. He's the one we've spent so much time with. Quite frankly, we're at a loss for words. I think that the conversation probably went something like that. Because you know as well as I do that when you face something really difficult, all you can do is just go to Jesus and say,

this is what's going on in my life. And I think the most important thing we can do as believers in Jesus Christ is when we face those times of loss, when we face those times of grief, that we take all of those things to Jesus. Take all of that grief to Him and let Him be the one that heals our broken heart. One of the verses that I find myself using at funerals a lot is Psalm 147, verse 3.

I would just write it down. We won't turn there because it's a very easy verse to quote. It says, He heals. The broken hearted. And He binds up their wounds. There's several words that stick out to me in that verse. Matter of fact, there's three of them that I think are really important for us to pay attention to as we think about taking our grief to Jesus.

The first word that always sticks out to me and I share this at funerals a lot is the word broken hearted. That word broken hearted in the Hebrew literally means to be broken or shattered into pieces. And I always share this exact same story. So if you've heard me share this before, bear with me. I used to have a favorite coffee cup. My girls gave it to me one year for Father's Day.

And it had pictures of Violet and Nora on the outside of it. It was a great coffee cup. Two of my favorite things, coffee and my girls. Well, I took it to work with me one time. And as I took it to work with me one time, one of my co-workers who was, shall we say, a little clumsy, knocked it off of the workbench and it landed on the concrete floor. And you can imagine what happened.

It shattered into a bunch of small pieces. And I remember thinking, oh no! Not just because there was coffee in it, but I was like, oh no! That thing's broken into a million pieces. What am I going to do now? I can never put that back together. That thought went through my head. You know, sometimes when you face really difficult times, times of grief, when you receive that phone call,

when you hear that news, sometimes even when you think back, when you think back on the incident, all you can think about is what happened to your heart that day that you received that sad news. Because in the same way that my coffee cup hit the floor and shattered into a million pieces and I thought, what am I going to do now? I can never put that back together. That exact same thing happens to our heart when we face grief.

Because I would venture to say that when Jesus got the news about John, when John's disciples got the news about what had happened to John, it's as if their heart fell off the top of their head. Their heart fell off the table and shattered into a million little pieces. And they found themselves going, what am I going to do now? I can't put this back together.

But you see, that's where Psalm 147 verse 3 is so cool because it tells us what the problem is. Because that's what the problem is when we face grief. But it tells us what Jesus does. It tells us what God does with that grief when we take it to Him. First thing it says is that He binds them up. That word bind, bind up means to wrap up for the purpose of healing.

Isn't that great? That's literally what it means in the Hebrew. Picture, if you will, someone who has a broken arm. And that broken arm gets set back into place and it gets casted and it gets bound up for the purpose of healing. You see, that's what God begins to do with our hearts when we face these times of grief. When we take all of those shattered pieces

and we give them to Jesus, He says, it's okay, I put it together once, I can do it again. I can do it again. He sets it up for the purpose of healing. But then there's a third word that I just love in here. And it's the word that takes place right before brokenhearted. It says He heals the brokenhearted. You know what that word heals means in the Hebrew? It's defined in the Hebrew as to make whole

or to restore back to normal. Isn't that a beautiful picture of what God is able to do with us when we have that grief that's more than our hearts can bear? Which we take all of those shattered pieces, that there's no way I could have ever put back together, and I bring them to Jesus and I say, here they are, I don't know what to do with them, and there's no way that I can put them back together. And He says, that's okay, I have a plan.

I know how to do this. And He slowly but surely knits all of those pieces back together and He wraps them up and holds them there in the right place until everything is totally healed. And when it's healed, He takes that binding off of them. We look and we say, oh look, it's been made whole again. It's been restored back to normal. Because that's what God is able to do.

For those hearts that have been so affected by grief. But He can't do that if we don't carry all of those things to Him. If we don't carry all of that brokenness to Him. You see, here's what can happen to us sometimes when we face grief, is we can sometimes find ourselves closing in and not letting anyone else near us. He goes, I don't want them to see me cry.

Listen, you get over it, okay? I don't want them to see me cry. I don't want them to see me hurt. I have to be strong. I have to be the rock for everybody else. No, you don't. And I would venture to say that there's someone sitting in this room this morning who has tried to be strong for way too many years and you've never taken those shattered pieces to Jesus

and let Him heal your heart. And because of it, you still are not restored back to normal. You still are not back to a place of being healed in the way that God intends for you to be healed because you were never willing to take those pieces to Jesus. It's not that you don't believe He can do it. It's that you don't want to let your guard down long enough to be vulnerable and allow Him to heal you.

But Jesus is greater than all of that in our lives, is He not? I can tell you, He is. He's greater than those things. And He knows how to put those pieces back together. And I've watched Him do it in the lives of people. So take all of that to Him because Jesus is so much greater than our grief.

Well, the story continues because the second thing that we're going to talk about is the second thing that we're going to talk about is the second thing that we're going to talk about is how Jesus is greater than my inability. Or, Jesus feeds the 5,000. Verse 13. Now when Jesus heard about John, He withdrew from there in a boat to a secluded place by Himself.

And when the people heard this, they followed Him on foot from the cities. When He went ashore, He saw a large crowd and felt compassion for them, and He healed their sick. When it was evening, the disciples came to Him and said, The place is desolate. And the... The hour is already late. Send the crowds away that they may go into the villages and buy food for themselves.

And Jesus said, They don't need to go away. You give them something to eat. They said to Him, We have here only five loaves and two fish. He said, Bring them here to Me. Ordering the people to sit down on the grass, He took the five loaves and the two fish and looking up toward heaven, He blessed the food. And breaking the loaves, He gave them, He gave them to the disciples.

And the disciples gave them to the crowds, and they all ate and were satisfied. They picked up what was left over of the broken pieces, twelve full baskets, and there were about five thousand men who ate besides women and children. Ah, probably one of the more famous stories within the Gospels. As a matter of fact, one of the few stories that's mentioned in all four Gospel accounts, Jesus feeding the five thousand.

It starts off like this. It says, When Jesus had heard about John, He withdrew from there and went in a boat and went to a secluded place by Himself. Now, I don't know if I can fully go along with the New American Standard translators here. I might be able to. You may notice, if you're reading the New American Standard, that those words about John are in italics,

meaning that that is not in the original Greek. Translators added it for clarification purposes. If you're reading the New King James or the Old King James, you will find that it says, When Jesus heard about it. It just leaves it blank like that. For whatever reason, Jesus felt like it was time to go to a secluded place. Again, this is where Warren Wiersbe got that title for this section.

He's going to go to a secluded place. Why? There's a handful of reasons why. I think part of the reason why is because of the threat from Herod. You see, it wasn't time yet for Jesus to be killed. It wasn't time for Him to give His life as a sacrifice for many. Perhaps Jesus was going to go to a place where there was a little bit, less heat on His ministry so He could continue doing what He needed to do,

not out of fear, but simply because that would be easier on the ministry that He was doing and He could minister to the most people that way. I think one of the reasons why, potentially, is because perhaps He was still dealing with grief over John the Baptist and He needed to go find a place where He could be alone with His Father and with His disciples. Perhaps it was a time for Him to be able to go away so that He could pour into His disciples and spend a little bit more time with just them. Or perhaps He just needed a little bit of a break because of the pressures of the ministry that He was involved in.

Because from sunup to sundown, Jesus was continually giving out to the people that were around Him. Whatever reason it was, Jesus decided that He needed to go off to a secluded place by Himself just with His disciples to have a little alone time. So He got into a boat and it says He goes to a secluded place. However, as usually would happen with Jesus, the crowds followed Him on foot from the cities.

Isn't it kind of interesting? The word crowds is used there and they're following on foot. Jesus goes across in a boat, hopefully to get ahead of everybody. Everybody says, hey, we saw where the boat was going. Let's go where Jesus is. And so they go around the water, they go on foot and they slowly but surely start gathering. You can imagine Jesus and His disciples, right?

Jesus is sitting there with them and goes, it's kind of nice just to be away for a few minutes, isn't it, boys? Well, there's some things I want to talk to you about. And you can imagine Him sitting perhaps on a hillside maybe. And as He's sitting on a hillside, slowly but surely off in the distance, He sees people coming and He goes, well, I guess we didn't go far enough to really get off by ourselves.

And slowly but surely, a few, a handful at a time, people start showing up. Now, in our flesh, we could think, well, Jesus should have just kept going, right? Surely there was a wilderness more secluded He could go to. But of course, Jesus wasn't willing to do that. I do want to point out that there was a point in time when Jesus did finally get off by Himself.

And we'll talk about that next week because I don't think that this is an excuse to not take that time. It's just that there were people there that need ministered to. Notice what it says. When the people heard of this, they followed on foot. And when He went ashore, He saw a large crowd and He felt compassion for them. And He healed their sick. That seems to be a really big word

that's used throughout Jesus' ministry is that when He saw people, He felt compassion for them. I think the best definition I've ever heard for the word compassion is when it hurts so bad that you just have to do something. And I think as Jesus saw the people coming, that's exactly how He felt. God gave Him that little glimpse into how lost they were. God gave Him that little glimpse

into the needs of their lives. And He saw them and He saw the looks on their face and He saw the needs that were presented for them. And He said, I just have to do something. I can't just pretend this isn't here. I just can't pretend these people don't exist. I'm going to show some compassion. So that's exactly what He does. And so what does He do? The entire day

He spends ministering to the people and healing. He's healing their sick. You can picture the scene, right? People just keep showing up and His disciples are going, we are never leaving. Oh, look, there's 100 more people right there. Oh, my gosh. They just keep showing up. Jesus, stop. We have to go. People just keep showing up. It's okay, guys. This is what's important.

This is what needs to happen. But pretty soon it starts heading towards evening. And as it's heading towards evening, notice what the disciples say to Him. This place is desolate. The hour is already late. Send the crowds away that they may go into the village and buy food for themselves. The disciples are like, Jesus, it's dinner time. And the people are hungry.

You know what that's code for? Jesus, I'm hungry. That's what that's code for, right? You know, because I've been around people and they're like, I bet everybody's going to be getting really hungry. And I look and I'm like, that means you're getting really hungry? And they're like, yes. That's exactly what that means. After church on Sunday, my daughter is learning to say,

hey, Dad, aren't you ready to go eat lunch now? And I'm like, does that mean you're ready to eat lunch? And she's like, yes, an hour ago. So I know what that means when they say, Jesus, send them away. They need to go get food. But I love what Jesus says to them. He says, they don't need to go away. You give them something to eat. Now we're given the commentary at the very end

about how many people are here. It says 5,000 men plus women and children, okay? Let's go super conservative and say there's only 10,000 people, although many believe closer to 15 to 20,000 people. 10,000 people out there. As far as you can see, it's just people. That's it. And Jesus looks at the disciples. Remember, they've already identified the problem. What's the problem?

We're in a desolate place. There's no food here. And Jesus says to them, they don't need to go anywhere. You give them something to eat. And the disciples are going, with what? He says, all we have are five loaves and two fish. By the way, that's a whole other sermon analogy in and of itself about the little boy who gave us five loaves and two fish. We won't go there today.

He says, we don't have nearly enough. What we have is insufficient. It's inadequate. It's inadequate to feed all of these people. The word loaves here, by the way, is indicative of barley loaves, which was the cheapest of the grain. In other words, the kid that brought these didn't have any money. Bear in mind, how old was the young man that brought this? We're told he's a boy.

So probably under the age of 15. And this was supposed to feed him. That wouldn't even have fed a grown man, let alone 10,000 people. They say, Jesus, what we have is not sufficient. It's not sufficient. It's not sufficient to do this. This is all we have. Five loaves and two little fish. What's that amongst all of these people? I love that Jesus just gives them one short little answer.

If you have a red letter Bible, you notice all it says right there is he said, bring them here to me. I love how Jesus didn't tell him what he was going to do. He didn't tell him how it was going to be enough. He just says, bring it to me. All of that insufficiency, all of that inability, all of that inadequacy, bring me what you have. And then, of course, Jesus does the most amazing thing ever.

He orders the people to sit down on the grass. To me, that's the most miraculous portion of this entire thing because if you read in John's account, you'll notice that he has them sit down in groups and companies. Listen, I've worked with lots of people before, never that many people, but getting everybody to do the same thing at the same time is the hardest thing in the world you will ever do, right? Because you got these people over here that want to do their own thing.

These people over here that want to do their own thing. Listen, once Jesus got them sat down, the miracle was done, right? Anything from there is just a bonus. And so he says, have them all sit down. You know, what I really love about it is that God is always orderly in everything that he does. God is not a God of chaos. God isn't a God of order, not the author of confusion.

And so he has them all sit down. You can imagine what the people are thinking, right? What are we doing? Why are we sitting down? And then Jesus takes the bread, took the five loaves, and the two fish, looking up towards heaven, he blessed the food. Breaking the loaves, he gave them to the disciples, and the disciples gave them to the crowds. There's a handful of things I want to see on DVR in heaven,

and this is one of them. Because I want to see the disciples, again, that's a bunch of people, right? It would have taken some time to distribute this food, right? And so you can imagine, they go to Jesus and they're like, I need some more. And he's like, hands them a little bit more food. And they're like, thanks. And so they carry that back. Like, did the bread just keep regrowing at the time?

Was he just continuing to break more pieces? Were there more loaves added as he was taking it? I want to know how this happened. Matthew, you've given us a lot of detail here. Tell me what you saw. He doesn't do it, because we don't need to know how Jesus does the miracle. We just need to know that he does the miracle. And so he's distributing it to the disciples.

And the disciples have given their insufficiency to Jesus. And Jesus has made it more than enough. And he's distributing. And now their job is to hand out Jesus' sufficiency to the people. Pretty cool, right? I think you see where I'm going here. So they start handing out to the people. And notice what it says. It says in verse 20, and they all ate and were satisfied.

They all ate and were satisfied. Again, perhaps the second biggest miracle is that everyone was. Did you hear it? Satisfied. Satisfied. Nobody was like, mine wasn't done enough. My bread was too hard. My butter wasn't soft enough. My butter was too soft. You know, nobody said anything like that. They were all just satisfied. Of course, that's not really what the word satisfied there means.

It means full to the point of satisfaction. That's literally what it means. It means you'd had as much as you could possibly want. Chuck Smith says that the word could also be translated glutted. Now, what's really cool is that because of the culture we live in, we don't always understand hunger. But in that culture, they understood hunger. And many of them would not eat a meal

that would fully satisfy them on a consistent basis because of the poverty that existed in that time. And so for some of these, this was the most filling meal they had ever had. And who provided it for them? Jesus. Because Jesus is the ultimate bread of life that fills us and satisfies us. Not just physically, but eternally. Well, he wasn't done yet because it says

they ate and were satisfied and they picked up what was left over of the broken pieces. 12 full baskets. Quick numbers check. How many disciples were there? 12. Isn't that amazing? They all got to take leftovers home to their family. They all got to be like, we ate until we were full. And now you can too. You can too. Because when, when Jesus does something,

he always does exceedingly abundantly above all we could ever ask or think. And so all of these leftovers were collected. And of course, we're giving this little commentary on the numbers about 5,000 men who ate besides women and children. Well, let's kind of wrap this up and put a little application on this last portion as well, because it's a cool story. It's an amazing story of what Jesus is able to do,

but I think it speaks not only to us, but I'm hoping it speaks a little bit to you mothers this morning as well. Number one, the need is great. The need is great. For these disciples, the need was greater than they could have ever imagined, right? To feed 10, 15, maybe 20,000 people with five loaves and two fish. That need was greater than they could have ever imagined.

It was greater than they could have ever fulfilled. They looked out at them and the need was so great that they said, this is impossible. I bet in your life right now, you're facing some sort of a need that's great. I don't know if it's a financial need that you have in your life. Probably some sort of a spiritual need that you have in your life. Perhaps you're looking out and seeing the culture

that's going to hell in a handbasket and we see that the need is great. Whatever it is, the need that you face in your life seems really great. I can almost guarantee it. I know for me, I've really felt this a lot with the spiritual condition of the world right now and the spiritual condition of the community right now. Sometimes the need feels greater than anything that I've got to give.

And it's because it is greater than anything that I've got to give. And may I say, just to speak a word to you mothers, I know that the need that you feel with your kids is greater than you feel like you've ever got the power or the strength or the energy or the ability to handle. Because the need that you see to see them become the men and women of God that you desire for them to be and knowing the things that they're facing on a daily basis in the schools and the culture and the social media, sometimes, the need just feels so great. And I think every now and then, we need to be honest with ourselves and say the need is more than I can handle.

Number two, my ability is insufficient. My ability is insufficient. I think one of the greatest things that the disciples were able to own up to at this point in time is when they said, but all we've got is five loaves and two fish. All I've got is this little bit. And this little bit is nothing compared to the huge crowd because what I have is massively insufficient.

My ability is massively inadequate for everything that I face, for every need that I face. My ability to live as God has called for me to live is absolutely insufficient. It's five loaves and two fish in the face of 20,000 people. My ability to provide any kind of hope to the world that's around me through the gospel that has changed my life so much is completely insufficient.

It's five loaves and two fish amongst the masses. My ability to change the culture to hopefully see some holiness come about instead of evil come about is so insufficient. It's five loaves and two fish amongst thousands of people. And may I say to you moms again, with your desire to pour into the lives of your kids, sometimes what you have feels like those five loaves and two fish.

Inadequate to handle all of those things because we were never called to be enough. We were never called to be sufficient in and of ourselves. Our adequacy, our sufficiency comes from nothing of myself. And may I say, the first taste of freedom you will ever have in your life is when you say, I'm not enough. I'm not enough. I see these shirts going around and I know the idea behind them

is such a good idea and I know what we're trying to do and I know what we're trying to do and I know what we're trying to do and we're trying to bolster some confidence in people that don't have confidence but I'm afraid it's going about it the wrong way because I see all these t-shirts that say, you are enough. Friends, none of us is enough. All of us in and of ourselves are massively insufficient. But can I say, the greatest freedom you will ever experience in your life is when you finally own up to the truth and say, hey, I'm not enough.

I'll never be sufficient for all the things that need done. I will never be sufficient to keep the house clean the way I'm supposed to keep the house clean. I will never be sufficient to raise my kids the way that I'm supposed to raise my kids. I will never be sufficient to be the pastor that God wants for me to be. I will never have enough to reach the world with the gospel.

I will never have enough to live the truth that God wants me to live on a daily basis. One of my favorite lyrics from a song says, I thought I was a good man and fell short of my standards. And now what am I left with? All of nothing but my first taste of freedom. Because you see, when I realize that the need is great and I realize that my ability is insufficient,

I then start looking outside myself and I find that my inability in the hands of God is more than enough. My inability in the hands of God is absolutely more than enough because when I'm willing to take Him, my five loaves and my two fish, when I'm willing to take Him, all of my insufficiency, He takes what is my insufficiency and my inability and He says, that's wonderful. Now I'm going to distribute this amongst the masses. Now I've made it more than you can ever think or imagine.

I'd like for you to turn with me in a scripture. Go over to 2 Corinthians. If you can't get there in time, that's okay. Just write it down. 2 Corinthians 3. And I want you to look at verses 4-6.

2 Corinthians 3, 4-6. This is Paul speaking to the Corinthian church about the ministry that God has given him. And this is what it says. Such confidence we have through Christ toward God. Not that we are adequate in ourselves to consider anything as coming from ourselves, but ourselves. Our adequacy is from God, who also made us adequate as servants of the new covenant.

Not of the letter, but of the Spirit. For the letter kills, but the Spirit gives life. Not that we can think of anything as being from ourselves or our adequacy as being from ourselves, but our sufficiency is in Christ. You see, what Jesus did here is illustrate this truth. That the sufficiency that the disciples had, the adequacy that the disciples would have,

the ability that the disciples would have, would have the same sufficiency that the disciples would have. It would have nothing to do with him because all they had to offer Jesus was those five loaves and two fish. But their inability in the hands of the creator of the heavens and earth will always be more than enough. Friends, stop trying to be enough. Stop trying to be good enough.

Stop trying to be smart enough. Stop trying to work hard enough. And start taking all of that inability and placing it in the hands of your Savior. Because he's then able to turn that into more than you can ever imagine. Exceedingly, abundantly above all you can ever imagine. Because Jesus is greater. Amen? Let's all stand.

And if you'd bow with me. Father, we come before you, Lord, and I thank you for the time that we've had here this morning. The time that we've had in your word. And Lord, I, as always, just thank you for the truth of who you are. That you are the all-sufficient creator of the heavens and the earth who is so much greater than any of my inability. Lord, you are able to take all of the things of me

and use them for your glory through your power. And I just praise you for that, Father. And so, Lord, lift up every soul that's here this morning that perhaps is a little bit worn out. Perhaps a little bit tired from striving. Perhaps a little bit broken from grief. And Lord, I just pray that they would carry all of those things to you. And that you would show yourself strong on their behalf.

Lord, I thank you so much for every mother that's here. For all of the moms that, have spent so much time pouring into the lives of their kids. And I just pray, God, that you would move in their hearts as you see fit to draw them to you. Lord, every mother who feels like she just can't quite measure up, may she find her sufficiency, her ability, and her adequacy in you.

And we just thank you, Father, in Jesus' name. Amen. Be blessed. In the morning when I rise In the morning when I rise In the morning when I rise Give me Jesus Give me Jesus Give me Jesus You can have all this world But give me Jesus And when I am alone Oh, when I am alone Give me Jesus Give me Jesus Give me Jesus You can have all this world But give me Jesus You can die Oh, when I die When I die When I die When I die come to die, and when I come to die, give me Jesus. Give me Jesus. Give me Jesus. You can have more.

Strengthen us with your might. Help us to look to you, the author and finisher of our faith, knowing that you are working in all of us, both to will and do of your good pleasure, setting us apart to serve you, to love you, Lord, and be a witness to those around us. In Jesus' name, amen. God bless you all.