The Glad Surprise
Rev. David Takahashi Morris
Thomas Jefferson Memorial Church--Unitarian Universalist
November 11, 2007
Our STARS stories this year are drawing from the rich resources of Jewish and Christian teachings and from the stories of women and men who have called humankind to greater justice. The story we’ve come to know as “Loaves and Fishes” is very much part of the cultural fabric we live within, so I’m glad our young people will have a chance to learn and think about it together, from within our own religious framework.
In our Wednesday evening drop-in Co-Ministers’ class, Leslie and I have been inviting people to engage with the Hebrew Bible and Christian Scripture with four principle questions in mind: What is the purpose of this text? How has it traditionally been interpreted? What might be some other interpretations? And finally, how might we as Unitarian Universalists be informed by this text? .
This story of Jesus feeding the multitudes is present in all four of the Gospels that tell the story of Jesus’ life and teachings. The numbers vary from Gospel to Gospel—one has it as 5,000 people and one as 7,000; one has 5 loaves and two fish while another has 7 loaves and “a few pieces” of fish. In one of the stories only men are there; in others there are women and children, although they’re not included in the count of how many were fed. Yet amidst these details there are striking similarities, suggesting that this story was very much part of the oral tradition that existed for more than fifty years before any of the scriptural accounts were written.
For historians trying to decide which parts of the Gospels are actually eyewitness accounts of Jesus’ words and deeds, presence in all four Gospels is a strong indicator that an event really happened or that Jesus’ real words are actually recorded there. Chances are good that some remarkable event involving food and a large crowd following Jesus actually happened. But even if it didn’t, this story clearly has something important to tell about what early Christians thought about Jesus, and about themselves.
For many generations, Christian clergy and scholars saw the miracles attributed to Jesus as proof of his divine nature. If the miracles were true, they said, Jesus must be God; if not, all Christianity must be false. That’s been one of the most common traditional interpretations of this story. Another has been that God will provide; that God cares for us all as Jesus felt compassion for the crowd and would not have us suffer needlessly. Other readers have seen that we like the hungry multitudes are dependent on God’s bounty for our well-being, and that through Jesus we are fed not just food but spiritual sustenance. This understanding is heightened by the fact that as the disciples bring Jesus the loaves and fishes he repeats the same pattern that later creates the sacrament of Communion: he took the bread, blessed it, then broke it and gave it to his disciples, saying in this precursor not “This is my body,” but “Feed the people.”
Our heretical religious ancestors and others realized finally that the truth of Christianity does not depend on whether or not Jesus could control the laws of nature, or on whether we believe in the Trinity. Rooted firmly in science and historical Bible criticism, they wanted to think about what might have really happened in this beloved episode of Jesus’ story. What is a real miracle? Does there have to be magic?
Suppose you decided even on the spur of the moment that you were going to walk out of town to hear that famous new Rabbi speak. Wouldn’t you have grabbed an apricot, a handful of nuts or dates or a piece or two of bread and stuffed them in your pockets on the way out the door? People were excited to hear and see Jesus, but they weren’t foolish. Then as the day wears on and you think about snacking on your private bounty, you see up at the front that boy with his few things and Jesus and the disciples preparing to give their dinner away. What can you do? You turn to your neighbor in the crowd and say “So, Jakov, you’re hungry? Would you have a few of these almonds?
Now that would be a miracle, wouldn’t it, a crowd of people thinking only of their own comfort suddenly transformed into a generous community: A perfectly natural miracle of sharing.
Or suppose there really wasn’t anything more than bread and smoked fish. You’ve just given up a day to hear the words of a great spiritual teacher. You’re hungry, sure, but you see there’s hardly any food. There are children out here, for goodness’ sake; how could we all have been so thoughtless, leaving the house and walking right through the market square without picking up any provisions? Filled with a new sense of your own connection to God, what are you going to do when the meager basket comes your way? “No, thanks, I’ll pass; I’m not very hungry, or—I’m fasting, really, I can wait until morning. Why don’t you take a few bites to that boy and girl over there?”
Now that would be a miracle, wouldn’t it, thousands of people suddenly realizing that someone else’s need might be greater or more urgent than our own: A perfectly natural miracle of abundance and grace.
What is the miracle? African American theologian Howard Thurman speaks of “the glad surprise,” the unexpected turn of events when thing are at their worst that without warning reaffirms joy, hope, and life, and invites us to see our lives and the world in a new light. I have thought of a miracle as the moment when no-hope turns to hope, somehow opening up possibilities where a moment before we had only seen shadow and disaster. It’s a transformation that always happens just out of sight, in the space between “They gave the food to the crowd, and “everyone was satisfied.”
But what should we do in the endless moments between the lines of our own stories, in the borderland between “no-hope” and “hope”? When we’re in a situation where a positive resolution seems unlikely at best, when things look bleak if not impossible, how should we behave? How do you wait for a miracle?
The crowd and the disciples offer two very different possibilities. The crowd is completely passive. If someone tells them to go to town, they’ll go to town and get something to eat; if not, they’ll go hungry. They’re not expecting a miracle, of course. They just haven’t thought things through very well.
The natural miracles of generosity and abundance contradict that passivity; maybe that’s why practical, this-worldly people like us prefer them. The crowd isn’t helpless or foolish; they are just waiting for leadership. I have to remember though that the Gospel versions of this event don’t offer any more support for these explanations than they do for the magical one. The story doesn’t say how the multitudes were fed; it just describes what people did.
The disciples are much more active and practical than the crowds. Before people have even begun to feel hungry, they come to Jesus and say, “We’re a long way from a falafel stand here. What are we going to do about dinner?” When he tells them to feed the people, they tell him what the inventory is. They’re not complaining or challenging him; they’re just giving him relevant information.
Jesus responds, “Bring me the food.” Then he blesses it and again he tells them to feed the people. So they do. What really happened next? There is no way to ever know, and for me it just isn’t the point. I’m more interested in what the disciples do. When things look bad, they don’t panic, they don’t pray for a miracle, they act. They show compassion and care for people at risk of suffering; they assess the potential risks of the situation and the available resources, and they do what they know is right. They act as if whatever they have will be enough—or better yet, as if it doesn’t matter whether there’s enough or not, because their responsibility is to share.
Can it be that this is what makes miracles happen?