“Faith that Satisfies”

This morning our attention is fixed upon one of the most well-known miracles of Jesus Christ, the feeding of the 5,000. This single miracle is better known on the streets of Devine and beyond than even the miracles where Jesus restored sight to the blind or made the crippled to walk again.

As we begin to wrap our minds around this miracle, let me invite us to start by considering the bonsai tree. The bonsai is something that we are accustomed to witnessing and risk overlooking amazing things about it. Bonsai trees are otherwise normal trees that are deliberately kept small. They are grown in little pots where they can put down only shallow roots. They are obsessively pruned to stunt them and keep them from growing tall or wide. They are mighty woods relegated to mere flowerpots, whole forests confined to side tables. Though they may live for centuries, they grow no more than one or two feet tall. Though they have such potential, their gardener applies constant and deliberate action to keep them from ever reaching it. If you think about it, the bonsai is a strange thing that a gardener would choose to grow a dwarf in place of a giant.

I’ve got us thinking about the bonsai tree this morning because we have arrived at the final message in our Resilient Faith series. And in light of what we’ve seen over the last month and a half together, we’re more like the disciples who walked with Jesus than we are the Christians that Jesus is calling you and me to be. When it comes to the matter of faith, though we’ve seen that Jesus has the authority over nature, over the demonic, over the diseased, over death, and even the authority to send us out to proclaim the foolishness of a bloody cross and an empty tomb, in practical terms, we don’t really experience resiliency do we? We don’t each find that there is that ability rise again from our toughest moments…which leads the lives we live to still find us wanting for something more. We don’t see resiliency because we have a dwarfed faith…where perhaps if the bonsai tree was a representation of our faith, we’re like the tedious gardener who is content to trim and trim and trim so as to restrict or limit what God wants to accomplish fully within us. In any number of ways, we act as that bonsai gardener to limit what ought to be a blossoming faith that moves mountains and sees the awesome power of the Holy Spirit.

At some point, whether it’s been when you’re really up against it or just in the quiet of your soul, you’ve had to ask yourself, “Is this it? Am I living God’s purpose in the faith I possess?” Or, perhaps a more challenging question for you and I today, does your faith in Jesus Christ satisfy the depths of your soul? Well, you’ll find your answer depending on how you answer this:

Do I have a resilient faith?

And certainly that’s a question intended for you to ask of yourself. There are three headings that will serve to guide our time in this text together, and they all start with the phrase “A resilient faith…” As we work through this passage, I pray you’re open to what God is seeking to accomplish in you both through exhortation and through warning in this passage. The first thing we will see about a resilient faith is a word of warning, which is:

A resilient faith is watchful for pride

For everyone’s benefit, there is a difference between the kind of pride that God hates and the kind of pride we can feel about a job well done or the kind of pride we express when a love one accomplishes something. The kind of pride that comes from a sense that you are self-righteous or from a sense of conceit is sin. God hates this sense of pride because for anyone who is consumed by it, their pride proves to be a hindrance to seeking the Lord. Saying this another way, if you think so highly of yourself and your ability, you convince yourself that you’re good without God. Pride like how I am talking about it right now has been called the carbon monoxide of sin, meaning you don’t even necessarily detect the scent of carbon monoxide, but when it’s present, it will suffocate you to death. And God doesn’t want you or I to be suffocated with sin, that’s why God in his word speaks so strongly against pride. God hates pride. God says that many times over in his word, take for example

Proverbs 8:13 (ESV)

Pride and arrogance and the way of evil and perverted speech I hate.

Now, that we have in our heads that short understanding of pride that God hates, I want us to see how the Lord Jesus is guarding the disciples from being consumed with pride. Notice with me in your Bibles that our passage opens with a transition:

Luke 9:10 (ESV)

On their return the apostles told him all that they had done.

It’s been two weeks since we looked at Luke’s Gospel, so let’s remind ourselves of a few things. Luke 9:10 says that the apostles had just returned. Where’d they returned from? If we look back at Luke 9:1–2 we see that the Lord Jesus had “…called the twelve together and gave them power and authority over all demons and to cure diseases, and he sent them out to proclaim the kingdom of God and to heal.” So the twelve apostles had returned from their journeys preaching about God’s kingdom and healing. And if we remember, in their going out, it appears their preaching and their healing must’ve had some effect upon the people they went to because word was spreading. Even the leaders of the region had heard about it all and were beginning to get nervous.

So they return home from their goings and as it says overhead, they told Jesus about all they had done. That emphasis on the screen for they is mine but I’ve placed it there because when you consider the rest of the verse, it’s rather telling.

Luke 9:10 (ESV)

On their return the apostles told him all that they had done. And he took them and withdrew apart to a town called Bethsaida.

Jesus got them out of Capernaum where all the throngs of followers were and I don’t think this detail should be overlooked. The Holy Spirit led Luke to record these miracle events that have taken place one after another after another so that you and I as readers would have impressed upon us the undeniable fact that Jesus is God and the undeniable fact that Jesus is all-powerful. And in the midst of this, God has chosen to entrust the labor of advancing of his kingdom to people like you and me and this work is to be done in and by the power of his Spirit. And for as much as these apostles have been witness to Jesus speaking the word and seeing all creation, death, demons, and disease respond to his authority and power, now here they return and talk about all they had done. Jesus had sent them out in his power and they return talking about their accomplishment. “We preached the kingdom! We healed the sick!”

Luke doesn’t intend for us to to have a necessarily negative perspective on these apostles and please know that I’m not arguing that we should. Yet, as we see that Jesus takes them to a place that would have been quiet, even if for a brief moment, we have to acknowledge the danger that is pride when it comes to God moving mightily in and through you and me. We have to recognize that in those moments after great spiritual victory, the last thing we should do is celebrate and the first thing we should do is retreat to the quiet and solitude so that the Lord Jesus can reorient our hearts upon him and his strength.

I rejoiced when I received an email early this week from Brother Cooke that shared that of the 400 Cubans his mission team shared the gospel with, over 360 of them received Christ. 360+ souls were saved in one week by a small group no larger than these apostles of Jesus. Glory to God! And for as profound as an impact as that is - that’s an 90% conversion rate, it’s exceptionally profound - the only thing that mission team can say of themselves is that they were faithful to obey God’s call for them to go. Their words - not to their credit, but to the Lord’s. The effectiveness of their speech - not to their credit, but to the Lord’s.

Last year, in this church, we baptized 45 souls. Praise God, right? We’ve never seen that before in this church family. But do you know what we can say to that? You planted, I watered, but it is the Lord who brought the multiply. We must be ever careful to remember that our labors for King Jesus and his kingdom are not accomplished in our own power and they are most certainly not to our credit. They are done in the power of his Spirit for the glory of the King. There is a sense in which you will find satisfaction when we present ourselves to God as one who has been approved, but you will not find satisfaction in how great you think you are nor how important you believe yourself to be, especially in matters of the faith. This conceit will not satisfy, but do you know what pride will do to you? It will destroy you. That’s what pride did to a former King of Judah named Uzziah. As you read about the succession of kings in Judah, you should know he was one of the good ones who was intelligent, innovative, and made it a point to seek God. And along the way, Uzziah had grown famous. He had become strong. And God’s word say that

2 Chronicles 26:16 (ESV)

…when he [King Uzziah] was strong, he grew proud, to his destruction.

A resilient faith is watchful for pride, so

When God works through you, praise Him, and withdraw to the quiet so He can guard your heart from pride

Run from the groups that will only offer you back slaps and atta-boys. Receive the compliments of others with grace but don’t let those flattering words make your head swell. Come to the place that you realize that

A resilient faith is humble

Much in the same way that I started the last heading with a definition, I’ll do the same thing here. Humility is the opposite of pride. Humility is a state of being where we recognize that others matter more than we do. Humility is not a sense that you think less of yourself, where you just tell yourself how terrible you are or something like that. No, humility is a sense where you do think about yourself less.

And that’s what we see Jesus doing here in Luke 9:11, isn’t it? He no sooner got the apostles away from the crowds so their heads wouldn’t swell from all the stories they were telling about what they accomplished than the crowds caught wind of where they were and surrounded Jesus once more. Do you know what amazes me routinely about Jesus? It’s his humble and gracious hospitality. Do you see what it says about Jesus in Luke 9:11 when the crowds got to them? It says he welcomed them. Jesus didn’t hear the tramping of foot steps and come out on the porch with a shotgun to run everyone off saying that it was a boys’ weekend. He didn’t declare that he needed some “me” time. No, he humbly welcomed them and interestingly enough, he started doing what the apostles had just returned from doing - proclaiming the kingdom of God and healing. Could that have been a subtle reminder to the apostles of the one through whom all their accomplishments were done? Perhaps…

But I’ve got to tell you, humility in the sense that Jesus has put on display here is not natural for you and for me. The sense where you esteem others better than yourself isn’t natural to us, that’s only by a supernatural work within us. What’s natural for you and me is to put ourselves first and to put everybody else last. But Jesus doesn’t assert himself here, rather, in the small act of humbly welcoming the crowds, Jesus is already pointing to the eventuality and the significance of the cross through this act of giving himself away.

You’ve probably heard it said that someone’s actions reveal who they are. Do you know what it is beneath this humility of Jesus? It’s the same thing as what is beneath Jesus willfully giving himself away on the cross. Do you know what it is? It’s the love of God. Speaking about God’s nature, the Bible says simply, 1 John 4:8 “…God is love.” The nature of God is that agape, sacrificial love that you remember we talked about a few months ago.

See, this life that the Son of God lived for 33 years… The whole of the Incarnation is a testament to the love of God. The Second Person of the Trinity abandoned Heaven. Consider for a moment… If you were the King of Heaven, would you leave the throne? Jesus did. And he added to himself humanity, which when you think that out, though he never stopped being God, Jesus became one of the creatures he created. If you’re maybe someone who is skeptical about God and about sin and the need of salvation, let me pose this question to you: What other religious system in the world has a story where God is born as a man and is fully human? I’ll tell you, there isn’t one. There isn’t one because this defies human imagination!

And beyond lowering himself by becoming human, Jesus identifies with the worst and the least - sinners - so that they may be saved from their sin. And more than that… so that sinners might be saved, in the love of God, the God-man Jesus took upon himself all our sin and put that sin to death! My friends, Behold this Jesus, who is John 1:29 “…the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world!”

And in beholding the glory of the Savior, can I ask you… How satisfying is the thought that all that you’re ashamed of about your past can be put to death? How satisfying is the thought that you don’t have to be condemned by your sin because Jesus put sin to death in his cross?

That’s what Jesus is offering you. Why? Because he loves you. And at that, how satisfying is the thought of being loved wholly and perfectly? You’re used to earning love but love is who God is. You don’t earn it, he gives it freely. The love of God Almighty is powerful. God’s love pursues us even when we’re rebelling against Jesus and even though we don’t do a great job of following the Lord. We don’t deserve it, yet that’s who God is. He loves us even when we’re unlovable.

If I can exhort us this morning… I sense some of us are growing weary. Spread thin and anxious about any number of things happening in the nation, the county, the city, or in the church. The evil one would love for us to turn on one another right now… The devil wants to see us each look out for #1 and say so what? about our brothers and sisters. So long as I get it my way or how I like it or as long as it’s not me doing that, I’ll be happy. Let’s remember this

1 John 4:7 (ESV)

Beloved, let us love one another, for love is from God, and whoever loves has been born of God and knows God.

A resilient faith is humble, so

Invite the Holy Spirit to grow you in Christlike humility because it reveals the love of God

A resilient faith is watchful for pride and it is humble. What we can see next is that

A resilient faith trusts God will provide

For our time thus far, we’ve focused on matters leading up to the miracle and that’s intentional. Often we fix our attention on what is bright and shiny and miss the detail that surrounds it. Let me remind us of a few things. Jesus has been preaching about the kingdom of God and he’s been healing folks and now the day is drawing to a close. The twelve apostles know that it’s getting to the point in the day that folks will be looking for a meal and so they start signaling that it’s time to wrap things up for the day. God in the flesh is doing exactly what he came to earth to do, but the apostles are looking to shut down the work of God because they see five thousand men whose tummies will start grumbling, if they aren’t already, and they look to send away the five thousand into the nearby towns to get supper. So the apostles come to Jesus and tell him that it’s time to wind the day up and Jesus responds oddly, “You give them something to eat.” They do what you and I would do and go check the fridge and the pantry and tell Jesus, “Hey, we wish we could feed them, but we just don’t have enough on hand to fix a meal for all these people.”

So Jesus does something even more odd and has all the five thousand sit down and he takes just a handful of bread loaves and two fish, he looks up to heaven and blessed five bread loaves and two fish. Then they start to break apart those loaves and fish and miraculously, every one ate to their satisfaction and there were even leftovers.

There is an interesting relationship between faith and fear such that circumstances that strike fear into you and me can make us sure seem like people who don’t operate in a way that fully trusts in and relies upon the Lord Jesus. Do you remember when the COVID pandemic came that fear drove us to buy up all the toilet paper? Was there really an issue with toilet paper production? No. But when the suggestion that things like toilet paper will become scarce gets into our minds, we sure affect the supply of things. I’ve already seen local news stations suggesting that with the influx of people coming to South Texas for the eclipse in a few weeks, there will be gasoline and food shortages. Are retailers really not preparing for this? I think this is all baloney, but there will be shortages if we approach life with a scarcity mindset.

See, there’s nothing satisfying when you go out hoarding stuff because that’s not a heart that gives itself away, that’s a heart that loves itself more than anyone else. And I could be stepping on toes this morning, but let me push a little deeper on the condition of our hearts and the Lord’s ability to provide. Let me speak to what are just some obvious big things going on in the life of this church. We have not one, but two, full-time positions we will need to staff. What you’ll hear tonight at our business meeting is about a combined music and youth pastor position. At some point we’ll need to address the position that Pastor Carlos currently fills. Oh pastoral staff aside, we’re making progress on bringing a master plan to the church family that will serve to guide us to renovate and develop this campus for future generations. Staffing, buildings, all the while we all feel the effect of our dollars not stretching as far they once did.

These are challenges. Serious ones. How do we provide for these ministers that our congregation needs to support and lead it? How do we raise the funds to focus on these facilities? You know, Jesus is gathering more and more people here to hear about God’s kingdom and be healed of their sin. And our first inclination might be to clam up and tell ourselves we should wait some things out, but is that what our Lord would have us do? Do you think that perhaps he’s telling us to feed them?

If that’s what the Lord’s saying, then we cannot look to the example of the apostles, pull out our pockets, and say, “but we lack provision.” And surely someone’s thinking, “Well, I knew it. He’s a typical Baptist preacher, just reaching for my wallet.” My friend, I’m not reaching for your wallet. I’m reaching for your heart. But if your wallet happens to be where your heart should be, well, then that’s an issue you’ll need to address with the Lord.

Can I suggest to you that we are exactly where the Lord wants us? The community is gathering to hear the gospel and to see the gospel applied in lives and the love of the Father shared throughout Devine and beyond. And someone wonders, “How can this be where the Lord wants us? We’re stretched to our limits!” Yes! That’s it! We might be where he wants us because we might finally be at the place where we aren’t trusting in our ability to make things happen, but we will finally be relying upon his!

That’s how the great George Mueller lived. He was an Englishman who was an evangelist and ran an orphanage. He was doing the Lord’s work. Read about Mueller and you’ll read about a man who trusted in God’s faithfulness to provide. One morning at his orphanage, the housemother told him that there was no food or drink for the 300 children. Do you know what Mueller did? Mueller had all the kids come to the dining room and sit down. He thanked God for the food that wasn’t even there and they waited. MINUTES later, there’s a knock at the door. It’s the town baker. The baker tells Mueller he couldn’t sleep the entire night and that somehow he knew the orphanage needed bread. So the baker got up and baked three batches. MINUTES after that, another knock! It was the town milkman. His cart had broken down and he wanted to offer the milk to the orphanage so the milk he carried wouldn’t go to waste.

I am going to challenge you with a point of application to this heading and it will be especially challenging if you’re someone who is struggling with this right now because all you know is self-reliance. Here it is:

Ask God to bring you to the end of yourself so you can see Him

I’m going to warn you that this is as bold a request of God as praying for patience. You’re not going to be comfortable, but you will be cared for and loved by our perfect God. But if you aren’t willing to arrive at the end of yourself, then you faith life is like that bonsai tree. It’s kept small. It’s stagnant. There are no roots that go deep to draw from the rich wells of living water. And that dwarfed, restricted life is not what God has raised you from death into.

This is the God who delivered his people out of oppression in Egypt and provided for them when their backs were up against the Red Sea. This the God who called Daniel, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego into pagan rule and provided for them both in the jails and at their attempted executions. This is the God who called upon himself to put our sin to death in the cross.

Let me say this:

A resilient faith knows that God has provided for all our need in Jesus Christ

These apostles…they walked with Jesus, they heard him preach and knew there was something unique about his teaching. His teaching had an authority like none other. They saw him demonstrate his ability and they knew he is like no one else. And yet, when push came to shove, at Bethsaida, they came up short in trusting Jesus. They thought there was no way out of their dire situation, saying, “How we gonna feed them? We gotta get them out of here.” Well, these same apostles will hear Jesus predict his death and resurrection, but when the huge boulder was rolled to seal his tomb, they said in effect, “How’s he gonna get out of there?”

And just as Mueller’s empty tables were filled with bread and milk by God’s provision, so was the dead body of our Lord filled with life by God’s provision. I cannot proclaim emphatically enough, Christ is risen! And that changes everything!

Repent of your sin, loved ones. Repent for the pruning you’re doing that is dwarfing your faith in Jesus the victorious and triumphant. Rejoice in the satisfaction of Christ’s provision - he’s provided the death sentence to our sin and death itself. He provides for us in every need we have, too. Relish with satisfaction that by grace alone through faith alone in the Son alone that you know Christ and the power of his resurrection.