Sermon Tone Analysis

Pentecost 11

Matt.

14:13-21

July 31, 2005

*“Refugees in Need”*

*Intro:*  Their faces look like our own.

They look like us - from the very rich to the very poor.

They walk silently, their faces down cast with despair.

Women carry nursing infants in their arms as they struggle on rocky paths and war torn roads.

Old men and young men stumble as they carry the elderly and the sick and the dying.

They walk without hope.

They are lost, suffering, homeless, in need of healing and in need of food.

These are the refugees of the world, our world.

We have seen their faces as we have watched the war in Iraq and Afghanistan.

We have seen them as they walked the beaches of Thailand and India after the tsunami.

We have seen them in the faces of the refugees in war torn Sudan and in the starving people of Africa.

Look closely at their faces when you watch the news on TV and when you read your newspapers.

Look at their faces.

You will see your own.

These people are refugees in need.

See their hunger and their pain.

And remember, you are refugees in need too.

How hungry are you?

Are you even aware of your hunger?

Today’s text speaks to us about our needs and how they are met.

Only the Lord knows our needs and only the Lord can satisfy them.

I.       *The Lord Knows His Peoples Needs*

A.    *He Knew Their Needs – Then.

*The Lord has always known the needs of His people.

The text details for us the miracle of the feeding of the five-thousand - the only miracle, besides the resurrection, recorded in all four gospels.

It was the spring time of the year just prior to the Jewish Passover and a year before Jesus was crucified.

Jesus had just spent a considerable amount of time teaching the people.

His disciples had just come back from a mission trip.

(Pause) Jesus, upon hearing the news of John the Baptists death, decided to take some private time in the desolate area near Bethsaida located on the eastern shore of the Jordan river and north of the Sea of Galilee.

However the crowds followed him.

They came from the surrounding towns, walking as much as eight miles.

They followed Christ into the deserted land.

They came with their sick.

They came in their suffering and in their need.

They cam with their hunger.

They came hungering for peace of mind and of spirit.

They had heard Jesus words and they had seen the signs that he had done.

They were wondering - “is this the Messiah”?

It was for these people that he came into the world.

They were lost, oppressed, sick and dying.

He knew what their needs were.

“He had compassion on them.”

They were refugees in a desolate world of sin and death which they themselves had created.

B.     *He Knows Our Needs – Now.  *Our world today is no different from in the time of Christ.

Our needs are the same as their needs were.

We find ourselves lost in a world that doesn’t make sense.

We hear of wars in other countries, and see the violence on our own cities streets.

We hear of the homeless and we suffer anxiety about losing our own homes, families and jobs.

We hear of people that hunger and we eat but rarely are we satisfied.

We suffer from sickness and desire healing for ourselves and those we love.

We fear death.

Most of all we hunger for peace of mind and spirit.

Often it seems like we are on our own and it seems that no one cares about us.

We are refugees in a desolate world of sin and death which we ourselves have created.

(Pause) Who will meet our needs?

C.     *We Can’t Meet Our Needs.

*We may be tempted to take care of ourselves.

Isn’t that what the American dream is all about - Self Actualization?  Through our own means it may appear that we are successful.

Rejecting our sense of being lost we may try to find relevance in the popular philosophies of our time.

We isolate ourselves from the violence of our own communities, by living in safe neighborhoods; we try to find comfort thinking that our families are safer living in the country and in small towns a safe distance from the horrors of the big city.

We store up food in fear of not having enough.

We hope that we will always have enough money to take care of ourselves, but often fear that we won’t have enough.

Nice families, homes in the country, the bountiful fair of farm life and the security of the Pig grocery store, they are all vanity.

They are here today and gone tomorrow.

Our real suffering comes from our spiritual condition and spiritual starvation.

No matter what we do or try, what we really need, we cannot satisfy.

We hunger for peace of mind and of spirit and cannot find it on our own.

We are refugees.

II.

*The Lord Provides For Our Needs*

A.    *He Alone Satisfies.

*The disciples wanted to send the people off to fend for themselves.

Jesus says “they do not need to go away.”

He knew that he was the source of their satisfaction.

He alone could meet their needs.

He alone could heal and feed them.

The Lord has always met the needs of his people.

The Jews knew that many Passovers ago, Moses led the people of Israel out into the wilderness, a desolate place.

It is there that God fed them miraculously with food from Heaven called Manna.

For forty years these refugees from Egypt were supplied with Manna until they crossed into the Promised Land.

Now here they were with Jesus who had delivered them by his word and healed them by his touch.

Then they found themselves in the wilderness sitting on the grass being fed by Him.

We may recall the words of Ps. 23 “He makes me to lie down in green pastures; He leads me beside still waters.

He restores my soul.

He leads me in the paths of righteousness for His names sake…he prepares a table for me…”

B.     *Our Daily Needs.

*Five loaves of bread and a couple of fish, it was an excellent meal for five thousand people.

Just as Christ took care of the daily needs of the people with Him; God wants you to know that he will provide for your daily needs also.

He knows what you need to live on.

Be confident that you will have enough.

In St. Paul’s letter to the Phillipians (4:19), he writes “my God shall supply all your needs according to His riches in glory by Christ Jesus”.

Some of you are wealthy; use it to the glory of God.

Some of you have just enough, rest assured that you will have just enough tomorrow.

Our bodies have many needs and the Lord leads us in the fourth petition of His prayer - “give us this day our daily bread.”

He gladly gives it to you.

C.     *Our Eternal Needs met at the Cross*.