Thoughts & Homilies

There's Plenty For All
A Homily for the 17th Sunday in Ordinary Time - July 27, 2003

Theme: The feeding of the 5000
At every Eucharist we pray for "our daily bread".
May the God who feeds us at this Mass also give us generous hearts and a willingness to share.

Prayer: God of life, we look to you for hope and love and nourishment. Hear our prayers and feed our deepest hungers. We ask this in your name. Amen

Homily:
I heard about a man recently who grew up thinking his grandmother was there the day Jesus fed the 5000.
He came to that belief because whenever that particular gospel was read, everyone in the family whispered:
"Grandma musta been there!"
And they would chuckle.
They all knew that no matter how many people arrived for dinner at her house, even unexpectedly,
everyone ate, and there was always plenty left over.
Grandma was something of a miracle worker in the kitchen. Perhaps you know people like that.

Some people are that way.
They have a keen sense of abundance.
There's plenty in life to go around,
and they love to share what they have.

Others are Scrooges who hoard everything,
worrying that there's never enough,
and if you share, there's that much less for yourself.
The apostles were something like that when Jesus asked them to start offering what little they could muster in the way of food.
But then food started showing up,
and everyone ate their fill with plenty left over.

This miracle holds a very special place in the Gospels.
It's the only one recorded by all four Gospel writers.
In fact, it's found six times in the four Gospels.
Matthew and Mark recount the miracle on two separate occasions. Today we hear the event as told by St. John.
He doesn't call it a miracle.
He calls it a "sign."
A "sign" was St. John's word for an act of God's power
at work in Jesus to reveal his true identity
and challenge the people to believe in him.
In John's Gospel, there are 7 such signs.
The first is changing water into wine at Cana.
The last is raising Lazarus from the dead.
The feeding of the 5000 is the 4th sign.

Today and for the next four Sundays all of our Gospel passages will be taken from the 6th chapter of St. John.
This chapter begins with the feeding of the 5000.
It then goes on to give the deepest Eucharistic theology found anywhere in the Bible.
What we shall learn again over the next five weeks
is that God feeds us in so many ways.

God knows our deepest hungers
and is ready to nourish us on a moments notice.

I'm not just talking about food,
and neither is this chapter of John.
God knows we can have full stomachs and well-stocked refrigerators and still feel empty.

What drew thousands of people to the hillside that day?
Not just to picnic.
They were hungry - hungry for the word of God
- hungry to be with the one person who offered them hope.
They were so intent on listening to Jesus,
they came unprepared to meet their own physical hunger.

But Jesus knew.

And he fed them - not only with bread and fish,
but with encouragement, compassion, healing and light.
He offered them something greater than bread
- a relationship with God,
- nourishment, life,
- sustenance only he could give.
And even more than that,
he taught them a great lesson about the power of sharing.
Give something away. Give everything away,
and you'll still end up having more.

Jesus made an extravagant gesture of generosity and hospitality. He gave away everything he and his disciples had brought with them. And there was enough…
God blessed them with more.
The crowd was fed…
and there were 12 baskets of leftovers besides.

Our faith teaches us to share, to give
not just because it's a nice thing to do,
but because that is the nature of God
in whose image we were made.
With God there is no skimping.

The God who created the countless stars in the sky and who pours out his life into all of creation is no miser.
He says to us:
Open your heart.

There's plenty for all.

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