MAIN HOMILETICS OF THE PARAGRAPH.— Mark 6:33-44
(PARALLELS: Matthew 14:13-21; Luke 9:10-17; John 6:1-13.)
The multitude fed.—When Jesus came forth from a brief rest, He was confronted in the desert place by the familiar sight of sinful, weary, sick humanity. That they should come there was almost a miracle of His attractive power. At once, we are told, the streams of His mercy began to flow.
I. The compassion of Jesus.—A great multitude is always a moving spectacle. The pathos of life comes out before our imaginations, as we behold in it so many broken, disordered, disappointing, wrecked lives; so much that begins with gladness and ends in grief; so much sin, and the countless victories of death. Even the withered heart of Xerxes was touched, when he sat on a throne at Salamis and looked down on his army of a million slaves, all of whom, he said, would soon pass away. Then we must remember that the company gathered around Jesus was at that time peculiarly a sad one. They were there because they were in need and they felt the need. Weary with a long journey, pressing their claims on His attention, stretching out “lame hands” of questioning and doubt, lifting imploring eyes to meet His—what could quicker touch the fountain of His compassion? He was deeply moved. His face changed with mingled sorrow and love. Now, who were they? He had compassion on them because they were as sheep that had been over-driven and were fainting on the road. And He stood before them as the Good Shepherd, who was soon to lay down His life for the sheep. This brings us to dwell upon the attitude of the Holy One towards sin and towards sinners separately and in masses. That whole company, men, women, and children, were sinners. Because they were such, He had come into the world to save them; and we might presume that the supreme fact about them in His mind was their sinfulness and guilt. But this compassion at the sight of the crowd speaks to us of that other relation in which He could look at them, even as objects of pity, while they were objects of condemnation. They were offenders against the holy law, but at the same time they were lost sheep to be called home. But this pity, we observe next, took shape in forms of real helpfulness. It was not wasted in the heart, like the emotions that come and go as we read a novel or see a play at the theatre, and think our feelings are tender because they are moved by imaginary griefs. The compassion of our Lord took on a twofold form: one, that of setting in motion far-reaching works in the preaching of the gospel among the nations and the seed-sowing of distant harvests; the other, a nearer, simpler attention to immediate wants.
II. The power of Jesus.—” He bowed the heavens and came down “to the measure of commonest human need. The fact about this power that touches us most is that it is power to bless the world, and to bring salvation to the lost. Each miracle of our Lord’s was a sign of something farther, something more lasting and blessed. How soon all that desert multitude passed away from earth! How quickly the bread created by miracle perished! And yet it stood for that which is imperishable, and on which, if we feed as we all may, we shall never hunger again. Christ Himself is the Bread of God that cometh down from heaven and giveth life to the world. We may feed on it each moment and never exhaust the supply. He is not a luxury, but bread to be eaten freely and without satiety. The whole lesson is that of the Divine helpfulness for all our needs, and of the Divine fulness of supply.
III. The command of Jesus to His disciples in all ages.—Each step in the supply of the crowd with food is interesting to all who preach or teach the everlasting Word, because it reveals the natural unbelief and distrust with which we have to contend when many are to be fed by us and we are sure that our stock is not sufficient. Many a time, if you preach, when you look upon a company of men seated in God’s house to hear your voice, you will feel like Philip, and wonder whence provision is coming for so many. But if you bring your scanty loaves and fishes—if you bid the men sit down to receive, not your fancies nor wisdom, your eloquence nor knowledge, but heaven’s bread, and that only—you will find the old miracle repeated. You will take what Christ hands over to you and pass it on to others. You will be fed by what feeds them. You will say with them, when the feast is over, “Lord, evermore give us this bread.” For, after all, this and this only is our work—to give what is given unto us. We are not to despise hard labour in winning our supplies. They will not come to the lazy nor to the ignorant. We are called to seek a chastened spirit that discerns the true intent of the heavenly messages. We are to meditate on the Word and grow into its spirit and life. We surely must obey it, and so prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God. But for the real conveyance of food from God to a soul we must rely on God Himself.—Edward N. Packard.
OUTLINES AND COMMENTS ON THE VERSES
Mark 6:33. Christ’s followers drawn by various motives.—
1. Some were drawn with the strangeness of those things which He wrought and taught amongst them. To whom in these our days we may compare them which haunt sermons for no other end but either vainly to hearken for news, or curiously to note what order and eloquence they may find in the preacher, or maliciously to take hold of things spoken, when they may by froward construction be drawn to an offensive meaning. These labour to their own loss: they are unprofitable followers.
2. Others followed Christ for bread. Such followers our times have brought out too many. So long as the gospel can feed, cherish, and maintain them, they are willing and glad to be professors of it; but when persecution cometh they shrink.
3. Sundry there were which followed for a desire which they had of bodily health. For Christ “went about healing every malady and every infirmity in the people.” We see by daily experience that the body is more cared for than the soul, the flesh than the spirit, the carcase than the mind.
4. The last and best sort of followers were such as followed Christ to hear His Word. This is that travail that chiefly is required of a Christian: “Seek first the kingdom of God.” This declareth us to be His children, to be His flock. “He that is of God heareth God’s Word.”—Archbishop Sandys.
The importunity of the crowd.—The fact thus revealed is worthy of observation, as a commentary upon the weary life of our Lord. He wished His disciples to retire to the desert to take some rest, but the people would let them have none. If the reasons which prompted them to follow Christ were really the love of His doctrine, then we may gain a lesson from their importunity, and we may be sure that, however much it might increase His labours, Christ would be pleased by such importunity. What displeases Christ is the quiet, easy indifference of those who care not for His presence, and will not put themselves out of the way to hear His words.—Bishop H. Goodwin.
Mark 6:34. The Church and social questions.—The virtue of compassion is the great discovery of Christ. The world’s pain and weakness were to the heathen a definite loss to society. It was only so much human waste. Christ believed in the usefulness of things, and utilised the rejected refuse of society. It was in this refuse that Jesus reared the tender plant of compassion. Fed upon sorrow and sickness, and watered with tears, compassion has redeemed the waste places, and made them blossom as the rose. Yet Christian compassion has been slow to overtake the whole field that claimed its energy and its labour. Compassion towards individuals was early developed as one of the first and finest of the Christian graces. Compassion towards the multitudes was, till lately, left uncultivated. This, no doubt, is partly to be accounted for by the fact that in Greece and in the Roman Empire the claims and interests of the State were paramount. The individual was sacrificed to society—so much so, that in Sparta sickness was regarded more as a crime than a misfortune. Weak children were quietly put out of the way, lest they should become a burden. In Rome the individual gave himself up in the arena of the Colosseum that the emperor and the people might enjoy the luxury of a fierce laugh or cry. As a rebound from this contempt for the sacredness of the individual, Christianity long confined itself to the salvation of the units of society. The masses, the multitudes, have to a great extent been neglected. But everywhere around us there are signs that the social conscience is being deeply moved. The trend of present-day activity is distinctly in the direction of redressing the wrongs and securing the rights of society. Now the question requires to be raised, What is to be the attitude of the Church towards the great problems relating to the social weal with which we are brought face to face? The answer is sometimes returned that the Church should confine itself to the duty of saving the souls of men; that she should only deal with men as individuals, and not with human society. Now this reply, which limits the sphere of Christian activity, requires to be looked at in order to see the poor conception of humanity and the paltry faith in Christ’s power which are at the root of it.
1. When we are told to confine ourselves to the care and salvation of the souls of men, we wonder how this can fit in with Christ’s idea of man. A great deal of His time was occupied in ministering to men’s bodies. To tell me that I am to save the soul of a man who is starving, or living in a filthy hovel, or almost worked to death, raises in my mind the query, “How is it to be done?” The physical and mental conditions under which a man exists have such an influence upon his spiritual condition that we must treat them all concurrently. Hence the justification for social work alongside of our evangelistic agencies.
2. Again, we are warned that the Church should confine itself to operating upon the individual, and leave social questions alone. What would you think of a man who advised a gardener to confine his attention to cultivating his plants, but not to heed the soil in which the plants had to grow? Society is to the individual what soil is to the plant. In order to save a man we must preach the gospel of Jesus Christ to him as an individual, but we must see that his Christian life is not next to impossible in the social surroundings in which he is compelled to live. The salvation of the individual and the salvation of society must go hand in hand. Now, if this be the case, the relation of the gospel to human life becomes more extensive and more complex than is generally supposed. Everything that affects the well-being of man is a proper subject of Christian inquiry.
3. But it is sometimes objected that the Church should have nothing to do with subjects that are under dispute, and upon which men, from interest or conviction, are divided. It is sufficient to reply that if the Church of Christ is only to deal with those things upon which men are agreed, her mission is useless, and her influence effete. The religious, social, and political life of the people is complex. The one shades into the other. Many of our social reforms cannot be secured without the aid of laws enacted by Parliament. Is the Church to be dumb because temperance, religious equality, sanitation, etc., have a political bearing? These social reforms affect the religious welfare of the country; and to stand still would be to betray the spiritual rights of the people.
4. Yet, when all this is said, we cannot but revert to the great truth that the chief aim of the gospel is to secure an inner change of heart. External changes are only enjoyed and secured after the great internal change, which is the crowning work of Christ’s mission.—Wm. Dickie.
A shepherd needed in all human societies.—Men must be organised, taught, disciplined. There are men Divinely qualified to interpret truth; they have insight, sympathy, and faculty of delicate and forcible expression. There are other men who can only receive what is given to them by God’s ministry. They are as sheep; they need a shepherd.—J. Parker, D.D.
Mark 6:39-40. Order in God’s work.—If we regard the feeding of the multitude as a parable concerning the work which the apostles were to do in the world afterwards, a parable of the spiritual feeding of mankind with the bread from heaven which Christ should supply them withal, then these orderly arrangements made by the command of our Lord are very full of instruction: the tendency of men, when they once realise the fact that they are surrounded by a hungry multitude, is to throw a piece of bread here and a piece there, to make irregular efforts to supply the wants which they perceive to exist; but this is not Christ’s way, and therefore it is not the wise way; order must in this, as in every other work of God, be the root of all success.—Bishop H. Goodwin.
Mark 6:41-43. This miracle illustrates—
1. The dealings of God in providence.
(1) Think of the number to be fed, and then look upon the corn-seed, cast into the ground, to supply bread for any one year, and you might well ask, “What are they among so many?” But God manipulates the seed in the soil, and then sends it forth as from His own hand, bread enough and to spare. The annual miracle is as great a wonder as the miracle wrought in an hour.
(2) God seldom works miracles when ordinary means will suffice; but when you have tried all, and men have given you up as a hopeless case, it is still right to go to God, the Great Physician. God sometimes sends food to the poor and needy in most unusual ways. It seems to them almost a miracle, but it would be a great mistake, if any were to infer from that, that if they only have faith they may neglect to plough, and to sow, and to work for their daily bread.
2. The way in which the world is to be fed with the Bread of Life.
(1) In the heart and soul of each man who receives this Bread it grows, so that there is not only enough for yourself, but also enough to distribute among your neighbours, and the more you distribute it the more it grows.
(2) This bread also resembles the Bread of Life in its overflowing abundance. There is room for all in the love of God. Lessons:
1. Christ commands nothing that He does not give us the power to perform.
2. Our resources will increase, if we make a diligent use of what we have.
3. The more you distribute, the more you yourself will possess. Every soul you bring to the gospel feast will enhance your own joy.
4. Jesus does not approve of waste.—A. Clark.
Christ the Restorer.—In no miracle of the gospel did Jesus actually create. He makes no new members of the body, but restores old useless ones. “And so, without a substratum to work upon, He creates neither bread nor wine.” To do this would not have been a whit more difficult, but it would have expressed less aptly His mission, which was not to create a new system of things, but to renew the old, to recover the lost sheep, and to heal the sick at heart.—Dean Chadwick.
Mark 6:41-42. Works out of the ordinary course.—The miracles which our Lord Jesus Christ wrought are in truth Divine works, and, from the things that are seen, awaken the human mind to contemplate and understand the invisible God. For He is such a Being as cannot be seen by human sight, and because the miracles by which He governeth the whole world and ruleth every creature are, by their frequency, little regarded, so that scarce any one thinks it worth his while to attend to and remark the wonderful and astonishing works of God, manifested in every seed and grain upon the earth. But of His mercy He reserved some things which He would do otherwise than in the usual course of nature, that they by whom His daily wonders were unobserved might have an occasion to admire, not when they saw greater, but more unusual works. For it is a greater miracle to govern and provide for the whole world than to feed five thousand men with but five loaves; yet while men pay little regard to the former, they are astonished at the latter, not because it is greater, but more unusual; for who is it that now feeds the whole world but He from whom a few seeds sown produce the plentiful sheaves; and the same power which gives that marvellous increase multiplied the loaves in the hand of Christ, who was Himself endued with all power. Those five loaves were a kind of seed, not indeed delivered to the earth for increase, but increased by Him who made the earth. The same Divine power which wrought the miracle with loaves and fishes instantaneously, works the greater miracles of nature gradually and with regularly appointed means.—Augustine.
Mark 6:41. “Blessed.”—There can be little doubt that the words which Jesus spake were those so well known: “Blessed art Thou, Jehovah our God, King of the world, who causes to come forth bread from the earth.” Assuredly it was this threefold thought: the upward thought (sursum corda), the recognition of the creative act as regards every piece of bread we eat, and the thanksgiving, which was realised anew in all its fulness when, as He distributed to the disciples, the provision miraculously multiplied in His hands.—A. Edersheim, D.D.).
Mark 6:43. The fragments that remained were greater in amount than the original loaves. This is true in relation even to temporal things, that the man who is reasonably liberal has more than the man who keeps all to himself. He may not have more wealth than the miser, though often he has that, but he enjoys more that which he has when he has given a portion to others: that which is left becomes more to him, and affords him more enjoyment than the whole would have done if he had retained it. But this is especially true in spiritual things.—A. Clark.
Gather up the fragments—
1. Of truth. Many a time, when a man has been really hungering after righteousness, he has found in some one truth which has fallen from his Master’s table exactly that portion which was required to satisfy his longings. As was once said by a dying man, great in human learning: “Give me now a single promise of Scripture, that I may hold it as an ear of corn, and rub it out in the hand of faith, and it is worth to me all my other knowledge.”
2. Of time. Who has not to weep for time which has not been used for its true purposes—for mercies little noted, for gifts abused, for vows forgotten, for sorrow that has not chastened and joy that has not sanctified, for numberless visitations of God that have passed over us and left no blessing behind?
(1) We have need to treasure up its very minutes, for they are fragments of a gift which God bestows.
(2) In course of time we become the result of the time we live.
3. Of the means of grace.
(1) Lord’s Day.
(2) Private prayer.
(3) Holy Eucharist.
4. Of duty. We are often apt to despise common things because they are so common, forgetting that we might lift them to a much higher dignity if we but infused into them a nobler principle, doing them as in God’s sight, by God’s help, and to God’s glory.—Canon Nisbet.
ILLUSTRATIONS TO CHAPTER 6
Mark 6:34. Sympathy with the multitude.—In the troublous times of the French Revolution a speaker in the Corps Legislatif asked, “Why do not our great men, our priests and philosophers, move and save the people?” A solemn voice replied, “Because they are cast in bronze.” We who profess the service of Christ can never win the multitude until our hearts are clearly responsive to all their appeals for betterment of body and soul.
Mark 6:41. God the Provider.—A boy was once saying a grace before meat, which his Sunday-school teacher had taught him, when his mother, who was not accustomed to such things, said to him, “Why do you thank God for it? does not your father work for it?” But if the father had worked a thousand years he could not have made a grain of wheat, and it would have been an easy thing for God to deprive the father of the health and strength which enabled him to work, or to close the door through which he obtained employment and wages to purchase food; so that the boy was right, and we are all right when we pray to God and thank Him for our daily bread.
Mark 6:43. Wise economy.—Two men set out for a ten days’ journey across the desert. They each took ten loaves, a loaf for each day. The first day the younger man ate all he could, and then tossed the rest on the sand; but the elder man, having eaten sparingly, brought out two bags, into one of which he put all the crusts, and into the other all the crumbs. Day after day he did the same, and the younger man marvelled and smiled. But on the tenth day they discovered that they were still two days short of their journey’s end. And now the younger man had nothing whatever to eat! But the elder now brought out his two well-filled bags, and both of them were very thankful to eat the crusts that day, and the crumbs the next.