Broadway Christian Church · Columbia, Missouri

Morning Worship · April 26, 2009

Third Sunday of Easter

Prayer of the Day

Creator God, life is your gift to me. Through baptism, you invite me to share my life in service to others. Give me the courage to respond to your call. May I be generous in what I give to others. Through your church, I have the opportunity to serve many people in this world. Help me to hear your call to “come follow me.” I give to you, my God, as I make stewardship a way of life. Amen.

Scripture

Matthew 14:13-21

Now when Jesus heard this, he withdrew from there in a boat to a deserted place by himself. But when the crowds heard it, they followed him on foot from the towns. When he went ashore, he saw a great crowd; and he had compassion for them and cured their sick. When it was evening, the disciples came to him and said, “This is a deserted place, and the hour is now late; send the crowds away so that they may go into the villages and buy food for themselves.” Jesus said to them, “They need not go away; you give them something to eat.” They replied, “We have nothing here but five loaves and two fish.” And he said, “Bring them here to me.” Then he ordered the crowds to sit down on the grass. Taking the five loaves and the two fish, he looked up to heaven, and blessed and broke the loaves, and gave them to the crowds. And all ate and were filled; and they took up what was lift over of the broken pieces, twelve baskets full. And those who ate were about five thousand men, besides women and children.

Message

Little Is Much When God Is In It

Larry Gallamore

I really get excited when I think about what God can do in our personal lives. God can solve problems, heal broken relationships, and turn dreams into reality. God can do big things with anyone, any place, and any time. Some of you are asking, “Can God do anything in this troubled economy?” 

Yes, especially now. Turning dreams into reality is much more possible today than ever before. Opportunities are unlimited. You can do so many more things in this modern era. You can create your own website. You can establish an electronic sales force. You can have constant communication with people around the world. We live in a time when anything is possible if you allow God to put your imagination to work.

Most of you have lots of creative ideas constantly flowing through your mind. The wheels are always turning in your head. They are always turning in mine. When I get up to speak on subjects I’m excited about, I have this constant stream of thoughts running through my mind. People have asked, “How do you get up there and speak for 20 minutes, 30 minutes, or two hours with no notepad and never run out of anything to say?” I never worry about having too little. I’m concerned about having too much. My mind is just conditioned that way. It never turns off.

When I look back to my grade school days, I began to experience ideas, thoughts, creative things, weird things popping up constantly in my mind. As I listened to my teacher in the first grade, Mrs. Grace Stewart, my mind just took off in all directions. She wrote on the board: “2+2=4.” I started thinking, “Yes. 4+4=8; 8+8=16. What about 16+16=? I didn’t have enough fingers and toes to count, so I made straight lines on a piece of paper and counted them. The wheels in my mind were turning.

Today, they would have diagnosed me as A.D.D. and would have medicated all that wonderful energy right out of me. Back then, we didn’t worry about how many thoughts we had. I learned I could use my imagination for all kinds of things. I imagined doing well in school, and I did. 

In the second grade, they discussed moving me up to the third grade. My parents and my principal were not sure that was such a good idea. They were right. It’s best to do school one grade at a time. It puts one in the right place, at the right time, to learn the right things. One grade at a time is enough for anyone.

This imagination thing has really worked for me. When I want something, I just start thinking about it, work toward achieving it, and it gets manifested in my life. When I was young, I had no idea what was happening. I didn’t know how my mind worked.

One Sunday, I was sitting in church. I was 13-years-old, going on 20, and the preacher said, “God knows all your thoughts.” I thought, “Boy, that’s a scary idea.” He went on to repeat, “God knows all your thoughts, all of your actions, all your feelings, and all your emotions.” My first thought was, “If God knows all these things, I’m going to have to clean up my act.”

The preacher went on to say, “Everything in your life comes from God. God wants to give all good things to you.” I felt the preacher was talking to me. He went on to say, “God is that still, small voice in your head telling you to be good and to do good. Good wants you to be your best self.” 

My mind was saying, “There you have it. You know what God wants from you. Wow! That’s it! God wants to be in all my thoughts, and God wants good for me. That’s tremendous! I’ll continue listening to that still, small voice.” The preacher went on to say, “God is that still, small voice in your head. The day you stop listening to that still, small voice is the day you start dying.”

I have to tell you, that Sunday morning, everything felt right in my life. You’ve had those times when everything just felt right. I concluded God is good. God wants only good for me. God wants to bless me with life, love, and happiness. I started getting excited. I don’t care who you are; that’s exciting. When you recognize the Presence of God, life gets exciting.

Can you imagine how excited that crowd of 5,000-plus got when Jesus fed them? Did they realize that Jesus was the only one in that crowd who thought God could pull off that miracle? He is the only one who was really thinking abundance. Jesus was the only one who believed God would feed all those people before it happened. Jesus never thought like the disciples. They were thinking, “If we see it, we’ll believe it.” The disciples were all from our beloved Show-Me State. Show me, and I’ll believe it. Jesus was thinking, “If I believe it, I’ll see it.” That’s faith. Anyone can believe after the fact, but it takes a strong faith to believe something is going to happen before it actually happens. The faith of Jesus was manifested on that day. 

Let me explain.

Jesus was asked to feed that hungry crowd of 5,000-plus people. The Bible says 5,000 men besides the women and children. I’m curious why they counted only the men. We won’t go there.

Today, many of the men would be out on the golf course, fishing, hunting, or whatever. It’s best we don’t go there, either. They might be down at the nearest Starbucks or one of the local lounges drinking (coffee, of course.) I told you it was best we didn’t go there. You have to quit thinking those thoughts.  I’m reading your mind and seeing what you are thinking. That’s really scary. Isn’t it?

Back to our story… The crowd of 5,000-plus followed Jesus to a deserted place. Jesus had taught them all day long. It was getting late. Everyone was hungry, and the disciples were panicking. They didn’t have any food. They were thinking, “No food; nothing to drink; a crowd of tired, hungry people who are starting to get agitated.” They were thinking “shortage.” 

Do you know what you’ll have in your life when you dwell on shortage? When you constantly think shortage, you have shortage. You’ll never have enough as long as your mind dwells on shortage. Do you know why? You’re not trusting God. You’re dwelling on fear instead of faith. You are believing that there isn’t enough to go around. You’ll tell people who believe that God can do something that they aren’t facing reality. 

I’ve got news for you. Thinking about what you don’t have is about as far away from reality as you can get. You’re not giving God a chance to do anything. In reality, God is never limited. Little is much when God is in it.

In our story, the first thing Jesus does is to ask the disciples to go out into the crowd to see what the people have to eat. They bring back five loaves and two fish. Not much; is it?

Now, let’s get in touch with what’s happening here. What are the disciples thinking? They are thinking, “This is all we have. This is all there is,” as they bring these limited resources to Jesus. They are focused on “not enough,” limited resources.

We’ve all been there. You sit down at the end of the month to pay the bills, and you don’t have enough. You have more month than money. There isn’t enough to pay your house payment, or car payment, or your student loan, or your electricity bill, or your gas bill. Listen closely.

This story tells you how you can overcome this all-too-common problem. Notice what Jesus does. He is thinking in a totally revolutionary way. Jesus isn’t focusing on what he doesn’t have. He is focused on the unlimited supply of God. He is saying to his disciples, “Let’s try it God’s way.” Jesus starts with what he has. He starts with what he has, believing 100% in God’s abundance. He lifts what he has up to God, blesses it, and it is more than enough to feed the hungry multitude.

By doing things God’s way, you can increase the abundance in your life a hundredfold. When God gets involved, things start happening. God isn’t limited. When God gets involved in your life, you begin to recognize what’s really important. As you open your heart and mind to God, you’ll start thinking abundance instead of shortage. You’ll start going deeper spiritually. You’ll start trusting God. You’ll not make any important decisions without praying. You’ll start loving the work you do. You’ll start loving your friends and family more. You’ll love yourself, and your heart will be strangely warmed. Your life will be changed, your purse strings loosened, and you’ll give more of your time, talents, gifts, and service to God and to others. You’ll be more. You’ll serve more. You’ll succeed more. You’ll have more. If you want to get rid of the limitations of your life, start believing and seeing things before they happen. Let me explain how things work.

Years ago, I watched and listened to a very wise layman as he stood before our congregation to speak about stewardship. He said, “Folks, we can raise this money for ministry. All we need to do is start praying and believing. Prayer is the foundation; belief makes it happen. We don’t have a shortage of money, time, or talent around here. We have a shortage of believing and praying. I believe and God believes we can raise this money for ministry. We can do it.”

As I sat there on the chancel pew ready to preach, God spoke to me. God said, “Larry, he is right. Go out there and tell the people to start praying and believing.” I did, and we raised more than our goal. People’s lives were changed. People were blessed. Family finances increased. Blessings came from heaven.

Listen to me. If you will listen to that still, small voice of God in your mind and start thinking that with God’s help, you can do whatever it takes, you’ll never have to worry about having enough. God will provide. God isn’t limited. God loves to create. God loves placing those wonderful ideas in your head, some of which are worth thousands of dollars.

I’m sure some of the people left that day after Jesus fed the 5,000-plus and went back home saying, “If Christ can do it, we can do it.” In fact, most of you know that Christ went on to say to his disciples, “You’ll do greater things than I have done,” (John 14:12a).  Jesus said, “I tell you, the one who believes in me will also do the works that I do and, in fact, will do greater works than these because I am going to the Father,” (John 14:12b).

The whole teaching of Jesus is to have faith and to believe. He placed a greater value on faith and belief than any individual who has ever taught spiritual truth. We are to have absolute faith in God. Jesus taught us to have faith in God, in life, in our fellowman. He was always certain of himself and sure of the outcome.

People who live successfully look upon life with radiant expression, with cheerful enthusiasm, and receptive minds. They know God’s going to give them more creative thoughts than they can ever use. They know the thing they must do is use some of those good thoughts. When they meet difficulties, they know things are not just as they should be, but things are going to come out right in the end.

Have faith and believe you can truly trust God. The great God of the universe is neither wishy-washy nor willy-nilly. God is positive. God is certain. And you can be sure of a good outcome in your life when you trust God.

So be it. Amen.

Benediction

God, thank you for your unfailing love! We ask that you help us to see and know when we are to speak up, lift up, and help out. In our own prompting, we might feel like we won’t make a difference, but when our hearts meet yours, we can have a miraculous effect. Amen.