Now, you all know I like to fish, and I enjoy it, but the Lord uses fish quite a bit during His earthly ministry to teach biblical principles. And here is a record of the feeding of the 5,000, and this is the only miracle but I'm talking about Christ's earthly miracles You will find some of the other miracles that Christ did might be in the book of Matthew. They might be in Matthew and Mark but not in Luke and John. Now that doesn't mean they didn't exist. It's just each book, each gospel emphasizes certain things. And so that's what God used under those pins. But here, this miracle is recorded all four Gospels. I think it's very important. And I believe that there is something here that we can learn from this. Let's read some scripture beginning in verse one. He says, now after these things, Jesus went over the Sea of Galilee, which is the Sea of Tiberias. And a great multitude followed him because they saw his miracles, which he did on them that were diseased. And Jesus went up into a mountain, and there he sat with his disciples. And the Passover, a feast of the Jews, was nigh. And when Jesus then lifted up his eyes and saw the great company, come unto him, he saith unto Philip, Which shall we buy bread that these may eat? And this he said to prove him, for he himself knew what he would do. Now that pictures Christ's deity, his foreknowledge. And he says, Philip answered him, 200 penny worth of bread is not sufficient for them, that every one of them may take a little. Now one of his disciples, Andrew, Simon Peter's brother, saith unto him, Now there is a lad here which hath five barley loaves, and two small fishes. But what are they among so many? And Jesus said, Make the men sit down. Now there was much grass in this place, so the men sat down in number about five thousand. And Jesus took the loaves, and when he had given thanks, he distributed to the disciples, and the disciples to them that were set down, and likewise of the fishes as much as they would." That's where I got that idea that a pastor, he needs to get the bread from Christ every week. And it's not that we can't find bread somewhere, but you want it from the Lord. You really do. You want it from the Lord. And if it's to be good bread, if it's to be sustaining bread, satisfying bread, it has to come from the Savior. And he says, and when they were filled, amen, they were filled, God will satisfy you. He said unto his disciples, gather up the fragments that remain, that nothing be lost. Yeah, amen, that's some miracle bread there and fish. Therefore they gathered them together and filled 12 baskets with the fragments of the five barley loaves, which remained over and above unto them that had eaten. Then those men, when they had seen the miracle that Jesus did, said, this is of a truth, that prophet, that should come into the world. Now let us pray and then we'll see what God has for us. Father we come we thank you now and Lord help us today we're hungry folks and Lord we're awaiting the return of Christ we are here and we're waiting on you to come and get your bride away we see things unfolding just exactly the way the Bible said it would we it comforts us to understand that the Bible surely is true and surely thou art the Son of God Lord help us for a little while this morning bind Satan Father, let the Holy Spirit reign supreme. In Jesus Christ's name, amen. Again, as I said earlier, this is the only miracle besides the resurrection. The resurrection is definitely a miracle. This is the only one recorded in the four Gospels. Everything that God does, there's something to note here. God is a God of order. And I don't know why, but it seems to keep popping out to me as I come through the Word. of God. Number one, this time coming through the Word of God as I do my daily Bible reading, is how many times he tells the New Testament Christian to love one another, to be at peace with one another, to forbear one another. But there is something else that I do keep picking up this year is God is a God of order. The Lord Jesus Christ is all about order. He's all about structure. And even here we can see that in this A miracle here when he says, make the men sit down, and if you look and study the other Gospels, he made them sit down in groups of 50 and groups of 100. And there's also women and children. Now, I don't know why he didn't count all the women and all the children. I don't know if it was because that there was as many women as there was men. I don't know, but I have learned it's where the Word of God is vague. You need to take that as a hint that you need to be vague also. There could have been two women for every one man that was counted. I don't know. But I do know this, there's at least 5,000 men besides women and children. That's quite a few people there. But even in this, God is about order. And He says, make them sit down, put them in groups. God has structure. God has order. Anything that God does, He has order in it. Even in the church, He tells the pastors, set these things in order. God's about order. I guess I say that in light of all the chaos we see going on. If people are having problems trying to discern what's going on, where's the Holy Spirit, where's the devil at in this? I got news for you. God's not the author of confusion. And He is the God of order. God likes order. That's why God hasn't changed His mind on family structure. He hasn't. God hasn't changed his mind on genders. There's two. Like I said last week, God or the devil has as many genders as you want, but God has two. And so we see here in this, as we begin to study this, that God is about order, but I wanna bring our attention, firstly, to the proving of Philip. Jesus, our Savior, was always apt to teach. And I believe that's what it means when he tells the pastors they need to be able to preach, but they need to be apt to teach. That means any type of situation can be a teaching episode. And here we see the Savior proving Philip. He knew what he was gonna do. He knew there was a little lad there that day that had five loaves and two little fishes. He knew that. Jesus knows everything. But he did this to test Philip. Why? God allows things to happen to test our faith. God knows our faith. It's a lot of time God does that. So we learn ourselves. It's a good point. You know, people, when they're younger, they say, yeah, I'm just trying to find myself. And I understand that. You need to learn yourself. And how you gonna do that is allow God to test you and prove you. God will reveal you to you. And I got news for you. Just like the old preacher said, you will find that you are the worst enemy you will ever have. And so God here is proving Philip. You know God allows things to happen to test our faith like unexpected bills. I don't know how I'm going to pay for that. How about sicknesses. Sometimes the Bible indicates that certain people have sicknesses not because of something they've done but so God can get the glory in their life. Amen. And there's a lot of people that have to deal with sicknesses. A lot of times they don't say anything about it, but it is an infirmity and God does it to get glory out of their life. Sometimes, according to the apostles, he does it to keep people humble. But God does it to prove us. How about natural disasters? God uses these things for the child of God. Now, listen to me. When these things happen, the devil uses them to destroy us, like he did Job. But God uses it to refine us and to pull that dross off our lives. God teaches us. Here's what he's teaching Philip. that the answer does not always lie within us. Man, Philip, he says, where are we gonna buy bread for this? And Philip is, he's a reasoning man. Look there in verse seven. He said, Philip answered him, 200 penny worth. Boy, he's been putting the math together. And I got news for you. If you run your church right, and you run your church the way the Bible says to run it, it ain't gonna make no sense on paper. And it's what I was teaching earlier. God specializes in doing a whole lot with a little. I'm told you once, I'll tell you again, God's people, the people that stand before God are always outnumbered, outgunned, and underfunded. They always are. But somehow, God meets the need, and that's what he's teaching, Philip. Your best reasoning, your best deducing, your best analytical thinking, how you gonna do it, and the answer does not always lie within you. I think it jumped out to me. My first name's Philip. And I've got news for you. I like to analyze. I like things to make sense on paper. Two plus two is always four. Always. And God is testing Philip. It don't always make sense. Number two, the answer does not always lie within you. Philip, being a reasoning man, why do we turn within ourselves first for the answer? I mean, it's not like Philip hadn't seen Christ turn the water into wine. It ain't like he hadn't seen him healing the sick here before this happens. It ain't like he hadn't seen him healing the blind. They said there hadn't been prophets that was able to do that, but Jesus did that. And here he stands by the King of Kings, the Prince of Peace, the Lamb of God. And the Lamb of God asked Philip, who was apostle, and he says, how are we going to feed this crew? Well, if you look at another gospel, Philip said, we need to turn them away. Or one of those apostles said, we need to turn them away so they can go buy vitriols for themselves. Now there is the third thing that God has been working, at least he's brought to my attention. And it's about the spirit by which things are done in. The spirit. And it's the wrong spirit for the men of God and for the apostles to say, let's just turn them loose and let them go feed themselves somewhere and get it. And the Lord said, no, we're going to feed them. The point is, and what God has worked with me on over the years is, the Word of God will never return void. The Word of God does its work. The Holy Spirit of God does its work. Sometimes, why do we not see God doing a good work? It's because the spirit in which these things are done is wrong. We have the mindset of, let's let them go and get their own bread. Now I threw that in there free, and maybe that's just for me, but the Lord has brought that to my attention. All the meanest, hardest, nastiest preaching, if it's not done in the right spirit, does harm. It's gotta be done from a spirit of restoration. It doesn't mean you can't say hard things. It doesn't mean that you can't stand for truth, but it has to be done in the spirit to restore, to teach. What did the Lord tell those two apostles that wanted to call the fire down on that city for rejecting them? He says, let's call fire down. The Lord says, you don't know what spirit you're of. Careful what spirit things are done in. So Philip here has turned within himself for the answer. I'm guilty as charged. A problem comes up, here's my thinking. I know God can work it out. I know God has the answer, but maybe God wants me to come up with the answer this time. Let me give you the backstory to that. There's this man. And he was in a flood. And the city come in a boat and he was hanging out the window. The water's up to the first floor and he's out the second floor window. They come by and said, Hey, you need to get in the boat. This is only going to get worse. He says, Nah, God's going to save me. He's going to make a way and say, OK, we'll be back by tomorrow. Well, by the next day, he's on the roof. They come by another boat and said, hey, you need to get in the boat. This is only going to get worse. He said, no, God is going to save me. He's going to provide. OK. They come by that third day. He's on top that chimney. In a helicopter, they come by and say, hey, hey, you need to get in this helicopter. He says, uh-uh, oh no, no, God's got this, buddy. The man dies, goes to heaven. He's a little upset. Not that he's in heaven, but because he thought God was going to miraculously send him something. And he even asked the Lord, Lord, Why didn't you provide? And the Lord says, I sent you two boats and a helicopter. What more do you want? And so that's always running in the back of my mind when I get into one of these situations like, well, maybe God's got the answer in front of me and I'm just too silly to grab onto it. And so we turn within ourselves to begin to try to work this problem out, but it's not the right thing. Why do we always look at the bigness of the problem? You see what Philip did? He says, my soul, 200 penny worth could not feed this people even if everyone took just a little. Why do we always look at the bigness of the problem instead of the sufficiency of Christ? Maybe I'm preaching to me. Because I seem to fit right in here with Philip. Lord, this is a big problem. Lord, I don't know. I know you parted the Red Sea. I know you fed the children of Israel in the wilderness. I just don't know if you got it this time. Why do we do that? We're human. We're human. But a lot of times it's a sign of our spirituality. Why do we look at the smallness of the resource instead of the bigness of God? Here they said, well, Andrew comes up and says, well, we got five barley loaves and two small fishes. Notice how he tagged that small fishes. Notice how we maximize the negative and we minimize the positive. You know what, I think our news media, they had really learned a lesson there. They're maximizing the negative, minimizing, that's called lopsided vision. And Andrew had some lopsided vision. And the problem is, because of Philip's lack of faith, it's contagious. Andrew gets caught up in this and he's like, well, Lord, we got five barley loaves and two small fishes. Yeah. We look at the smallness of the resource. People are like, well, what can this little church do? God turned the world upside down with 11. 12 if you want to count of the devil among them. Lord, a little is much when God is in it. This Bible says that my God shall supply all your need according to his riches and glory by Christ Jesus. You say, well preacher, that ain't true because God didn't supply my need one time. Are you sure it was a need or was it a want? God's language is clear. He says, my God should supply all your need. He didn't say once. The red Lamborghinis, you might not get that one. Years ago, I've had people pray that they would win the lottery. Christians don't play the lottery. It's gambling. But people ask, preacher, pray at our window. Right in church, you're like, are these people kidding? No, they just don't know no better. I'll promise I'll tithe. No, you won't, you ain't tithing now. If you can't be faithful in the little stuff, you're not gonna be faithful in the big stuff. But God says, this Bible says, God shall supply all your need according to his riches and glory by Christ Jesus. Let me put it to you like this. If God brought you there, He'll provision it. He'll pay it. He'll pay it away. This Bible says God will not be in debt to any man. He won't. He's always so far in front of us. Salvation cannot be paid for. Never could pay for it. God will never be in debt to mankind. We are in debt to Him. But I see The proving of Philip. He's testing Philip and proving his faith. He's not tempting him. Notice how the language says he proved him. He's trying him there to show Philip the smallness of his faith. But now we're going to build on that. Don't cut Philip too short. But I do see the present lad. He wanted to be used. of God, and here's what I learned from this lad. If you want to be used of God, you're going to have to be present. People say, oh yeah, I just want God to use me. Well, first, get in church. You're going to have to be present. This lad would have never been used that day had he not shown up. The present lad, that's why Pointed that out, if you wanna be used to God, you're gonna have to be present. When you give it all, or when you give, give it all. This little boy, you're all preacher. Well, what I mean by that is don't hold back. If God wants it all, Let him have it and take your hands off of it. That little boy wasn't trying to control what he gave to the master. Now, at 50 years old, I've been around a little bit. Not that that makes me the all-knowing, but I've been around long enough to know there's people that have tried to put money in the plate and then control where it goes. When you give it to God, it's God's. and you need to take your hands off of it. When you give, give it all. Don't give and then want to control it, that's a control freak. Don't give and give part of it like Ananias and Sapphira and then lie about saying you give it all. It's God's now, let him do what's best for his glory. This shows humbleness. I believe this little lad was humble. I really do. I believe this little boy was humble. And I also firmly believe, now again, we're in a vagueness because the scripture doesn't say this. And if you want to say it was his father that made that lunch, I'm perfectly okay with it. But I bet you maybe his mother might've been responsible for packing that little lunch that day. Now I could be wrong. Maybe that little boy packed his own lunch. I just kind of think how it hit me was there was a mother there that packed that little boy's lunch. Daddy probably already out in the field and working. But there's something else we can learn from this little lad is when you give to others, you don't have to go without. He got to eat that day. Maybe if he'd have just eat his own lunch and never give it, maybe it would not have satisfied. But because he gave it to the master, the master prayed over it and broke it. He was able to, it says they eat till they were filled. Oh, that's kind of like being in a buffet bar. And you know me, I like buffets. I've not been to too many this year. But he eat till he was filled. Little is much when God is in it. But I want to bring us in our focus. There's so much that we could say but I want to bring our focus to the providing Savior right here. God not only supplies our spiritual needs but our physical needs as well. He knew they were hungry. He knew they needed to eat. Boy, that is nice to know we got a savior. Not only does he sustain the spiritual, he's looking out for the physical need. Boy, I like that. I like that. God involves now. Now you got to get this. I was teaching on this at Sunday school. God involves others in ministry. I like that. You know the Lord, the great shepherd, he's the pastor. He's the pastor, he's the head. He says he's the chief shepherd. He owns the church. He's the head of the body. But notice how he delegates. He involves others in the ministry. Even those of little faith like Philip and Andrew. I bet you even Judas served that day, and I'm not trying to make something out of Judas, but I guarantee he was there. What I'm saying, the point I'm saying is the Savior involves others in ministry. You know, good pastors try to get the involvement of the people, they delegate, and they allow people to do the work. One of the worst things you can ever witness is a pastor that tries to do it all. He'll drive himself insane. Been there, tried that. It sounds good on paper. You can't. Learn a lesson from the providing Savior. He involves others in ministries. And no, not everybody's going to do it exactly like you would. I bet you they didn't serve the fish exactly like the Savior would. But it's nice to know he allowed them to grow and to serve anyway. I want to also bring something to your attention. He did not reprimand Philip and Andrew for their small faith. He didn't get on him and say, oh boys, how dare you doubt me? He didn't say a word about that, didn't he? You know what that was? True leadership. He's not going to maximize the negative. One of the things I've learned about leading, I still have a lot to learn, but leaders lead by example. Don't get bogged down in the trenches, move on. Move forward. Move on. Involve others. Work with the folks. God involves others. Let me get back to the making the men sit down. We talked about it being an order. But if we're to be fed by Christ, we must sit. Amen. Amen. All physical activity must come to an end if the bread of life is to be received. Do you ever stop to think about that? When Christ here, if you wanna be fed spiritually, you're gonna have to stop all physical activity. That's why you've seen me in times past, when we get into the smaller room in the back, if somebody's playing on a phone during the service, that's a little disrupting and a little distracting. And it's not good, it's disruptive. They're not sitting down, people up and moving. Sometimes that has to happen. But when it's in defiance, You see, Christ, before we can be fed spiritually, we got to be seated and cease that physical activity to receive the bread of life. This also tested the apostles' obedience. Now, I told you I'd get back to this. Their faith may have failed. Philip had a weak faith here. Andrew had a weak faith, but their obedience did not fail. Now there's a lesson in that. To obey is better than to sacrifice. And it is important to note if our faith should be weak, I guess I'm preaching to me again, I can preach on faith all day long until I gotta get in the wheelbarrow. And then I'm like, but if our faith is weak, don't let the obedience be weak at the same time. Here's why, here's the teaching. Should faith and obedience fail, there is a grave reason to doubt spiritual life to be present in the person. If faith is weak, obedience is the best way to strengthen it. Now, I've got a couple of illustrations. Let me give you the biblical one first. The Bible says faith cometh by hearing, hearing by the word of God. You want the faith to increase? You're going to have to obey, obedience, God when he says it comes by hearing. You could pray for faith all day long. You're not going to get it. Faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the word of God. You got weak faith, you need to hear more of God's preaching. You need to hear more of the word of God. You need to hear more of God's teaching. People, and there's preachers that have confessed, they've prayed for years that God increased their faith, and then the simplest little verse. Faith cometh by hearing, hearing by the word of God. God says, he kinda whispers, if you want a bigger faith, Obey me, hear the word of God that takes obedience. That's why obedience is important. That's why I was talking about this morning some hard things in life is one, consistency. Just be consistent. Be consistent. Be faithful. What are you talking about? Obedience. Because there's gonna be times when your faith is weak. But obey the master. The physical illustration, I got to go back to my apprenticeship and plastering by trade, there was a lot of things that was taught me that I did not understand. in the moment when you get to talking about, and I'm not talking about drywall, I'm talking about real, real plastering. And I'm talking about we're working a wet wall and we begin to work with sets in materials. When you're working with cornice and when you're working with cement stuccoes or white coat or putty coat, and you're adding the lime and the gauging. I couldn't tell you why gauging plaster made lime set. I didn't understand it. I still might not be able to understand the scientific side of it. And so in those moments during that apprenticeship, your faith is weak, but if you'll just obey and do what you're told and let the teacher teach you, And here's how my dad said it to me. And I served an apprenticeship in the union, but I got to work with my father also. He says, look, I don't have the time right now to explain everything to you about this wall and work in the mud. Just do it. And I promise you one day it'll make sense. You know what? He was right. I served my apprenticeship, it was four years, graduated, become a journeyman plaster, but I didn't understand fully all those things until my 10th year. I was working on the wall one day, and all of a sudden it just like clicked, like an engagement of gears. I said, what are you trying to say, preacher? I'm trying to say that sometimes your faith is going to be weak, and you're going to have to rely on obedience even though you can't understand it. until God reveals it for you. But don't let your obedience be weak at the same time the faith is. That's what He's teaching. Jesus and Him alone gives the bread. The disciples distribute that bread. You say, what are you trying to say, preacher? I'm saying that Jesus provides their spiritual needs as well as their physical. Now, listen to this. Jesus supplies the need, not according to our faith, but according to His grace. Did you see that? If He would have provided based on Philip's faith, they wouldn't have got much. I am so glad that God does not provide our need around here based on our faith but on God's grace. Boy, what a Savior. Jesus' test or faith to teach us our sufficiency is to be placed in Him and not in ourselves or our physical means. Jesus uses people to work His will, even young people. Samuel had just been weaned when God began to use him. Not everyone that comes to see Jesus, they don't come just to see Jesus. If you was to look down to about verse 26, some were coming because they wanted to be fed. So they came and they come back again not to see Jesus or the miracle. They weren't concerned about that so much. They just wanted their bellies filled. That takes me back to there's two kinds of people that come to church, givers and takers. You can say, well, lost or saved. Yeah, amen. Lost or saved, that's right. Here's the last thing I learned. Kind of goes with me, when you go to see Jesus, pack a lunch.