RESOURCES & MEDIA

writings

" 2 + 5 + C = E " By Russ Cripps

Do you remember the Bible story of how Jesus fed five thousand people with just two fish and five loaves of bread? Do you remember where they got the food from? They got the food from kid who just happened to bring his lunchbox along that day.

Who was that kid?

This young dude's lunch was the source of one of the most famous miracles in history, but the Bible doesn't even give him credit. No mention of his name, no thank-you afterwards, no quid-pro-quo. Nada.

The disciple Philip gets his name in the story. When they saw the crowd coming to find Jesus, he asked Philip, "Where shall we buy bread for these people to eat?"

Philip answered, "It would take more than half a year's wages to buy enough bread for each one to have a bite!"

This disciple of Jesus saw only the problem—too many mouths and not enough money.

The disciple Andrew gets mention as well. Andrew followed up Philip's comment by saying, "Here is a boy with five small barley loaves and two small fish, but how far will they go among so many?"

Again, a disciple of Jesus saw only the problem—too many mouths and not enough food.

Frankly, I doubt the disciples wanted to deal with the real problem. In fact, they just finished rowing across the Sea of Galilee and set up camp for the night. They wanted to sleep - not deal with thousands of people wanting to hear Jesus.

But Jesus was - and is - always ready to show compassion. In fact, compassion is one of the things He does best. When he saw the crowd coming up the mountain, he immediately made up in his mind that he was going to feed them. He only asked Philip "Where shall we buy bread?" to test him. The scripture says Jesus "already had in mind what he was going to do."

He was going to perform a miracle.

Did you get that? He had already decided he was going to miraculously supply their needs. He knew in his heart he was going to feed thousands of people. Everything that happened between the decision to feed and the act of feeding was just to see what the people around him would do.

My point isn't that his disciples didn't have enough faith to believe he could supply the need. What I want you to focus on is the kid.

The kid didn't know all those people. He didn't have to share his lunch. If he could count, he knew his lunch could feed maybe a handful of people, at best. But he made a sacrifice. He gave what little he had to Jesus. Like Philip and Andrew, he probably saw the problem: it simply wasn't enough.

It wasn't.

By itself, some bread and fish couldn't feed thousands. What made the difference was the kid's compassion. The little he had plus the compassion to act was all Jesus needed to perform a miracle and supply more than enough.

The Bible says the people ate their fill and there were enough leftovers to fill twelve baskets full.

You see, you don't need to do or be or have anything special. Just what you have now - right now as you read this - is enough for Jesus to perform a miracle.

You can be someone's miracle. You can be the reason someone's life is changed. All you need is the compassion to act.

Don't worry about how insufficient or how small your efforts are. Don't worry about how inadequate or unworthy you feel. You see, being someone else's miracle isn't about you—it's about them.

Jesus wants to use you. Let him!

Two little pieces of fish and five small loaves of bread - plus enough compassion to do something - is all he needs to provide more than enough.

By my math, that looks something like 2 + 5 + C = E.

By His math, it just looks like compassion.