Thank you, Pastor David, for leading us in worship. Well, friends, as we begin this morning, I have a bit of confession to make. And that confession is that I am an owner of a messy garage. Now, whatever you just thought when I say that, I can pretty confidently say that it's worse than what you thought the other week. I was carrying something out of that garage, and I accidentally bumped the button, you know, that opens the door. And I didn't realize it. And so it was open all night. It was terrifying. As I went out to my car, I went, oh, my goodness, someone opened my garage. And then I realized, wait a minute. Someone is me. The reason why I tell that part of the story is something could be living in there, and I wouldn't know. I just. There would be. Unfortunately, there's no way to tell. I could put food out and see what happens, but I haven't tried that yet. Now, the funny thing is, those of you who are not like me, you're like, well, why didn't you keep your garage clean? Those of you who are like me, you know exactly why the garage isn't clean. Because every time I look at it, it feels so big. How could I possibly find the time? And there's also this part of me that kind of believes, well, it's just gonna get messed up again, right? Because when you clean it, like, let's say Saturday, I said, today's the day. And I got a dumpster and I got rid of a bunch of stuff. The minute there was any clutter in the house, I'd say, you know where that could go? The newly cleaned garage. And it would go down there, and somehow we would get more toys or something, because I don't know. I don't know who's buying them, but toys keep finding their way into my house. And, you know, the reason why I tell that story is because that's kind of how we feel when we maybe look at a messy garage or a big project that we've been holding off as it gets worse. And I think that's kind of where the disciples find themselves in this story. And I'm going to explain it a little more, but we're continuing in the Gospel of Mark. And the disciples just got back from kind of this missional journey, right? They had been following Jesus, and he sends them out two by two. And the text tells us that things went great. In Mark 6, verse 12, it says they went out and preached that people should repent. They drove out many demons and anointed many sick people with oil and Healed them. And so that's all the way back in verse 13. And then we get this awful story about King Herod, right? The king of this area and his beheading of John the Baptist. And we talked about that last week. This, this awful man, Herod, this man who's having drunken parties with women dancing for him where he casually kind of takes life, right? And so we get, we get, we get told that the disciples are sent out. We get this terrible story about Herod. And then in verse 30, we come back to kind of our main narrative about Jesus. And this is what Mark 6, 30, Mark 6, verse 30 says. And it says, the apostles gathered around Jesus and reported to him all they had done and taught. Then, because so many people were coming and going that they did not even have a chance to eat, he said to them, come with me by yourselves to a quiet place and get some rest. So they went away by themselves in a boat to a solitary place. The disciples are back and kind of their mission had gone well, right. In fact, the text here calls them apostles, which just means like kind of sent ones or missionaries, right? Like we kind of associate that word with. Yeah, the 12 apostles, the 12 disciples, that is what they are called, you know, later. But this is the first time this shows up in this gospel. And the idea is that these people who were sent out had come back. And then we find out that Jesus is interested in some work life, balance that he said, all right, yeah, we're gonna, we're gonna take some time. We're gonna, we're gonna take a little bit of a break. They're going off to take. Take a break, but the break doesn't happen. Verse 32. So when they went away by themselves, so they went away by themselves in a boat to a solitary place. But many who saw them leaving, recognized them and ran on foot from all the towns and got there ahead of them. When Jesus landed and saw a large crowd, he had compassion on them because they were like sheep without a shepherd. So he began teaching them many things. And depending on how you read this, what basically happened was the boat went out. It was headed to a south solitary place. And the people who knew who the disciples were and knew that they healed people, knew that they taught the words of God, kind of skirted. I mean, really, the text kind of says they kind of skirted along the dry land watching the boat and just kind of, I don't like not having a wireless mic and just kind of, you know, made their way to where they would land and met them. And so Jesus comes upon this crowd and we hear. And what Jesus says there or what the text says there is important. They were like sheep without a shepherd. So he began teaching them many things. Now that phrase, it has kind of some history to it, right? It's used over and over again in the Old Testament to refer to kind of like leaderless people. One of the first times we see it is the Book of Numbers. So what's happening is Moses is looking ahead to his own death. And he says to the Lord, says Moses, sorry, Numbers 27 says, Moses 27, Numbers 27. There is no Moses, 27, Numbers 27, Verse 15. Moses said to the Lord, may the Lord, the God who gives breath to all living things, appoint someone over this community to go out and come in before them, who will lead them out and bring them in so the Lord's people will not be like sheep without a shepherd. And this phrase is going to kind of show up over and over again. It's kind of a shorthand for this idea of, you know, leaderless people, of people who have no sense of leadership. I love what one scholar, N.T. wright, says about Herod, who was kind of supposed to be the king of this people. He says Herod is often. And N.T. wright is an Englishman, so he has kind of an English sense of humor. And so you gotta imagine it with a British accent. I'm not gonna do a British accent, but, you know, you can imag. Herod is off in his palace, probably far to the south of the Sea of Galilee, carousing with his cronies, winking at pretty girls and beheading prophets. And so that is what their leader is up to. He's up to nonsense. He is not interested in leadership. And the contrast of the text is obvious. Herod is only concerned for himself. But Jesus sees, sees people who need help. He sees people and says they're like sheep without a shepherd. As I studied this week, I came across Ezekiel 34, which also uses this phrase, sheep without a shepherd. In this passage, God is kind of calling out the shepherds of the people of Israel, the leaders of the people of Israel. And he says, they're more concerned with myself than with them. I'm sorry, they're more concerned with themselves than my sheep. They're concerned about feeding themselves and not feeding my sheep. And if you read kind of the entirety of Ezekiel 34, God says, so what I'm going to do is I'm going to step in and I'm going to take care of them. I'm going to step in and I'm going to feed them. And that's kind of what we have in this verse, right? We have God coming down in the person of Jesus Christ and stepping in and shepherding his people. And, you know, Herod is the kind of shepherd that God is calling out. In Ezekiel 34, Jesus is stepping in and doing something about it. So all of that kind of gets carried by this phrase. They were like sheep without a shepherd. And Jesus says he. And it says he taught them many things. He knew that they needed guidance. He knew that they needed care. But that isn't the end of the story. And it's not even ultimately the point of the story. Verse 35. By this time, it was late in the day, so his disciples came to him. This is a remote place, they said, and it's already very late. Send the people away so that they can go to the surrounding countryside and villages and buy themselves something to eat. This was a very reasonable thought for the disciples. They're looking at this group of thousands of people and they're saying, jesus, it's getting late. We have no means to host these people. We got to send them away, and they've got to head out to a town in a village, and they've got to, you know, feed themselves because we're coming up on a meal, and we just got to start to think ahead. And the disciples had no means of caring for the crowd's need for food. There was no other option there. But Jesus looks at them, verse 37. But he answered, you give them something to eat. They said to him, that would take more than half a year's wages. Are we going to spend that much on bread and give them all something to eat? And Jesus says, how many loaves do you have? He asked. Go and see. When they found out, they said, five and two fish. Then Jesus directed them to have all the people sit down in groups on the green grass. So they sat down in groups of hundreds and fifties, taking the five loaves and the two fish and. And looking up to heaven. He that is Jesus gave thanks and broke the loaves. Then he gave them to his disciples to distribute to the people. He also divided the two fish among them all. They ate and were satisfied. And the disciples picked up 12 basketfuls of broken pieces of bread and fish. The number of the men who had eaten was about 5,000. So we've kind of broken down this story. But what is very clear to us about what has happened, right, let's make sure we've kind of Captured it. Jesus sees these people, he sees their need, and so do the disciples. Jesus addresses their spiritual needs by offering them guidance. He gives them teaching, right? And the disciples, thinking like hosts would think, thinking responsibly, thinking reasonably, said, you know, these people have physical needs and they reasonably want to send the people home. Jesus looks at them and says, no, you guys can do it. And the disciples say, no, we can't. We don't have that much money. We don't have, you know, the means to do that. We don't have any way to make that happen. Jesus responds and says, okay, well, what do you have? They say, we have some loaves and some fish. And Jesus says, okay, let's see what we can do. And then they distribute enough food to feed 5,000 men and we assume women and children and there are enough baskets full for the disciples to also eat. That is kind of the bones of the story, right? Like, you know what I mean? That is kind of the structure of what we have. That's what we know. But when I read this story, I begin to ask some questions as a reader of the text. My first question is kind of, who is this miracle for, right? Because this is, this is actually David reminded me, Pastor David reminded me of this this morning. This miracle occurs in all four gospels, right? It's one of the only miracle, one of two miracles that appears in all four gospels. This and the resurrection. That's it. So this is a very important story to the disciples. They see this as an essential kind of load bearing story. And so. But who is it for, right? The audience for the miracle has to be the disciples because the crowd would not have even known there wasn't a lot of food up there, right? If you've ever been in a group of 5,000 people, it's a lot of people, right? Like, you know, it's 5,000 people is a good, good chunk of, you know, humanity, right? Like, we're talking like the lower bowl of the giant center or something like that. I don't know exact numbers, right? But like, we're talking about like a good amount of people. And, you know, we got to assume that most of the people who experienced this miracle didn't even know that there wasn't enough food, right? Like think if you're kind of on the outer edge, you're like, oh, bread and fish, cool. You know, I mean, you're not like, oh, I bet this started with five loaves and two fish. You're just like, oh, cool. Yeah, that's great. Okay. Yeah, I was I was thinking we had to go, but I mean, I guess there's food, right? And so the audience of this has to be the disciples. The audience of this has to be the disciples because the crowd was just passing by. So what are the disciples supposed to learn if they are the ones who are supposed to learn something from this miracle? Right? Because we've talked about how these miracles are meant to make us ask questions. They're meant to make us push further in and learn who God is, to lean in to the kingdom of God. And we know the disciples were supposed to learn something because the Gospel of Mark points out over and over again that they did not learn whatever it was that they were supposed to learn from this. Later on in the. Later on in the chapter. We're going to look at this next week. Later on in the chapter, Jesus has just walked on water, right? Jesus walks on water and he gets into the boat. And verse 51 says, Then he climbed into the boat with them. The wind died down. They were completely amazed. Why were they completely amazed? Not because he had just walked on water. For they had not understood about the loaves. Their hearts were hardened. Jesus had walked on water. And Mark tells us that the reason they didn't expect this man to walk on water was because they didn't understand what had happened with the loaves. That the reason that they were surprised that he walked on water was because they didn't understand what had happened with the loaves. And mark 18. 18, 4, 8, mark 8. There's not a mark 18. I don't think there might be. Mark 8, 14, 21. The disciples had forgotten to bring bread. And they think that Jesus makes a sarcastic joke about it. If you read it, it says, I think the exact text is, watch out for the yeast of the Pharisees and Herod. And the disciples said, oh, he's making a joke about yeast because we only brought one. One loaf of bread. Bread. And Jesus looks at them and says, you sound like I'm worried about bread. Do you remember the loaves? Right? Like he looks at him, he says, like you still don't remember. You see, the disciples consistently failed to understand early on in the Gospel of Mark. And really, you could argue for the entire Gospel of Mark. They. They failed to understand who it was that they were dealing with. You see, they still thought this was just teacher. They still thought this was just a wise man. They still thought this was a guy with some good ideas, right? Like if we. If we look at the Gospel of Mark, right? Right in the beginning of the Gospel of Mark says, this is the story about Jesus, the son of God, right? And then all throughout the Gospel of Mark, we get these stories that that show us Jesus, that show us, in Jesus, interacting with people and kind of failing to understand who he is through, you know, one way or the other. And then at the very end of the Gospel of Mark, Jesus has been crucified. And the Roman centurion looks up and says, surely this man was the son of God, right? So we get kind of this bookend of this is the Son of God. And then finally at the end, the character that realizes who this is is the Roman centurion who looks up and says, this man was the son of God, who looks at Jesus on a cross and says, this man was the Son of God. But the disciples have not yet realized that. You see, they don't realize that this was not an ordinary man. They don't realize that this is God in the flesh. They don't realize that this is the King of Kings. They don't realize this is the Lord of Lords. They don't realize that this is the God who creation does his bidding. This is the God who spoke earth into motion, who said, let there be light, and there was light, who said, separate the waters with land and there was land. They don't realize that this is the God who brought Egypt to his knees, the God who spoke the ten commandments from atop a trembling mountain. Jesus wasn't worried about bread. He wasn't limited by lack of bread. He could make as much bread as he wanted to make. He wasn't limited at all. And the disciples still didn't realize it. That even though they watched it over and over again, Jesus says, you still don't understand who I am, do you? You still think I'm just a teacher. You still think I'm just a guy who's just kind of gaining something of a following. But he needed them to realize that he was much, much more than that, that he was in control of creation itself. And why did they need to learn this? Because they were still the sent ones. They were still the missionaries. At the beginning of the verse that we looked at tells us they are called by Jesus and sent into the world to carry his kingdom. And when they saw people who were like sheep without a shepherd, he did not want them to look at those people and say, yeah, that's a real shame. Really wish somebody could do something about that. But what are you going to do? I don't have a half a year's wages sitting Around. So what am I supposed to do about this? No, he wanted them to do something. He wanted them to do what someone who knows God would do. They needed to learn it because this kingdom of God was breaking through, and he had entrusted them to carry it. And he needed them to know that not only that they could do something, but that they should do something. And so as we look at this miracle, the feeding of the 5,000, it would be wrong to look at it. I mean, not wrong, just not all the way correct. I guess you could say it would be wrong to look at it and say, oh, this is a story about God providing bread for people. And what we should learn about this is that God will provide for our needs. Yes, that's true. And yes, I could point to a million verses that would say to you, God will provide for your needs. But that is not what Jesus hoped to teach the disciples. What Jesus hoped to teach the disciples was, I am God, and I have the power of creation in my very hand. And you have to understand that choosing to carry my kingdom, choosing to be a part of my kingdom, means that you have access to me. And by having access to me, it means that you actually can do something about those moments when the kingdom of God runs up against the kingdom of the world, right? When this kingdom that is breaking through comes up against the kingdom of Herod. And we see people that are lost and helpless like sheep without a shepherd. When you see that, you don't just have to look at that and say, well, yeah, I mean, it's tough, right? You can actually look at that and say, oh, we can do something about this because we have God himself on our side. We have God himself who has called us and sent us to heal the wounds of the world. And that is what Jesus is trying to get through to his disciples over and over again in this section of the Gospel of Mark. So if we struggle to get it, we shouldn't feel too bad because they were, you know, watching a multiply bread and fish. And I've never seen that. And so, you know, and they were still struggling to get it. But what about us? What could we do with this lesson? Because we sit here in the year 2026 as disciples of this same Jesus, and we have to ask ourselves some questions. And they are kind of long questions, so hang with me. And my first question is, when we see the kingdom of God come face to face with the kingdom of the world, do we respond the way that Jesus responded? When we see the kingdom of God come face to face with the kingdom of the world, do we respond the way that Jesus responded? And I want to explain some terms there because maybe you would think I'm making a political point and I'm not. When I say the kingdom of God, I'm talking about, right, us, the way that we hope that people live and act, right? The value system of the kingdom of God, right? The, you know, love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind and strength. And the second is like it, love your neighbor as yourself, right? People who ground their values and their personhood and the way they see people, that people are made in the image of God, that they have intrinsic value, right? That people are not valuable because of what they can do for work. People are not valuable because of how much money they can earn. That people are not valuable because of how important that they are in a boardroom, right? But people are valuable, why? Because God has implanted his creative energies into them that they are made in the image of God and therefore have intrinsic and not ascribed value. And that is how we see every single person that breathes air, right? That is how we see every single person who has ever been created by God. And therefore we love them, therefore we care for them, therefore we share the gospel with them so that they can come into a life giving relationship with their Savior. Because the reality is that they are made for a relationship with that God who created them. However, sin has entered the picture and therefore we live in rebellion against a holy God and that our lives are not the way that they should be when we are in rebellion with that holy God. And we have a different value system and a different way of living than the world around us. So when the kingdom of God, right? That's kind of the broad idea of what I'm talking about. And when I say the kingdom of the world, I'm talking about the opposite, right? A world that says, oh no, people are valuable based on their financial contribution, right? People are valuable based off of their social status. People are valuable based off what they can give me that I can take and I can steal and I can take advantage of others because why it just benefits me. And there's no such thing as right and wrong. There's no such thing as a God who has values or a God who has laws or there's no idea of sin because ultimately it's just might makes, right, right? And I can just do whatever I want. And the reality of living, right, I don't have to convince anyone of this, is that the kingdom of God will come into Conflict with the kingdom of the world and Jesus response. So let me ask the question again. With those ideas kind of settled, when you see the kingdom of God come face to face with the kingdom of the world, do you respond the way that Jesus responded? The way Jesus responded was with compassion. Because they were like sheep without a shepherd, right? That idea of compassion, he hurt with them, right? He hurt alongside them. He allowed their hurts to become his hurts. But we tend to respond more similar to how the disciples responded. We say, well, that's difficult, but what am I supposed to do? I can't do anything about it. I can't do anything about systemic problems, right? I'm not. I'm not a. I'm not a system. I'm just a person. What am I going to do? And, you know, after all, like, I mean, even if I. Even if I fix it, will it last? Right? We tend to respond to these moments similar to how I respond to my messy garage, right? What am I going to do about it? It's going to take too long. I don't have that kind of time. I don't know how to do something about it. And it's not that I don't think something should be done. It's not that I don't think someone should do something. I just think that I can't do much. But Jesus would challenge that. But Jesus would challenge that. He would say that we have something to do about this. And this leads right into kind of the second question. When we look at the job that we have in front of us, right? When we have that moment of compassion that I hope that we have, do we remember who called us to do the work? So when we see the kingdom of God meet up with the kingdom of the world, do we respond with compassion? And secondly, when we respond with compassion and we see the job in front of us, do we remember who has called us to do the work? I talked about my messy garage and the feeling of, I'm never going to get this done. And when we look at the world, it can feel that way. If you've never felt this way, go home. Don't actually do this, but go home, turn on an hour of cable news, and you will see 100 things you can't do anything about. You know what I mean? Just Google all the places where people are hungry, all the places where people have needs. You'll just feel small and powerless, right? Because when we actually look at the world, it can feel overwhelming. And we respond with compassion. It can feel overwhelming, but that is where we have to remember who has called us to do the work in front of us. It's not some powerless middle manager, right? It's not Jesus sitting there going, yeah. I mean, you know, unfortunately, it's above my head. Unfortunately, there's just nothing I can do about this. Unfortunately, you know, I wish I could, but they don't let us. My login to the computer doesn't let me do that. Right? Like, Jesus isn't sitting there saying that. No, he is God himself. He is God who came down in the body of Jesus Christ, and he has invited us to participate in his mission. And there's beauty in that because it goes into kind of the last thought that we have. Because the last kind of thought is, okay, so I'm supposed to respond with compassion. I'm trying to respond with compassion. And I feel overwhelmed. And, okay, when I feel overwhelmed, I'm supposed to remember who Jesus is, that Jesus is God himself. Okay, that's great. That's a great thought. But what am I supposed to do with that? And what we're supposed to do is we're supposed to go get our loaves and our fish and give it to Jesus. We're supposed to go get our loaves and our fish and give it to Jesus. Jesus looks at the disciples and he says, you give them something to eat. And the disciples say, we can't do that. And he says, okay, what do you have? We have some loaves and some fish. And he says, all right, go get them and bring them over here. Right? The text doesn't say it explicitly, but I heard someone say it, and I love it. It's this idea that what we're supposed to do with this is that there's a book that I read that mentions this is. It's this idea that we, too, as Christians, are also blessed, broken, and multiplied, right? Like, if I live for myself, right? Like, I am limited to what I can do for myself. If I live for myself, my life is my own and maybe my family's, right? Like, we talk about, like, what I bring to the table, like, what I'm supposed to do if I limit it to what Addison can do. I think about this a lot because I'm a pretty weird person. I think about how much I know about, like, my great grandfather, right? And I'm pretty sure if I thought about it, I could tell you, like, his first name and, like, what he did for work, right? And I think about that because I think, you know, for all the things I stress about, ultimately this life that I'M leading. However long it lasts will be kind of flattened into that. Oh, yeah. My great, great grandfather was. His name was Addison. They had three kids and. And they lived in Lancaster, and he was a pastor. I think that's it. And like, I mean, you could see that as sad. You could say, I don't. You know, I think it just is, right. Like, it's just the nature of how things are. But when I take kind of my loaves and my fish, right? When I take like this, this, these, you know, 60, 70, 80 years that I have on this earth. 90. I know some, you know, I'm not trying to, you know, whatever. 60, 70, 89. I don't know. Medicine's getting crazy. 100. You know, when I take the amount of years that I have on this earth and I put that at the feet of Jesus, he is able to do so much more with my loaves and fish than I can do with my loaves and fish. He has invited me to a life that matters. He has invited me to participate in his eternal mission on in the world. He has invited me to contribute my little paragraph to his mission and purpose in the world. That I can lay myself on his altar and that my life can do more there than it ever could do elsewhere. That I am. That I actually have the opportunity to take this life, that I have to put it at the feet of Jesus and for him to take it, bless it, break it and multiply it, and give it out for. For the sake of what he has called me to do. And in the hands of God himself, it is just much more valuable than it could ever be in my own hands. So the questions I asked were, when we see the kingdom of God come face to face with the kingdom of the world, do we remember to have compassion? And if you have compassion, you'll feel overwhelmed. So do you remember that it is God himself who has called you to it? And therefore that we ought to take our life, that we ought to take our loaves and our fish and to put it into his hands and trust him to do the multiplication. In other words. And this is a statement I'm borrowing, but I think it's a great way to put it, you do what you can with what you have and you let God take care of the rest. I saw another person. Put it this way. What? I saw another place. I'm sorry, I saw another place. Where I put it this way. What are your five loaves? Is there something you could take to Jesus and say, jesus, help me do something about this. This is too big of a job for me. But I know you want me to do something. I know you want me to step in and do something. See, we look at the world and we can feel overwhelmed. But the question is much simpler when we say, okay, what could I do if I were to do something right down here? Next month, Angela Licata is going to lead Bible to school. They're going to meet on Tuesdays and Wednesdays, and kids are going to come from the school right across the street, and they're going to come over here, they're going to learn about Jesus. That's what's going to happen, right? That's something we can do, right? Like, we talk about, like, oh, kids aren't being raised in the church. Kids aren't hearing about Jesus. Kids aren't, you know, getting the right values or that, you know, we're not. We're not sharing the gospel with kids and all. They. They pushed God out of schools and all this. We could talk about that stuff, right? We could be mad about it. We could be frustrated by it. But Angela Licata needs volunteers. And if we're. And if you're frustrated about it, if you're mad about it, guess what? You can do something about it. And I know it's during the workday, and I know it's difficult, and maybe all you could do is you could just pray for her, and you could pray for her volunteers, and you could pray for them to, you know, keep after it. But the point is, there's something, right? You know, and this is. I could tell story after story after story of people who kind of come up against this, and they see the thing. They stop at the compassion piece, right? Where they see people who are harassed and leaderless like sheep without a shepherd. And their compassion comes up and they go. They stop where the disciples would have stopped. They go, yeah, it'd be great if we could do something, but what are we going to do? And this was the lesson that Jesus was trying to get the disciples. What you're going to do is something. What you're going to do is carry some bread, right? Like, what you're going to do is you're going to carry some bread. That's going to be your participation. That's all they did. They just carried baskets. And they were like, I guess there are more baskets. Okay, There are leftovers. Well, waste not. What not. I guess we'll take some with us, right? Like, you know, that was their role in kind of the. The interaction here. Jesus is the one performing the miracles, all they are doing is participating. And friends, we have the same invitation over and over again. So if you find yourself in, you know, your workplace and you're saying, man, I really wish that Jesus would reach these people. Ask yourself, what can I do? You know, what conversations can I have? What, you know, in what ways can I be Jesus to these people? Can I be encouraging? Can I be loving? Can I be life giving? Oh, I wish, you know, I wish more people would follow Jesus. Who was the last person you invited to talk to you about Jesus? Hey, can we go out for coffee? I just want to get to know you better, right? Like, you know, we can find those things where we can do what we can with what we have and let Jesus be in charge of the multiplication. We can find our five loaves and we can put them in the hands of Jesus. And we could say, jesus, work in me and through me to do the multiplication. Friends, we are not powerless. We have God, very God on our sides. That the God of creation, that the same God who created the world lives in us. That your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit and that we work alongside God to complete his mission in the world. We are not left wanting for the ability to do anything. We can choose to pray, we can choose to find something to do. We can choose to put our hands to the plow, if you will, and find a way to do the work of the kingdom in the world. So my prayer for you is that you don't feel powerless. That as you see, Jesus challenged his disciples. That you would not look at a world that is in chaos and say, man, I wish somebody would do something. But you would say, you know what, Jesus? Show me what I can do. Because I see a couple pieces of bread and some shriveled fish and I don't see anything I can do with that. But in your hands, it's something. Let's pray together. Jesus, help us to get this. I feel excited as I talk about it and I feel challenged as I talk about it, because I know that I don't always live this way. I can be completely tied to the practical. I can be handcuffed to. Well, I mean, that's the way it should go, or that's the way it should do. And we have to be reasonable after all. But Lord, we can put things in your hands and you can do what only you can do. And Lord, you are God himself. And Lord, you care about our friends and our neighbors and our loved ones. You care about, about those who are on the outside of your kingdom, Lord, you look out. And you have a deep compassion for them. So, Lord, show us those places where we can pick up some bread. Show us those places where we could take what you've given us and we could put it at your feet and say, this isn't anything. This isn't enough. This isn't. But in your hands, maybe it could be. And I pray that you would challenge us to grow and to learn from you. That as we see you multiply things. Lord, we would understand what had happened with the loaves. We would understand that you were God himself. And that you are working in and through us. To do what? To complete your mission in the world. And we ask all this in your name. Amen.