That Boy

It is the small things that we do that will have the greatest effect on others. The Gospel story from this past weekend proved that:

Gospel
Jn 6:1-15
Jesus went across the Sea of Galilee.
A large crowd followed him,
because they saw the signs he was performing on the sick.
Jesus went up on the mountain,
and there he sat down with his disciples.
The Jewish feast of Passover was near.
When Jesus raised his eyes
and saw that a large crowd was coming to him,
he said to Philip,
“Where can we buy enough food for them to eat?”
He said this to test him,
because he himself knew what he was going to do.
Philip answered him,
“Two hundred days’ wages worth of food would not be enough
for each of them to have a little.”
One of his disciples,
Andrew, the brother of Simon Peter, said to him,
“There is a boy here who has five barley loaves and two fish;
but what good are these for so many?”
Jesus said, “Have the people recline.”
Now there was a great deal of grass in that place.
So the men reclined, about five thousand in number.
Then Jesus took the loaves, gave thanks,
and distributed them to those who were reclining,
and also as much of the fish as they wanted.
When they had had their fill, he said to his disciples,
“Gather the fragments left over,
so that nothing will be wasted.”
So they collected them,
and filled twelve wicker baskets with fragments
from the five barley loaves
that had been more than they could eat.
When the people saw the sign he had done, they said,
“This is truly the Prophet, the one who is to come into the world.”
Since Jesus knew that they were going to come and carry him off
to make him king,
he withdrew again to the mountain alone.

Did you see it, did you read the small thing that made a great change, the small act that had an impact? If not look it over one more time, I’ll wait…

Ok, her it is, are you ready for it?

“There is a boy here who has five barley loaves and two fish;
but what good are these for so many?”

The small boy, with out even knowing it, was going to be part of something greater, some larger than himself. He was going to be part of a miracle that will be talked about for thousands of years. He made a difference in the lives of not only who were there, but also in the lives of people who are thousand of miles away and centuries yet to come.

It was kind of funny really, as I sat in mass this weekend hearing this story this was the first time I ever remember hearing about the boy. I don’t mean to state that they just added him to the story, but rather that this was the first time the Holy Spirit opened my ears to him and his story to tell.

Think about it, this boy has only one line in this gospel, the writes could have chosen to pass over him, yet John chose not to pass over him, rather John chose to mention him, to place him in a spot light of sorts. We have learned of the years that the writes of the gospels didn’t add a lot of “fluff” to the stories, that if they took the time to mention someone or something there was a reason for it. Whole books have been written on people mentions only one time in the bible, peoples lives have changed based on one act preformed or one phrase mentioned.

This young boy was mentioned for a reason, what is his example, what is his purpose? Why did John waste the time identifying him, to what end? We don’t even know his name, yet we hear about him in this one story.  This boy and his fish and bread were used for God’s will, from him the miracle of the fish and loafs took place. With out this boy there would be no miracle. Now some of you would say that’s not true, Jesus would have done it anyway, that he could have turned rock in to food if he wanted too. So true, Jesus could have, but he didn’t that was not his style, Jesus and for that matter God use humanity as the agents of there divine work. God used Moses to free his people, he didn’t need to, but he did. Noah was used as was Lot and his wife, and lets not for get Job. God always used humanity for his greatest works, such as God’s use of Mary in or redemption. Well in the same way this boy was being used, his simple gift of a few loafs and fish, was used to feed the 5000. Yes I said gift, although it’s not stated in the story it is implied that that boy offered his food.

Why do I say it’s implied, well first off I really don’t think Jesus told the apostles to steal the fish and bread, nor do I thing thy forced the boy to hand it over. that’s just not Jesus’ style. Rather it is more his style to ask the boy if he would not mind sharing his food with others, or maybe the boy offered it before he was even asked either way that boys simple gift of a few loafs of bread and some fish is a lesson we all still need to learn today. The simple act of of sharing what we have with those who have none is a powerful thing.

That boy helped to change the course of history, simple by sharing…

Paul

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