Psalm 23
Mark 6:30-44

Nearly 25 years ago, Robert Bellah introduced us to Sheila Larson, who described her faith saying, “I believe in God.  I’m not a religious fanatic.  I can’t remember the last time I went to church.  My faith has carried me a long way.  It’s Sheilaism.  Just my own little voice.” (Robert Bellah, et al., Habits of the Heart: Individualism and Commitment in American Life, Berkley: University of California, 1985, p. 220-221)
           
What Sheila voiced was what many were expressing then and have continued to express over the course of the last quarter century.  I hear this often in the statement, “I’m spiritual but I’m not religious.”  It is the rise of “Sheilaism” as the religion of our time—“Just my own little voice,” as the only authoritative word to our lives.  No voice of God to challenge our voice.  No voice from a friend, colleague, or acquaintance to nudge us to rethink an idea or a position.  No need really to participate in worship because there is no need for growth or challenge or change or development when all that is needed is “just my own little voice.”  I cannot pass the opportunity to underscore that when the only voice I need to hear is my voice, it is a frighteningly little voice that I’m hearing. 
           
We are here in worship because we have heard something more significant than our own little voices or we want and need to hear more than our own little voices.  We are here so that we might hear God’s voice, and the voices of fellow pilgrims and disciples, and so that our voices might become larger and stronger as a result of hearing God’s voice. 
           
We are here to learn and grow because discipleship does not come naturally. We need to learn from Jesus, grow in our faith and understanding.  We do not do that alone, in a vacuum.  Actually, our best learning occurs through interaction with and insight from others.  I hope you will continually avail yourselves of the opportunities for growth and formation that are offered through worship, adult education, small groups, and conversations.
           
Being a disciple of Jesus is not contiguous with being a caring, sensitive person.  It’s not enough to say that we live in North America and therefore we are at least nominally Christian because Christianity has so influenced our culture. 
           
Disciples of Jesus are people who are shaped, formed, reshaped and reformed by the good news of God into people with certain attitudes expressed in just and loving ways that often are counter to the ways of the culture and the larger world in which we live.  So we have to be taught, formed, shaped, and prepared to live the narrow way called discipleship. 
           
Jesus was a teacher and the story of the feeding of the 5000 is an excellent illustration of Jesus’ teaching his disciples and of their need to hear voices other than their own.  The disciples reported to Jesus all they had done and taught and he suggested they get away and rest awhile.  They go to the desert but a huge crowd anticipates where they are going and gets there before they do.  They were like sheep without a shepherd Jesus said and so he began to teach them.  Time passed and lunch time arrived.  The people were hungry. 
           
We are often like those in the crowd.  We seem to wander through life without direction or purpose or to borrow Jesus’ phrase, “like sheep without a shepherd.”  We find ourselves in the wilderness where many of us lose our way.  At times we feel like strangers in a strange land. 
           
Many are in pain because they have lost their way.  They’re wandering and hurting.  They are confused.  They aren’t sick; they’re ignorant.  They simply have not taken the time or had the opportunity to take the time to think through their faith.  They are faced with the complexities of life but have only bits and pieces of insight and understanding they have cobbled together from here and there.  But there’s nothing solid, consistent or thought through that can give them direction.  Or they are trying to live in the world as adults but they haven’t upgraded their faith since they were ten or since they rejected nearly everything when they were in their teens.  They are trying to address first hand issues with second hand faith.
           
The church forms a culture that is counter to the world’s ways of doing things.  The church is not only to reach out and speak to the dominant culture but also it is to disrupt the culture by rescuing people from it.  Then, the church is to inculcate them into a new culture called the church. 
           
The culture tells us there is a scarcity of everything.  You only go around once so you had better grab all the gusto you can get.  There are people starving, the culture says, because there is a scarcity of food.  The culture emphasizes wants.  Wanting becomes an addiction.  We become collectors of stuff.  My dad’s home is an example.  Unfortunately, so is our home.  The storm of August 23, 2007 exposed clearly what Peggy and I already knew.  We had a lot of stuff, stuff that we didn’t need and weren’t using, stuff that others could use.  We did an amazing thing.  We got rid of our television set. We weren’t using it so we gave it to the Salvation Army so someone else could use it.  Isn’t that great? However, we still have 4 television sets.  We don’t need four television sets.  We want four television sets.  In the words of Carlyle Marney, we need to have our wanters fixed.
           
The insightful thing about this story is not that 5000 people ate but rather there was enough for everyone.  Their needs were met.  The message is the sufficiency of God.  God has created and designed the world in such a away that as Mahatma Gandhi stated it there is enough for everyone’s need but not enough for everyone’s greed.   
           
The story begins with a sense of excitement by the disciples.  They have done what Jesus asked them to do, have been successful and buoyed by it and eager to tell Jesus about it.  Jesus invites them to come away to a lonely place and rest awhile.             
           
Suddenly with this story the job description of the apostles changes from apostles to disciples to waiters to busboys.  The disciples saw many people coming and going, taking Jesus’ time and they thought they were going to have his undivided attention.  They wished for one of those storms to take the boat away from where the people were traveling.  Who was captain of the ship?  Why didn’t he guide the boat away from all those people?  With all those people came needs, demands, and expectations.  What caused disciples to have concern about food for the people?  Perhaps it was compassion on their part.  They realized the day was getting away and the people were going to  be hungry.  Jesus commanded his disciples to give them something to eat.  200 denarii was a significant amount.  Was Jesus suggesting they spend their entire treasury or were they being sarcastic with Jesus? 
           
As a leader Jesus is willing to be vulnerable to the point of looking like a fool.  Jesus does not solve the problem and serve as the answer man.  Jesus continues to believe in people who do not believe in themselves.  This story is relevant today because we have inherited from Jesus a leadership of abundance rather than of scarcity and we are to believe in people who do not believe in themselves.
           
Parker Palmer tells the story about being on a flight from Saskatchewan to Minnesota.  The plane is delayed and the pilot announces that it has been delayed because of problems with the equipment  getting the coffee and snacks to the plane.  The pilot was convinced that people preferred to get to their destination as quickly as possible rather than have snacks.  Was he ever wrong?  There were complaints and threats.  Soon after take off one of the flight attendants comes on the intercom to announce they are  now cruising at 20 feet above the ground and  then says, “Now that I have  your  attention, I know this is disappointing not to have snacks.  I have a suggestion.  Why don’t those of you who were on this flight yesterday and took extra peanuts, get them out and share them.  Those of you who have newspapers cannot possibly read all sections at the same time.  Why not share some of the sections with others?  And you grandparents, why don’t you get the pictures out of your grandchildren and show them to those around you?  The mood changed dramatically as people interacted, shared, and enjoyed each other.  Parker invited the attendant to him and asked her to give him her supervisor’s name and address because he wanted to write a letter of appreciation.  She thanked him and said she would get the information.  Then, as she turned to go, she said, “The loaves and fish still work.”
           
There is an insightful and valuable lesson in this story about leadership that can help us discover that we have all we need and there is no way ever to have all we want.  The feeding of the 5000 demonstrates what leadership for abundance and community does.

• The leader in this story looks, listens and discerns but does not press a pre-planned agenda.
• The leader in this story acts responsively, informed by trust but does not get obsessed with “goals that become binding and blinding.
• The leader in this story keeps “reframing “reality but does not accept other’s definition of the situation.
• The leader in this story deflects, redirects and “hands off” initiatives and actions but does not embrace other people’s projections about his/her responsibilities.

• The leader in this story issues invitations, permissions, and challenges but does not give detailed orders or coercive commands.
• The leader in this story deals with what is available but does not become obsessed with what is lacking
• The leader in this story models the desired action but does not merely exhort others to act.
• The leader in this story risks waiting for reality to emerge, whatever it may be but does not force results, or the illusion of results. (Parker J.  Palmer)

It is this kind of leadership that will help us embrace the insight and understanding that we have all we need and that we can never have all we want.  This kind of leadership teaches, teaches us a new way of thinking and learning and living.  It teaches us the joy of abundance and moves us away from the fear of scarcity. 
           
Rodney Clapp stresses that the church forms a new and unique culture and invites any and all to join this new culture which actually is a counter culture movement.  This new culture includes:

• A particular way of eating learned in and through Communion.
• A particular way of handling conflict, the peculiar politics called “forgiveness” and learned through the example of the life and ministry of Jesus.
• A particular way of perpetuating itself, through evangelism rather than biological propagation.  (Rodney Clapp, “Practicing the Politics of Jesus,” in The Church as Counterculture, Michael L. Budde and Robert W. Brimlow, eds., Albany: State University of New York, p. 29)

The best known passage of Scripture is the 23rd Psalm and one of the best known stories from Jesus’ ministry is the feeding of the 5000.  Both communicate the same message, the sufficiency of God’s grace to meet whatever needs we have. The Psalm assures us that God provides the resources to enable us to cope with any need we have. The lesson in the parable is the abundance of all we ever need.  The lesson was there for the disciples and for the crowd.  Is there a lesson in these two passages for us in the midst of a world economic crisis?  Is there a message for us as a congregation when we fret and stew about the revenue and expenses of a budget?  The story of the feeding of the 5000 concludes with the observation that everyone had enough and there was plenty left over.  God has provided resources for all that we ever need.  Not even God can provide enough for all that we ever want.  When we function from an understanding of abundance rather than from a fear of scarcity, we discover we have all we ever need because the Lord is our shepherd, we shall not need.