Good morning, everyone. Take your Bibles.
Open up to the Gospel of Luke Chapter 9.
Luke Chapter 9. That's page 919.
If you're using one of the Bibles in the seat underneath of
you, for those of you who have asked me the question, those
Bibles in the sea, are we allowed to just take them?
And the answer is yes. It is our gift to you as a
church. We would love for you to have a
Bible that you can bring home with you.
I want you to think about a time when you came face to face with
your limitations as a human being.
I remember one time my sons were sharing a bedroom and they
wanted me to paint their bedroom Spider Man colors and being a
good dad I thought this is a great thing and I'm going to go
paint their bedroom spider man color.
So I spent all this time painting it the red and the blue
and it looked awesome. And I called Shannon into the
room to show off my work to her and she said, so what's with the
paint all over the carpet or the ceiling?
And I, I just like the color outside the lines a little bit.
It's fine. But it, it was like, moments
like that have happened so many times in my life where I
recognize that Bible college does not train you how to use a
paintbrush or a drill or anything like that.
I, I come face to face my limitations all the time at
home. And because you're a human
being, I know I'm not alone. I know you've got your set of
limitations as well. You've got moments that happen
where your limitations are exposed, moments where you
realize you don't have enough resources to fix the problem.
Even worse, you don't have the skills or the strengths or the
personality that you would need to step into the situation that
is in front of you. We all have limitations for all
kinds of different reasons, whether it's your genetics,
nobody's ever taught you, maybe it's your age.
Sometimes you've got limitations because you're younger and you
don't have all the experience that other people have.
And sometimes those of us, as we get a little bit older, we start
to feel some of our own limitations as well because we
can't do all the things that we used to be able to do.
If you've got poor health and health challenges, you are very
acutely aware of some of your limitations.
So what is your normal response when you come up against your
limitations? What what's the way that you
normally react to them? Do you just get stressed out and
anxious? Do you get angry and frustrated?
Do do you feel like a failure or a loser or not enough as a human
being? Do you just go, I'm just going
to power through this and figure it out.
Or maybe you're just someone who just shrugs your shoulders and
goes whatever, and you just accept the limitation and you
move on. Well, we're walking through Luke
Chapter 9 and we're talking about how Jesus shapes people's
lives, how he shapes us to be the people that God wants us to
be. And as we come to Luke 9 today,
here's what we're going to discover.
Jesus is going to use your limitations to shape your trust
in God. That from God's perspective,
your limitations are not something for you to get
stressed out over or anxious about.
They're not something for you to power through and just figure
out. They're not even something to
just accept and move on from now.
And in reality, the limitations that you have are an opportunity
for you to find a greater closeness in your walk with God.
It's an opportunity for you to find rest for your soul and for
your relationship with God to be strengthened.
Now, I know that there's a lot of people who don't like to
admit that they've got weaknesses and limits.
We, we, we are filled with a little shame sometimes around
that. But throughout human history,
the human race has tried to show that we've got no limits.
We can do anything. Your mom probably told you you
can do anything. She lied.
You can't. Even the development of AI has
created a world where some people imagine a life without
limits. And while humans are capable of
doing some pretty extraordinary things, no matter how hard we
try, we will always come face to face with things that are beyond
our ability for one simple reason.
You're not God. You're hardwired by God to be a
person who points to what God is like, but you are never going to
be able to be and do everything that God does.
In Luke 9, the disciples of Jesus are going to come face to
face with Him, shaping them through their limitations.
This is where we pick up beginning in verse 10.
When the apostles returned, they reported to Jesus all that they
had done. He took them along and withdrew
privately to a town called Bethsaida.
When the crowds found out, they followed him.
He welcomed them, spoke to them about the Kingdom of God and
healed those who needed healing. Late in the day, the 12
approached and said to him, send the crowd away so that they can
go into the surrounding villages and countryside to find food and
lodging. Because we are in a deserted
place here. You give them something to eat.
He told them. We have no more than 5 loaves
and two fish. They said unless we go and buy
food for all these people. For about 5000 men were there.
Then he told his disciples have them sit down in groups of about
50 each. They did what he said had them
all sit down. Then he took the five loaves and
the two fish, and looking up to heaven, he blessed and broke
them. He kept giving them to the
disciples to be set before the crowd.
Everyone ate and was filled. They picked up 12 baskets of
leftover pieces. So the very first thing that
happens in this passage is that is that the disciples of Jesus
return and they're reporting to Jesus on what they had done.
This is referring to what we talked about two weeks ago,
where Jesus had sent the disciples out to go on mission
to go and heal people and proclaim the good news of the
Kingdom of God. So now they've come back to
Jesus and they're telling him stories of what went on while
they were out doing the work of ministry.
They've been busy. They've been giving their all to
love people and meet their needs.
When the Gospel of Mark shares this same story, he says that
the disciples had been so busy serving other people they had
not even had any time to eat yet.
Matthew adds one more layer by saying the disciples had just
found out that John the Baptist had been killed and they had
gone and taken John's body and buried John.
So this group of men who had been out on mission giving
themselves over and over again to help other people, they are
worn out. They are worn out physically,
they're worn out emotionally, they are worn out spiritually.
And the very first thing that Jesus does is he takes them away
from the noise in the crowds to a place called Bethsaida to be
alone with him so he could care for them.
And right away, Jesus is ministering to his disciples in
their limitations. And here's what I want you to
hear today. When you are weary and you are
exhausted, come to Jesus. I know that in this room and
watching online, there are many, many people who are just simply
exhausted. You're working hard, some of you
are working multiple jobs, and it doesn't seem to be enough.
You're caring for family and friends who are going through it
right now, and you're caring. You're so invested that you
don't even have enough time to eat proper meals or exercise or
take care of your own health. Some of you, many of you are
faithfully serving in the life of our church family.
You are giving and giving and giving of yourself to others for
for their benefit. And and you're almost afraid to
stop because if you stop, you don't know what might happen
when the adrenaline comes crashing down.
That's how tired you are. And if that's you today, if you
find yourself in a place where you are just tired and your soul
is feeling weary by the grind of life, I want you to know Jesus
is not a slave driver who is just going to say to you, suck
it up and learn to work harder. The exhaustion you're feeling is
God's way of showing you that you've got limitations, and it's
also an invitation from Jesus for you to find rest and
refreshing from Him. I don't know what you do to
refresh yourself, but if you're like most people, you probably
take a vacation or you've got hobbies that you use.
You like to take a nice long nap, long nap.
All those things are great things to do, but there is
something unique about going and being alone with Jesus and
allowing Him to speak into your life.
He's going to give you something that no other outlet you have to
be refreshed can give you. He's going to renew your soul.
Jesus is the one who knows exactly what your limitations
are, and Jesus has compassion for you.
He is the Good Shepherd who loves you.
At the core of the Christian story is not a whole bunch of
responsibilities or tasks that we have to accomplish.
It's not about how many ways am I serving the needs of all the
other people. Everything about the Christian
story is rooted and flows out of a love relationship with God.
Jonathan Edwards said it like this.
He said a true Christian delights at times to retire from
all mankind. Now doesn't that sound awesome?
Who doesn't want to retire from all mankind sometimes, right?
But this is not that's not the whole sentence.
Here's what his full sentence is.
A true Christian delights at times to retire from all
mankind, to converse with God in solitary places.
It's the words of David in Psalm 42.
As a deer longs for flowing streams, so I long for you, God.
Jesus is the bread of life. Jesus is the living water.
And when you're exhausted and worn down, he sees you and he
simply says, hey friend, come here and and let me refresh you.
So when was the last time you turned off all the noise and you
stepped away from all the responsibilities?
Not just to go on a trip somewhere or go up to a cottage
or take a vacation. But when was the last time you
did all those things so that you could just simply sit in the
presence of Jesus? Not, not to tell Him all the
things that you want from Him, but to receive what He wants to
say to you and speak into your own heart and soul.
Some of you may not even know what that even looks like or how
to even do that. So I want to just take a minute.
I want to kind of give you some practical handles of what that
might look like for you if you've never done something like
that before. First of all, you don't have to
go far away to have this kind of time with Jesus.
You don't have to sit there and think, OK, how do I go to the
desert somewhere or up to a mountaintop somewhere to have
this kind of time alone with Jesus?
The disciples are brought to Bethsaida.
Bethsaida was the hometown of three of Jesus disciples.
But what Jesus does is he keeps them close to home, but he takes
them to a deserted area, probably just outside of
Bethsaida, an area where they could be free from the
distractions and free from all the things that are going to
take them away from hearing what Jesus wants to speak into their
life. And so turn off your phone, turn
off your television, turn off your computer.
If you are dealing with young kids and the reality of your
home and you're going Kirk, silence is not a thing.
Tag team with each other. Seriously, your team work
together so that each other can have some time alone with God.
If you're a single parent, tag team with other single parents
and create some space, support each other in being able to do
this. And then take 20 minutes or an
hour or half a day or a full day, whatever it looks like,
whatever you can take. Get alone with God.
And then you're probably going to need to take a few deep
breaths. Because if you're like me, your
brains kind of still in about 500 different spots and you're
going to need to take a few deep breaths and just remind
yourself, OK, I'm here right now and I just want to hear from God
and invite God. Like God, would you come and
minister to my heart and my soul?
Would you speak to me? The things you want to speak to
me, you open up to places in the Bible and verses like Psalm 23.
The Lord is my shepherd. You read passages throughout the
Bible that talk about the amazing gifts that God gives to
you because you're his child. And just listen to what the Holy
Spirit wants to say to you from Scripture.
I promise you, God doesn't just want to speak to somebody like
me who's standing on a platform as a posture.
God wants to speak to all of his children and minister to your
heart and soul. Sing worship songs, fix your
heart on God, invite him to minister to you.
And I, it's going to feel weird at first.
I'm just like, if you've never done that before, I promise you
it feels weird at first, but I'll tell you, there's nobody
who loves you more than Jesus does.
He delights in caring for you and ministering to you.
Enjoy His presence and His love. Now the reality is this,
spending time alone with Jesus does not remove all the
pressures and responsibilities. They're going to still find a
way to find you. And if you've ever gone away on
vacation, you know that's true when you come back to work after
a vacation. And the same thing happens here
in this story to the disciples in verse 11.
The crowds find out where Jesus and his disciples are, and they
go to them. They go chasing them down.
Jesus is trying to be alone with his disciples to minister to
them. And the crowds just keep coming
and going. Give us more, Jesus, Give us
more. So Jesus starts ministering to
these people. He's healing them.
He's speaking to them about the Kingdom of God.
And the day is going on and on and on and getting longer and
longer. And, and the disciples, they
come to Jesus and they say, hey, Jesus, hey, we're really tired.
Could you just send the crowds away, please?
Could you just get rid of the people?
We're in a deserted place here, Jesus.
We're tired. There's no food to eat.
There's nothing here to help these people other than you
meeting their spiritual needs. But practically, there's nothing
here for them, Jesus. Just send them away to a place
where they can get their needs met.
And really, it's a very logical response from the disciples.
There's a clear need here. These people are getting hungry.
We need to feed them. And the only solution is send
them away to the villages where they can get some food.
But Jesus has a different idea. Jesus looks at his disciples and
then he looks out at the crowd, looks back at his disciples and
he says, you give them something to eat.
That is such a wild response from Jesus because he's actually
the one who created all the realities of the limitations
that are happening right now. First of all, he brought the
disciples out to a deserted place where he knew there was
going to be no food. Second, earlier in Chapter 9,
Jesus had told his disciples don't bring any food for the
journey, so they didn't have a whole bunch of extra snack food
in their backpacks. In the end, they're in a
deserted place that Jesus brought them to.
And then Jesus says you give them something to eat sometimes.
Jesus is going to create the limitations in your life to
teach you this lesson. When the need feels
overwhelming, don't just pass it off.
We live in a culture of constantly outsourcing our
problems to other people. We, we can easily identify all
kinds of things that need to be addressed.
And we also quite easily go, I don't have the ability to help
these people with these things. Like you, you look at some of
the people in your own life and you go, man, I, I see all the
things that they need help with, but, but I don't have the skills
to give them the counseling they need or the finances to help
them get out of the trouble that they're in.
So what do we do? We, we outsource the solution.
We, we say, well, you should go here for counseling and you
should go check out these places to get all the supports and
resources that you need. One of the things that happened
in a church all the time is people go, I think you should
talk to the pastor about that. You should sit down with him and
and let him solve the problem for you.
And we outsource all this stuff to pastor or to staff members.
God is going to bring people in needs into your life that
sometimes are going to feel too big for you.
Do not automatically pass the buck to someone else.
Start by asking how can I be part of the solution?
Now I I know some people immediately you're thinking, but
Kirk, you don't really understand how big some people's
problems are. There is no way I can do
anything to help. You want to talk about a big
problem? These guys in this story are
facing a big problem. They're about to come face to
face with 5000 very hangry men. It is about to become a big
problem. And that's just men.
This is not a men's conference. Probably it doesn't count the
women and children who were probably there.
They were probably looking at how do we feed 15 to 20,000
people? So there's this huge need,
there's no food, and Jesus says, I want you to do something about
it instead of just passing it off to someone else.
So what do you do in a moment like that, assuming you would
say yes to Jesus, you probably would do the same thing.
What the disciples did you look to see?
Well, what do we have? Let's see what?
Let's do a bit of inventory and see what we have to be able to
feed all these people. And then once you figure out
what you have, you think to yourself, what I have to offer
is not nearly enough for the size of the problem.
And here's what Jesus is teaching his disciples.
When you feel like it's not enough, bring what you have
anyway. In verses 13 and 14, the
disciples tell Jesus, hey, we only have 5 loaves and two
fishes. Thousands of people hungry. 5
loaves, 2 fish. Now 5 loaves isn't even as much
food as you, and I think 5 loaves is because back in that
day a loaf was a smaller loaf of bread.
It actually took three loaves of bread to feed one person, so
it's even less food than you. And I think about the math is
not math thing in this story. And you will encounter moments
like this in your life where you come face to face with your
limitations and Jesus says, I want you to still bring what you
have to offer and you go, I don't have much to bring.
And moments like this are quite often a defining moment in our
lives. What do you do when you don't
have enough to meet the need? Do you just give up?
Do you send people somewhere else?
Or do you obey Jesus and bring what you have to Him?
See, the temptation in moments like this is to forget all the
promises that God has made to us would have been the same
temptation the disciples faced. It would be so easy in that kind
of a moment for them to forget the promise that Jesus had made
to them. Just a few verses earlier in
Chapter 9 where he said, I am sending you out with all of my
power and authority. So this group of men are given
the power and authority of Jesus to go out, and now they're at a
spot where it's getting real. Like there there are times where
our faith is theoretical. We know that this is the right
thing. We know what the Bible says.
You've been sent out with power and authority, but then you're
presented with a moment where the odds don't make any sense
and you know what Jesus has told you to do.
But you're like, that doesn't add up though.
What do you do? The odds don't look good.
But in those moments, are you willing to trust Jesus?
Are you willing to do what Jesus would want you to do, even if it
doesn't make sense? See, that's what it means to
bring what you have to Jesus. It just means being obedient.
Give what you have financially, give what you have physically,
give what you have emotionally and relationally to what matters
to Jesus. That's what one boy does in this
story. When John tells this story, he
talks about a young boy who is the one who provides the five
loaves and two fish. And John puts in this little
piece where he says it was barley bread.
And what we learned from that is that this boy really is bringing
nothing to the table of significance.
You see, barley bread is the kind of bread that was only used
in homes where people were poor. Wheat bread is what was used for
people who had money to be able to make bread for themselves.
Giving up this bread to this boy was not only costly to his
stomach, it was costly to his wallet.
But he brings it to Jesus anyways.
God doesn't ask you just to bring what you don't have.
He asked you to trust Him with what you do have.
Some of you right now, you are in the middle of some incredible
challenges. There's someone you love who's
very sick, your family or your marriage is just stretched to
the limit. Your friends are in crisis.
And the question you need to ask yourself is, what is it that
Jesus would want me to do in this moment?
And bring what you have. Take the skills and the wisdom
and the experience that you have and bring it into the situation
and love people. And you might think, but Kirk,
some of the problems are so big. I, I, it's not going to be
enough. You might think, I, I, I just
have this limitation. Do it anyway.
Bring what you have anyway. I've heard multiple stories over
this past week of people in our church who are engaging in
spiritual conversations with people who don't have any faith.
And there's this temptation when we talk to people who are
exploring Christianity or struggling with spiritual
questions. And the temptation is I'm not
going to be able to answer their questions.
I don't know how to respond to them.
So I'm going to invite them to go to AA, will fix the problem
for them. You'll get your answers there.
And Alpha's great. It's good that you invite people
to Alpha, but what if before you just sent someone away, you
brought what you have to that person?
Like if you're already a follower of Jesus, you have the
Holy Spirit of God living in you.
You're empowered by God to go and make disciples.
Alpha's awesome. It's a great resource for you to
have, but it's not meant to replace you going and sharing
the story with other people. You want to talk about a big
challenge. As a church, we face huge
challenges. You look at the thousands upon
thousands of people all around us in our region who don't know
Jesus, and Jesus says go and make disciples.
You talk about all the people who are struggling with mental
health and financial issues, and it's like, how can a church like
us possibly meet all the needs in our area?
And then on top of all of that, we have a building that requires
a lot of work to be done to it, a few $1,000,000 worth of work.
How in the world are we going to do all of that?
See, the truth is limitations are simply an opportunity for
you to experience God's provision.
There is something really incredible that happens in this
story. They've got nothing compared to
the need. And then Jesus says to them, OK,
well you've got 5 loaves and two fish.
Now I want you to have everybody sit down in groups of 50.
He takes the bread and he takes the fish and he blesses it and
he says to them here, just start with this group of 50 over here
and let's, let's see how far we can get the food.
Like forget trying to feed 5000 men, feeding 50 from 5 loaves
and two fishes is a miracle. And you can imagine the
disciples taking this food that Jesus has blessed and given to
them and they start to distribute it and, and then they
get to the end. It's like, oh, there's enough
food. We can, we can go to the next
group of 50. Oh, hey, Peter, there's more
food. We can go to the next group of
James. There's more food.
We can go to the next group of 50.
Oh, John, we can go to the next group.
And then before you know it, like 100 plus groups of 50
people have all been fed. Jesus says this first, He goes
just feed this first 50, and after a while you're going to
reach a point where you look back and you go, wow, how
amazing is the faithfulness of God.
Sometimes in my experience, when you come up against some big
challenges or even big opportunities in life, Jesus
does not show you the whole story.
He does not show the disciples how they're going to feed all of
those thousands. He just takes it one group of 50
at a time. Sometimes, many times, Jesus
just calls you to take the next step.
You don't know what the whole story is going to look.
You know what the whole need is, but you don't have a clue how
you're going to meet the whole need.
What Jesus is just saying, trust me to get there, just take the
next step. Sometimes we miss experiencing
the provision of God because some of us just need to see the
whole story mapped out for us before we're going to take the
first step of obedience. I've got to tell you, it's, it's
scary, but man, it is an amazing ride when you just trust God to
take you through the journey. The ability to look back at the
faithfulness of God to to sit there and go.
How in the world did we get from there to here?
And here's what's even more awesome about this part of the
story. Not only did everyone else leave
full, there is enough leftovers for each disciple to have one
basket full. Jesus doesn't only care about
you meeting the needs of everyone else.
Jesus will take care of you too. It's so radical because we are
taught look after yourself. Look after yourself.
But what if the best way to look after yourself is to trust your
entire life into the hands of Jesus?
God created you and me with limitations, but bringing those
limitations and offering them to Jesus is an opportunity for you
to experience just how much God loves you.
God is your provider, not just with your physical needs, but
with your emotional and spiritual needs too.
The single greatest limitation that every person has is your
inability to be good enough to measure up to God's standards.
You are not a perfect person. Maybe you know that already, but
it has a far greater consequence than you realize.
Every single one of us. We are all sinners, the Bible
says, and no matter how much you try to be a better person, you
will still fall short. The book of Romans tells us all
have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, but Jesus is
God's abundant provision for you.
Jesus makes up what you cannot. He was perfect for you while you
were still a Sinner. Jesus Christ died on the cross
for you. He died to provide you with
eternal life, to provide you with the opportunity to have a
reconciled relationship with God, and to give you all the
blessings that come from being a child of God.
You can experience God's provision for you spiritually
when you get honest with your own limitations, when you stop
trying to measure up and you start to put your life into the
hands of Jesus. And for those of you who are
already believers in Jesus, let me ask you this question.
Where right now in your life are you sitting and thinking, Hey,
I, I don't have enough to meet that that need that exists.
I don't have enough. Where in our church are some of
you thinking, hey, we don't have enough to be able to do this?
Now I want you to imagine something.
Imagine how your life would be different if you stopped looking
at what we don't have and started looking at what God is
capable of doing if we simply take what we do have to Him.
Several decades ago there was a man who worked as a butcher in
Brantford. His name was Ray.
Ray was a blue collar guy, typical butcher, rough around
the edges. Through a whole series of really
miraculous things, Ray started to realize that he needed Jesus
in his life. A bunch of people had come to
him and started talking to him about the Lord and and he
realized he needed Jesus. So he he put his faith in Jesus,
surrendered his life to Jesus, started going to church, started
reading his Bible, started doing all the things that a Christian
does, and over a period of time he kept growing in his faith.
And Fast forward a little bit while longer and God started to
call Ray to go into full time Christian ministry as a pastor.
And Ray was really struggling with it.
He, he thought God was calling him to do it, but didn't totally
make sense because he had two really big problems.
Ray had a massive stuttering problem, which is kind of a big
deal when you're a pastor. And second, he had no money to
pay for his schooling. All kinds of debt.
So Ray just kept praying, kept talking to his wife, they kept
trying to figure out what they should do.
And then one day, after a whole series of time of praying, the
two of them agreed that, hey, let's just fill out an
application for Bible college and see what happens.
Let's just take the next step. The whole story doesn't make
sense, but let's just take the next step.
So they filled out an application to go to Bible
college, and within a matter of days, Ray's stuttering stopped.
He could just talk normal without any stuttering.
And within a matter of days after that, someone contacted
him and said, hey, you're thinking about going to Bible
college. I want to pay for you to go to
Bible college. I've become convinced that one
of the reasons people struggle with their faith, like sometimes
long time Christians struggle with their faith and sometimes
even get bored in their faith, is because we've stopped
experiencing the reality of God in our lives.
For a lot of us, the Christian life is simply a whole bunch of
information. We gain a bunch of facts and
knowledge and truth, which is great and important, but it was
never meant to end there. The Christian life is meant to
be a real living relationship between you and the God of the
universe. And I'm not going to promise you
that God's going to stop your stuttering problem or he's going
to give you all kinds of money. In fact, He probably won't give
you all kinds of money, but I am going to tell you this in every
single opportunity and challenge that God's God brings your way.
Don't lean into your limitations.
Lean into the God who wants to provide for you.
In those moments. Watch what God does.
Bring what you have to Jesus. Be obedient what He would with
what He would want you to do. Don't worry about the whole
story, just take the next step and watch what God does.
He is your provider and He loves you.
We pray. Father, thank you for your word.
Thank you for your great love for us.
That is not just a theoretical love, but it is a very real
practical love that shows up in the everyday of life where we
can experience Your provision for us.
Help us God, help us to receive from you, to trust You, shape
our lives to be people who are filled with faith of the living
God because we are confident the Lord will always provide God.
I know that some of us are wrestling with real fears around
doing that. Fears of letting go, fears of
what ifs and what might happen and what might not happen.
Father, I pray that your spirit would set your people free from
fear and help us to fix our eyes on the greatness of a God who
deeply loves us. In Jesus name I pray, Amen.
Amen. Let's stand together and worship
our God.