Ministers are the hands of the Lord’s providence

Sermon for Trinity 7

Romans 6:19-23 + Mark 8:1-9

“In every sermon text, there are a hundred sermons.” So one of my seminary professors used to say. In other words, there are a hundred ways of fruitfully explaining a text, with a hundred details that can be explored and a hundred different applications that can be made from it. Well, I haven’t been preaching for a hundred years yet, only 25, 18 of which have been spent right here, among the saints at Emmanuel. And since the congregation has lovingly decided to celebrate those 25 years in the Office of the Ministry, I thought it would be fitting today to focus on something in this Gospel that I haven’t focused on before, in all these years of preaching on this text, although I’ve alluded to it on occasion: the ministry of Jesus’ apostles in the feeding of the four thousand.

You see, there are two important “groups” in this Gospel. On the one hand, you have the Lord Jesus. He’s the One who has compassion on the crowds and who wishes to provide food for them, bountifully and miraculously. On the other hand, you have the faithful people who have followed Jesus. Those are the two sides that really matter in today’s Gospel: Jesus on the one side, the people whom He wishes to serve on the other. In the relatively insignificant middle are the apostles, the Lord’s chosen ministers, whose role it is merely to serve as the hands of the Lord’s providence toward the people on whom He wishes to have compassion. And that is a most fitting description of the Office of the Ministry itself.

You probably recall that Jesus miraculously fed thousands of people with a few loaves of bread and a few small fish on two separate occasions. First was the feeding of the five thousand, followed by the feeding of the four thousand some months later. Even though the accounts are similar in many ways, the feeding of the four thousand has a different feel to it. It happened way out in the wilderness, far from any town or grocery store, unlike the feeding of the five thousand, which took place on the shores of the Sea of Galilee, close to town, where the people could have easily found food. The feeding of the 4,000 happened after the people had spent three whole days with Jesus, intently listening to Him teach, whereas the five thousand had spent less than a day with Jesus and were mostly interested in seeing the miracles He would perform. In fact, after that day, most of the Jesus’ followers began to walk away from Him. That means that the 4,000 were among those who remained, who stayed with Him even after so many others had departed. That says something about them. These were the committed ones, the ones who were following Him, not to see something spectacular or exciting, but to be fed by God’s Son with God’s Word.

After three days of nonstop teaching, Jesus looks out at this crowd with compassion. Now, remember, He’s the One who’s been doing all the work of preaching and teaching, counseling and caring—all the work of a true pastor, a true shepherd. And yet, here He is, not at all concerned about Himself. Only about them. Only about these people, who all have their own record of sins, but who have been drawn by His Father to look to Him for mercy, who have put their own earthly lives on hold for three whole days, just to be close to Him. Now Jesus wants to do one more favor for them, unrequested, unearned. He wants to feed them. He wants to provide a meal for them. He wants to show them that the Lord will provide for those who stay with Him—not always miraculously like this, but certainly, and dependably.

So He turns to the apostles and expresses His desire to feed the people. And their answer to Him seems strange at first, considering that He had just fed the five thousand, in their presence, a few months earlier. Where could anyone get bread to satisfy these people here in the wilderness? You see, the apostles, like all ministers, were just men, far from perfect. They weren’t filthy wretches by any stretch; they weren’t dumb, and they weren’t “underachievers” as some have foolishly branded them. But neither were they perfectly confident, always trusting, filled with superior understanding all the time. They had served as Jesus’ ministers for handing out bread and fish to 5,000 men, plus women and children, not that many months earlier. But when they saw the thousands before them on this day, needing to be fed, they saw the task as impossible, the obstacles as insurmountable.

You may find yourself in a similar predicament at times. For all His goodness to you, for all His past providence, even though God did not spare His own Son, but gave Him up for us all, the next crisis (or even mini-crisis) may hit, and you may find yourself saying, “How can I possibly handle this? How can we possibly provide for this great need?” Ministers are not immune to that kind of thinking, either. In fact, we may fall into it even more often than most. More than most, we know just how corrupt man’s heart is, how hopeless the world’s situation is, and, yes, what an absolute mess the outward Christian Church has also become. More than that, we see our own shortcomings, sins, and inadequacies. And we think, “How can I fix any of this? Why would anyone believe anything I have to say? How can I serve God’s precious people? How on earth can the Lord possibly use me to do any good?”

These questions are good, if they force us to dig back into God’s Word, where we find stories like the feeding of the four thousand. And we realize, the apostles didn’t fix any problem. Jesus took care of everything. His was the compassion. His was the care. His were the knowledge, and the wisdom, and the almighty power to multiply the bread and the fish, to such a degree that there were seven basketsful leftover. And His was the assigning of the duties to His apostles. All the apostles provided was the little bit of food they had on them—seven loaves and a few tiny fish which they placed into Jesus’ hands. And then, at Jesus’ direction, they provided the hands that would distribute what the Lord Himself would provide, taking the food from the Lord’s hands and passing it out to the people. The apostles played a good and necessary role in that interaction between Jesus and the people, and yet, at the same time, their role was relatively insignificant.

Such is the ministry of the Word. During this New Testament age, the Lord Jesus, seated at the right hand of the Father, has chosen not to deal directly with His people, but to provide for their souls through the hand of ministers. The ministers themselves provide nothing, or practically nothing—only a few talents (God-given in the first place), and a willingness to serve God by serving His people. We use our mouths to speak, but it’s God’s teaching that’s supposed to come out. We use our hands to baptize, but it’s Christ, by His Spirit, who does the washing. We use our hands to hand out the Sacrament of the Altar, but it’s Christ’s body and blood, given and shed on the cross, that bring the forgiveness of sins, life, and salvation to His people. It’s the Lord Jesus who calls ministers, through His Church, and sends them to tend to His precious sheep with His Word and with His Sacraments, pointing them back to Christ, taking the forgiveness and the strength, the comfort and the guidance, and, when necessary, the warnings that He Himself provides, and simply handing it all over to His sheep, according to the needs of each one. We don’t add anything to the gifts Jesus is handing out. We don’t improve upon them in even the tiniest possible way. At best, our “contribution” lies in not dragging Jesus’ gifts through the mud as we hand them out, keeping them pure and clean and salutary for God’s beloved people. Because the real story here is Jesus, and His people for whom He wishes to provide. The role of the minister is good and necessary, and yet also, at the same time, relatively insignificant.

Looking back, I have to say that my ministry today looks vastly different than it did 25 years ago, and far different from what I ever expected it to be. From Puerto Rico, to Mexico, to New Mexico; from the WELS, to the ELDoNA, to the CLM; from the expectation of serving large, established, wealthy, synodically-attached congregations to serving very small congregations, and holding services in hospital chapels, storefronts, garages, and dance studios, in addition to this beautiful sanctuary, now traveling across the country to serve the scattered saints who have been entrusted to my care, now unattached (all of us) to any synod, including the one that I and some of you grew up in. So different from what I expected! But so very, very blessed. The Lord has found a way to use even these hands to care for His people around the world, including you, dear saints of Emmanuel, who have supported this ministry so faithfully, including my wife, who has been with me on this journey from the beginning, including my sons who have become part of it along the way.

Looking forward, God only knows for how much longer He’ll find a use for this particular minister. But, as we’ve seen, that doesn’t matter all that much. Jesus will be here always, till the end of the age, seeing to it that His beloved people, for whom He always has compassion, for whom He always wishes to provide, will have the ministers they need to take from His hands and to place what He provides into the hands of His saints. What He provides is the treasure of the life-giving, life-sustaining Gospel of Christ crucified and risen from the dead, the Savior of the world, and especially of those who believe. But, as St. Paul writes, We have this treasure in jars of clay, to show that the surpassing power belongs to God and not to us. May the Lord continue to provide these jars of clay to His saints, that the name of Jesus may be glorified, and that His holy Church may be edified, until He comes in glory, when He will no longer choose to deal with His people through the hands of humble ministers, but will provide all things directly, from His own hands, into the hands of those who love Him, who have stayed with Him in the wilderness of this life. To Him alone be the glory, forever and ever. Amen.