A reading from the holy Gospel according to John
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?”
In today’s Gospel, there is so much to ponder in the miracle of the loaves and the fishes. On encountering the large crowd coming to him, Jesus isn’t startled or alarmed. He knows with unshaken confidence that his Father will provide for him. The question he asks Philip, John tells us, is a test; it’s an opportunity for Philip to answer for himself that God will provide for their needs. By a simple leap of logic, I recognize that Jesus himself is asking me the same question: “Where is enough?” Philip answers this question in human terms with a human solution: they would need two hundred days worth of wages to feed the crowd only a little. And in response, the miracle Jesus provides is not in a little way but is generous to the nth degree: after the crowd had eaten, twelve baskets of leftovers were gathered. Human solutions fail; God’s divine intervention exceeds all human expectation.
God, for the times when my mind goes into overdrive searching for a solution, give me the grace to turn to you for assistance. Give me the eyes of Jesus when overwhelming needs approach that call for a solution. I am often caught up in using the gifts you have given me, trying to do all I can, but am slow to recognize that the best solution is not mine but yours to carry through. Lord, give me the peace to know that it’s okay to step off of the mental treadmill to give you space to work miracles. Relieve me from the sole burden of making things happen and draw me into your will so that I see and accomplish it.
Thank you, Lord, for the gifts of reasoning that you have given me and for your extravagant generosity. Give me the peace of Christ in confronting the problems that seem to be too big for me to handle.
Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit, as it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be, world without end. Amen.