Matthew 14.13-21
This week it was George’s birthday, and we had a lovely day out at Duxford watching the planes and going round the exhibits. We even went on the simulator, which George loved! Of course, the tug tractor was more interesting than the PBY Catalina to George, as I bored him with my great-grandfather’s war stories. Nevertheless, as we walked around, two things struck me — firstly, just how large the place actually is (I went well over my step goal), and secondly, just how intelligent human beings are. How is it that we can make what is essentially a tin can fly? How did someone first have the imagination to dream up a jet engine, or to attempt flight at all? And then the sheer skill it takes to design, build and maintain those aircraft, let alone fly them.
It left me thinking about the sheer abundance of God’s grace and mercy, his love, and his evident joy in his creation, that we get to live in a world so full of intelligence and imagination.
Our reading this week is the feeding of the five thousand, and there’s one small detail people often overlook: out of just five loaves and two fish, twelve baskets of food were left over. It’s worth pausing on why that detail is even in there. Long before this, God had fed his people bread from heaven in the wilderness under Moses, but that manna never had leftovers; it was given exactly enough, one day at a time. What Jesus does on that Galilean hillside is something more: not just enough, but abundance, with baskets to spare. Many first-century Jews were actually expecting exactly this kind of sign when the Messiah came, bread from heaven returning in overflowing measure. So this isn’t only a story about a packed lunch stretching further than anyone expected. It’s Jesus quietly saying something about who he is, and what kind of kingdom he’s bringing in.
I think that’s worth sitting with. Whether it’s a hangar full of aircraft that shouldn’t, by any sensible reckoning, be able to leave the ground, or a basket of bread that shouldn’t stretch to feed a crowd, God seems rather fond of giving us more than we asked for or thought possible, and of making sure none of it goes to waste along the way. It’s not a bad lens for looking at our own lives and our life together as a benefice, where we so often assume we’re working with barely enough, and are surprised to find there’s more grace, more provision, and more to be thankful for than we expected.