When I was Chaplain at Saint Margaret’s House in New Hartford, I celebrated the Holy Eucharist every morning in Saint Margaret’s Chapel.  Ordinarily, we used real bread for our daily celebrations.  We used real bread which the Kitchen Sister baked in little round loaves and then froze to keep them fresh.  Each day the Sacristy Sister would go into the pantry freezer to take out a single round loaf to be used at the next day’s Eucharist.  . . . It wasn’t a precise science, but I could break a single round loaf into four somewhat equal pieces.  Each of these quarters could then be broken into three pieces of sufficient size so that when you ate it you felt like you’ve eaten a piece of bread.  So, one of Kitchen Sister’s round loaves was sufficient for twelve people, which was quite adequate for all of our daily Communion Liturgies, at which we might have seven to ten communicants.  If we had a large group on a weekend, the Sacristy Sister would get out two loaves.

    Well, one morning, several years ago, quite a few people must have been feeling in need of the Blessed Sacrament, because, rather unexpectedly, we had fourteen people present in Chapel . . . with one twelve piece loaf of altar bread to share among us.  I expected that I’d have to draw from the Reserved Sacrament.  But when I broke the bread at the Fraction, . . . I had two quarters somewhat larger than the others, and I broke each of these larger pieces into four.  So that when I was done, . . . I had communion bread for fourteen!

    When the Liturgy was ended, the Sacristan Sister commented to me that this particular Eucharist was like “the feeding of the five thousand”.  And you know?  It was.  It was a truly miraculous moment to have enough bread when we shouldn’t have.  . . . It rather put me in mind of when I was Rector here at Zion in the early 1980’s, when there was a sheet of plywood above the organ bench held in place with 2 by 4 posts.  It was the ugliest darn thing you ever saw.  . . . But the plywood “canopy” was necessary in order to keep pieces of ceiling plaster from hitting the organist until we could discover why the ceiling was crumbling.

    In due time, an engineering firm was hired, and the Vestry was told that the reason we had plaster falling onto our organist was because the roof was collapsing, taking the Church walls with it.  We needed a new roof, the engineer said.  Timidly the Vestry asked him how much such a project would cost, and, after some calculating, he said $100,000.  . . . Well, there was such wailing and wringing of hands as you never saw or heard:  “Oh God, we’re such a small Parish with so few resources.  We’ll never be able to pay for a new roof.  Why have you done this to us, O God?”  . . . But eventually the Vestry pulled itself together and grit its teeth and printed little blue envelopes to give to people who pledged money to the “Building Fund.”  Uncle Bud talked to his friends who had money, the Vestry prepared to borrow capital at usurious interest rates, and the project went forward.  . . . And do you know what?  Never a cent was borrowed, a new roof was put on the Church, the ugly plywood canopy disappeared, the interior was plastered and painted, and the floors refinished while we were at it.  . . . And just like the apostles before us, we “took up twelve baskets full of broken pieces and of the fish”; . . . that is to say, when the project was completed there was a considerable sum of money left in the Building Fund; . . . more than we started with.  . . . It was a miracle; . . . it was like the feeding of the five thousand.

    . . . Did you notice, today, in the reading of Mark’s account of the feeding of the five thousand; . . . did you notice that Mark tells us that when Jesus came ashore in the little cove off the Sea of Galilee, He was met by a great throng, . . . and He “began to teach them many things,” Mark says?  But Mark never tells us any of the “many things” that Jesus taught.  Why do you suppose that is?  Why do you suppose that Saint Mark passes up, entirely, the opportunity to tell us every single precious and important thing that Jesus had to say to the multitude that greeted Him?  . . . Well, I’ll tell you what I think.  . . . I think that, in the portion of his Gospel which you have heard today, Mark has something else in mind besides telling us the particulars of what Jesus taught.  . . . Do you remember that, for some Sundays past, Saint Mark has been telling us over and over again that one of the things the disciples learned from Jesus, early on, was that fear ought not to control their lives . . . but that they must be governed by Faith?  . . . And do you remember when Jesus went home to Nazareth; . . . do you remember how Saint Mark tells us that it was the want of Faith that prevents the good which Jesus desires to do for the people of Nazareth?  . . . Well, today Saint Mark makes the point that even more important than what Jesus says . . . is Who Jesus is; . . . that Jesus can and does make a difference in your life . . . if your Faith permits Him.

    And so, Saint Mark tells us that
 

when it grew late, his disciples came to him and said, “This is a lonely place, and the hour is now late; send them away, to go into the country and villages round about and buy themselves something to eat.”  But he answered them, “You give them something to eat.” And they said [that they only had five loaves of bread and two fish among them.  But Jesus] commanded [the throng] to sit down by companies upon the green grass. So they sat down in groups, by hundreds and by fifties. And taking the five loaves and the two fish he looked up to heaven, and blessed, and broke the loaves, and gave them to the disciples to set before the people; and he divided the two fish among them all.  And they all ate and were satisfied.

Saint Mark tells us that when Jesus looked upon the throng that met Him in that lonely place, . . . He had compassion on them because they were like sheep without a shepherd.  And the important thing about a shepherd to sheep . . . is not the things he says to them, . . . but that he cares about them . . . and that he provides for them.  With the five loaves and two fish the apostles give Him, Jesus feeds five thousand.  With a twelve piece loaf of altar bread, Jesus fed fourteen.  With a few blue envelopes and a lot of hope and determination (dare I call it Faith?); . . . with a few blue envelopes and a lot of Faith . . . Jesus kept our Church from collapsing, … because Jesus is the shepherd Who cares for us.

    Saint Mark reminds us of these things because we churchpeople sometimes fall into a pattern of thinking which regards our faith as a kind of historical set of facts.  We tend to fall into thinking that Jesus was the Son of the Most High God Who was here on earth and healed and taught and died and ascended into Heaven leaving us with a lot of advice and cryptic stories which teach us not to annoy God so we’ll go to Heaven when we die.  . . . But ours is not a faith in Him who was.  Ours is a faith in Christ Jesus Who is.  Remember that we are on the other side of the Resurrection:  Christ is Risen!  Christ is Risen, and it is, for us, as God whispered into the ear of the Prophet Isaiah:

thus says the high and lofty One who inhabits eternity, whose name is Holy:  “I dwell in the high and holy place, and also with him who is of a contrite and humble spirit, to revive the spirit of the humble, and to revive the heart of the contrite.”

Christ may have risen and ascended into Heaven, . . . but He is our shepherd.  His place is with us as well as with the Father.  Christ is risen, and He comes to any of us who need Him or who desire His companionship.  Jesus fed five thousand men in order to show us that He desires to make a difference in our lives.  Jesus desires to make a difference in our lives because He cares for us.  Jesus is our shepherd.  He is not an historical Lord, . . . Jesus is a living Lord.  Christ is Risen! . . . and

he does not despise nor abhor the poor in their poverty [Psalm 22 tells us]; . . . he does not despise nor abhor the poor in their poverty; neither does he hide his face from them . . . The poor shall eat and be satisfied, . . . My soul shall live for him; my descendants shall serve him; they shall be known as the Lord’s for ever.  They shall come and make known to a people yet unborn the saving deeds that he has done.

Jesus makes a difference in your life, Saint Mark tells us.  And, like the Psalmist and the Apostles, you are witnesses to that wonderful secret that faith in Jesus makes a difference; . . . a secret which the world so desperately needs to hear.