Mark 8:1-10 - The Message in the Leftovers

A link to the story I'm talking about below if you want to read it first

The world we live in as humans has us conditioned to, when we have 7 loaves of bread, doubt that we could feed 4000 people with it. That's how the laws of the universe work. How could we ask that 4000 people be fed by 7 loaves of bread? It doesn't add up.

This is what the disciples went through, and they behaved like normal, rational human beings. "We can't feed 4000 people with 7 loaves of bread".

I think because of the harshness of this world we're used to, we underestimate the goodness of God and we are hesitant to trust Him at all sometimes. We wouldn't ask that 7 loaves of bread feed 4000 people because in this life that's not possible. It's how things were made.

Jesus is communicating to more than the 4000 people he passed out bread to on that day a long time ago. It's a statement that what we know is minuscule and small. There's tons of messages you could draw from this.

A message from this passage that struck me today was the idea of the goodness of God and how we approach Him. The disciples couldn't even ask Jesus to feed 100 people with 7 loaves of bread, let a lone 4,000, and God symbolically shows them how small they are thinking versus His power and love for them by having them pick up 7 baskets full of leftovers after everyone has eaten.

Where we are doubtful that God would do a small good thing for us, if even that - His love and intentions for us go beyond what we can imagine, just like what God did for those 4000 people was beyond what the disciples could even conceive asking.

God loves us a lot more than we think. His will is to bless us and shower us with gifts. Not just give us enough food to scrape by until we die, but to leave us with full bellies and leftovers too. It challenges my understanding of Jesus' attitude towards me. Do we really think He's for us? Does He want to bless us with good things? Food? Enjoyment? Peace? A reliable car? Healthy relationships?

If you're like me you doubt all of those things. But I think the message in the leftovers is meant to challenge that. Our expectations and understanding of His love for us are petty compared to the reality, I'm thinking.