When I read the Bible, I admit I tend to skim over the weights and measures. I have trouble with quarts and pints. I’m not sure my brain can handle a cubit.
But sometimes I need to step closer and read the fine print. Sometimes I need to sharpen my focus on the details so I can see more clearly. For example, I love how God reveals His heart with Jesus’ first miracle, turning water into wine at a wedding in Cana (John 2:1-11). Jesus’ mother learned that the host had run out of wine and she asked Jesus to do something about it. Jesus told the servants to fill six stone pots with water. The pots held 20-30 gallons each. So Jesus made at least 120 milk jugs worth of wine. The party was just about over. They didn’t need that much wine and at that point the quality wasn’t really important.
Except that it was. God’s love is lavish. Jesus loved the bride and bridegroom. He poured God’s love for them into those stone waterpots. He filled them up with gallons of the best because that is the only way that God expresses His heart. He doesn’t give half measures. He doesn’t give just a little. He doesn’t deal in mediocre.
About two years later we find Jesus on a hillside trying to get some rest with His disciples when a great crowd of people come looking for Him. “He had compassion on them because they were like sheep without a shepherd” (Mark 6:34). So He taught them and He healed their sick. Then it got late. Soon the shops would close. The disciples suggested that Jesus should send the crowds away so they would have time to buy food and find a place to sleep for the night.
Their hearts were in the right place. It was a desolate place. There was no delivery service, no food trucks. Just Jesus, His disciples, and a whole lot of hungry people. The thing is Jesus knew the crowd would have physical hunger. But He knew their spiritual hunger was even more critical. To send them away would be to leave them hungry for more. And that’s just not how Jesus operates. This is the man who told the Samaritan woman at the well that the water He gives “takes away thirst altogether. It becomes a perpetual spring within them” (John 4:14).
So Jesus took care of their physical and spiritual hunger in one fell swoop. He told the disciples, You feed them. The disciples took stock – they came up with five loaves of bread and two fish. That’s like five crackers and two anchovies. The disciples looked at the need, and they looked at what they had, and they did the math. Of course they came up short. They knew they didn’t have enough. But they had forgotten who they were working with.
Jesus stepped in. He turned their not enough into more than enough. What they had was plenty when it was put into Jesus’ hands. Jesus loved the multitudes with God’s lavish, compassionate, generous love.
Breaking the loaves into pieces, he kept giving the bread and fish to the disciples to give to the people. They all ate as much as they wanted, and they picked up twelve baskets of leftover bread and fish. Five thousand men had eaten from those five loaves! (Mark 6:41-44)
Five thousand men, not to mention the women and children. Twelve baskets of leftovers. Our God is an exceedingly abundant giver. He gives so much, we’re not left wanting more. When we partake of what He provides, we are satisfied. There are leftovers. What’s the best part about Thanksgiving leftovers? You can take them out when you’re hungry and enjoy the good things all over again. That’s our God – the one who gives so lavishly, He is a perpetual spring.