He said to them, “Give them some food yourselves.”
luke 9:13
They replied, “Five loaves and two fish are all we have.”
Reflection
As Jesus is speaking to the crowds and healing people, the day is coming to an end. The Apostles ask him to dismiss everyone so they can find food and lodging, but Jesus tells the Apostles to give the people food themselves. They only have five loaves and two fish, but Jesus has everyone sit down, blesses the food, and then gives it to the disciples to disperse among the crowd. Everyone eats their fill and there are twelve baskets left over.
The Apostles don’t want to provide the crowd with food themselves; when Jesus tells them to do this, they essentially balk at his advice. Notwithstanding the fact they probably couldn’t afford to buy enough food for everyone, they aren’t being especially generous with what they do have. Often, we can be like this. When someone asks us for extra cash, clothes, a favor of some sort, we might protest that we don’t have enough for ourselves; how can we help them?
Yet from this Gospel passage, we see that Jesus provides, even from a little. If we are generous in heart and act out that generosity, the Lord won’t fail to assist us. What little we do have, when given in love, can be multiplied in miraculous ways by Christ. Yes, it is difficult to give when we don’t have much. But the way of Christ is selflessness, not selfishness. He asks us to give what we have to others, for in doing so, we are exemplifying the love of Christ and becoming more like him.
Reflect on ways you can give from your poverty – how is Jesus calling you to do this?
Saint of the Day
St. Thomas More: 1478 – 1535
“Aesop says in a fable that everyone carries a double wallet on his shoulders, and into the one that hangs at his breast he puts other folk’s faults and he looks and pores over it often. In the other he puts all his own and swings it at his back, which he never likes to look in, although others that come behind him cast an eye into it sometimes.”
A Dialogue Concerning Heresies, St. Thomas More
The Healing Word 