Abundance
A sermon by Currie Burris
Matthew 14: 13-21
July 31, 2005
Not enough! Not
enough! They say that there is not enough. Not enough food to feed all
the hungry people in the world. They are starving again in
Not enough! Not enough relief to help those ravaged by the earthquakes and tidal waves. Not enough to stave off starvation, not enough to rebuild lives shattered by catastrophe.
Not enough! Not enough money to share the world’s resources with the poor and developing world. Too much debt. Not enough money.
Not enough! Not enough oil to meet the growing needs for fuel to drive cars and trucks, factories and industry. So the price of oil goes through the roof. We search for more and more and more.
Not enough! Not enough space for the six billion people on planet earth, to live, to work. We are crowded into sprawling cities and suburbs, crammed into the shrinking countryside. Is there room for any more?
Not enough! In our own lives, there is not enough! Not enough money to pay the rent, to make the mortgage; not enough money for utilities, for food, for clothes; not enough saved for retirement, not enough for the medical bills. There’s not enough to go around.
Not enough education, not enough courses and degrees, not enough credentials. Not enough letters after my name. Not enough recommendations, not enough support.
Not enough! Not enough time to get it all done. Not enough time to meet that deadline at the office. Not enough time to fix the broken window. Not enough time to take that trip I always wanted to do. Not enough time to learn that second language. Not enough time to spend with the children, not enough time to share with my wife, my husband, with those I love. Not enough time to start over again. Just not enough time.
Not enough time, not enough money, not enough things, not enough power, not enough respect, not enough love.
So we go to work. Harder and harder, longer and longer. We have got to make more, do more, provide more, and earn more. Five days, six days, seven days a week. No time to rest, no time to stop, no time to quit. One shift, two shifts, maybe three shifts today? 24-7. Make more bricks for Pharaoh, gather your own straw.
There is never enough, never enough. We get that bigger house. We get that better job. We buy more stocks. We build that retirement account. We send that money home. We earn that respect. We work for that love—all that, and still it is not enough. Yet we struggle harder and harder for it.
A wise teacher, Walter Brueggemann, has called this sin the “dream of scarcity,” the profound belief that no matter what we have and what we think we need, it is never enough. The dream of scarcity. It’s a dream driven by our lack of faith and the weakness of our trust in God. It’s a dream that trusts only what is in our grasp, what we can control, what we can make and not what is given to us. It’s a dream blinded by our own eyes, not illumined by the light of God’s love for us. As Jesus said in Matthew 6:
Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more important than food, and the body more important than clothes? Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they? Who of you by worrying can add a single hour to his life?
The dream of scarcity—and it is just a dream. There is enough, always enough when we trust in God’s provision.
The hungry children across the world do not starve because
there is not enough food. There is more than enough food on this planet to feed
every single person. People are hungry because we lack the will to share. Some
have more than they need, others not enough. They
starve in
We worry about the price of oil and where to find it, but there is more than enough energy for the needs of all the people of this world. It doesn’t necessarily come out of the ground. It’s shining like the sun, blowing in the wind. A free gift. We just need the will to accept it and use it.
We worry about those devastated by disaster. Yet as
the response to this year’s tsunami in
We worry about space for all the people in the world, but the real issue is not space, but whose space and how much. Who gets the shacks and who gets the mansions, who has 100 square feet and who has 100 acres.
We worry about food and clothing, about homes and savings. Yet look at the lilies of the field. Is there anything more glorious? Is anything you want greater than what God has already provided?
We worry about having enough time. Yet even God – who created the universe, from the farthest reaches of space, to the tiniest microbe, from galaxies to superstrings – stopped on the seventh day and rested. God ceased the work of creation, to enjoy all that God had done. God rested on the seventh day and said, “It is good. Yes, very good.” If God has the time, we have the time as well.
In God’s world, in God’s time, in God provision, there is enough—no more than enough. In God’s world there is abundance—all that we need and more. God is always extravagantly creating, extravagantly sharing, extravagantly giving, and extravagantly loving.
God is extravagantly giving all that we need—and especially that which we need the most—God’s very self, God’s heart, and God’s love. It is right here for you, right here, right now in the deserted place of our heart, God is right here for you.
Jesus was teaching on the mountainside, moving among the large crowd gathered to be near him. It was a deserted place, with no obvious source of provision. There he touched them, he healed the sick, and he spoke words that they needed to hear. He gave them what they needed. He was with them. Toward the end of the day, his disciples came to him and said,
“This is a deserted place, and the hour is now late; send the crowds away so that they may go into the villages and buy food for themselves.” Jesus said to them, “They need not go away; you give them something to eat.” They replied, “We have nothing here but five loaves and two fish. “Its not enough” they said.
But Jesus said, “Bring them here to me.” Then he ordered the crowds to sit down on the grass. 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, and the disciples gave them to the crowds. And all ate and were filled; and they took up what was left over of the broken pieces, twelve baskets full. And those who ate were about five thousand men, besides women and children.
There wasn’t just enough. There was more than enough. Amen.