Sermon Title: What do I owe my neighbor?
Sermon Text: John 6:1-15
Sermon Date:
(Today we begin our “Journey to
Think about this:
Let’s say God decided to put your story in the Bible today.
Is there a story in your life where God worked with the little you had to do a
mighty thing?
It happened to this young boy. All he did was share his lunch and he is remembered in all of Christendom. He probably didn’t envision this would happen when he set off from home that day.
This wasn’t
the day Jesus envisioned either. He went
into the hills and sat down with the disciples. Was it for prayer time? Another opportunity for a lesson? After all a lot had been going on. Changing the live of a Samaritan woman at the well. Healing a government official’s son, then a
lame man. He got in trouble for telling
the man to pick up his mat. I mean,
didn’t he realize it was illegal to carry a mat on the Sabbath? Sheesh!
Then he had to stand up for himself and talk about why those pesky
Sabbath rules were bad for the
He had to be exhausted. But the crowds wouldn’t leave him alone. They had seen these miracles and followed him everywhere he went. They wanted more!
Here he was trying to model for us how we should live our lives – that no matter what kind of wonderful ministry you’re involved in, you’ve got to make time for God. Time for reflection. Time to journal. Time to listen to God. Take time to cross the sea, climb the mountain to find that quiet place where you can be renewed in the spirit by the Spirit. (Day 1, Rev. Grace Imathiu, “A Picnic on the Mountainside,” July 2000)
But they wouldn’t leave him alone. Male, female, young, old, middle-aged, healthy, sick, lonely, confused, one struggling with addictions. Some for a touch, some for a word. Some skipping; others limping. Some being carried and all of them climbing up the mountainside to be with Jesus.
Hungry people. Hungry to hear a word of encouragement or comfort. Hungry to be with the one who could do miracles. And eventually hungry for real food.
Every gospel recounts this story
and two of them even recount it twice.
But ultimately it is believed to be the same story – whether it is
called the feeding of the 5,000 or 4,000.
“For those early
Christians, it clearly got to the heart of something they knew was important
about this Jesus, about who he was and what he was up to, and what he found to
be important. (Day 1)
In John’s version, Jesus brings up the subject of feeding them first. “Philip, where can we get enough bread to feed these people?” (Remember he wasn’t looking for an answer. He just wanted to see if Philip could think outside the box.)
Philip, an analytical thinker, pulled out the calculator and started how many gyro sandwiches they’d need to feed this group. About six month of paychecks. That is how much it would have cost to feed this crowd on the mountainside.
Then he
probably thought about the precedence they would be setting even if they could
have brought in sandwiches. People would
always be expecting to be fed at these Jesus’ revivals if they did. People will start coming for the food and not
the message. I mean, really,
Jesus. What are you thinking?
But, there’s another disciple, Andrew, Simon Peter’s
brother. Andrew goes a bit further than Phillip but then he is a practical
thinker. He looks around to see what is
available outside the budget and decides they have to have a fundraiser. Well, statistics indicate that Andrew’s
fundraising was hardly successful. Andrew got only one response -- a child, a
boy. A boy was willing to share his lunch. Five slices of bread and two fish
sticks. Can’t you imagine a little boy so happy that he has some contribution
to give Jesus, so glad that he has something Jesus can use, not realizing that
he will remembered for it.
"Here’s my
lunch. Give this to Jesus." And guess what Jesus did with the lunch? He
gave thanks. He gave God thanks for fishes and loaves. He shared it with everyone there, but enough
for a lot of leftovers.
Why, because God cares about our hunger. The bottom is that in this story. God even cares about our hunger. It is really that simple. And if God cares about my hunger and your hunger, God cares about our neighbor’s hunger too. We don’t get special dispensation just because we came to church today. God even cares about our neighbors who don’t come to church, our neighbors who are atheists and agnostics and people we don’t like very much. God cares about people of all faiths, colors and beliefs. And if God cares, then God expects us to care too.
Why? Why are we supposed to care about these people?
There is really one only
reason. Because Jesus said so. Remember in Matthew 22 when he is asked by
the tricky Pharisees which commandment was the greatest. His answer was to
love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind. Second is to love your neighbor as yourself.
(Matthew 22.37-40)
That is why we are supposed to care. Let’s be clear. Jesus isn’t offering this as a suggestion of how we should treat each other, but a commandment, second only to loving God with your whole heart. We must love our neighbors as we love ourselves.
But who is my neighbor? Is it the person who lives next to me? Yes, but Jesus stretches it to be everyone with whom we come in contact, even people we don’t like.
In Matthew 5:43-48 he says: “You have heard it was said, “You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy. But I say to you, Love your enemies, and pray for those who persecute you, so that you may be children of your Father in heaven…..For if you love those who love you, what reward do you have? Do not even the tax collectors do the same? And if you greet only your brothers and sisters, what more are you doing than others?”
So Jesus says everyone is our neighbor. Whether we like them or not. Whether they attend church or not. Whether they believe or not. Whether they shared their lunch or not. Everyone is our neighbor.
Our question today is “what do I owe my neighbor?”
Next week we will continue this discussion using the story of “The Good Samaritan” as our scripture. We will talk about being a neighbor who goes the extra mile but today let’s just think for a moment about the idea of being neighborly to everyone we meet.
Let’s look at this story and see what we can learn. Let’s face it. Young boys are not known at being exceedingly
generous with their food, unless they don’t like it and then they will trade it
away for a dirty baseball. But this
young guy is so taken with Jesus, he is willing to share his small lunch with
him. This means someone taught him
well. Mom or dad, or maybe even Jesus,
but someone laid it upon his heart to be unselfish.
First of all, we owe our neighbors unselfishness. To offer a generous spirit. We owe them our respect. We owe them courtesy. They deserve to be spoken to a way that is
pleasing and not offensive. Even
telemarketers who call during dinner deserve to be spoken to in a pleasant
way. It is perfectly acceptable to say
pleasantly, “I’m hanging up now. Have a
good day.” Remember these are folks
trying to make a living too.
They deserve to be treated like this because they, like you
and me, are children of God. Loved by
God. People Jesus was willing to die for
as well. No less deserving of God’s love
than we are.
Our Wednesday night Bible Study group is doing our best to
live this out. One night we took flowers
to some of our seniors. Last Wednesday
night we brought homemade cookies and put them into little bags along with
Hershey kisses and a card that said, “from your friends at First Baptist
Church.” Then on Thursday I took them
over to St. Mary’s Nursing Home. Not to
the residents, but to the workers, all 125 of them. We wanted them to know how much we appreciate
their hard work. When I delivered them
the woman at the desk was stunned. In
fact, she didn’t get it at first.
Finally she asked, “What church
are you from?” Don’t worry. We put cards on them – from your friends at
First Baptist lest someone get confused.
This Wednesday night we are taking a tour of the Church
Women United’s food pantry to see how that works. In August we are preparing and serving dinner
at LUM’s homeless shelter. I’m sure we
will do a few other things too but the reason we are doing this is simple. James reminds us to be “hearers and doers of
the word.” You can’t just hear the word
of God and not live it out. One without
the other is incomplete. If you believe
in the message of Jesus Christ you must live it out. There is no way around it.
Please join us as we study James and go about the work of
our Lord too.
James L. Evans is pastor of Auburn First Baptist Church in Auburn, Ala. said, “Toward the end of his life, Jesus said it was the way we cared for these sorts of people that demonstrated whether or not we really knew him.”
You see, it isn’t just for your
neighbor’s sake or even Jesus’ sake that you need to understand how to treat a
neighbor. It is for your sake as well.
Having trouble thinking of the story God would put in the Bible? There is still time to make it happen.