Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit · Sermon No. 1885
“And His disciples answered Him, How can a man satisfy these men with bread here in the wilderness?’” Mark 8:4.
I HAVE been, for a while, lying outside the crowd, unable either to feed the multitude or to bring the sick to the Master. Here and there I have helped one, as opportunity has occurred, but I have been called to rest rather than to serve. Yet all the while I have never ceased from constant thought about the perishing multitudes—this great city and its sad estate, this country, Ireland and continental nations are all under a cloud of deep depression. One can remove his body from the turmoil, but his heart is still in it. If ever there was a time when there was a call for the deep sympathy of all Christian people with the perishing multitudes, it is just now. If ever the Church should gird herself to do her Master’s service, it is today. Never forget that the Church is the Spouse of Christ. She is His chosen Bride and she is, therefore, to unite with Him in His great enterprise among the sons of men. The work is salvation and that work is to be worked by means of Divine Truth, carried to men, externally, by human hands and, internally, through the Spirit of God. The Church will be false to her heavenly Bridegroom if she does not sympathize with the tenderness of His heart and enter into His gracious labor of love.
The question before us is certainly unique if we remember that those who asked it had seen a former miracle of feeding the multitude. It would seem that those who had seen 5,000 fed would not ask concerning the feeding of 4,000. “How can a man satisfy these men with bread here in the wilderness?” Inasmuch as on one memorable occasion they had seen the Master multiply loaves and fishes, they might have expected Him to do the same again. I grant you to the fullest that it was an inexcusable question. I will not offer the slightest apology for it, but yet it is a very natural question— natural, I mean, to that fallen and depraved human nature which is our daily grief. He that knows what human nature is will be astonished at nothing evil that it produces! I do not mean human nature merely unrenewed by Grace, but I mean that carnal nature which remains even in the disciples of Christ. This is of such a character that it shamefully gives way to unbelief.
You ask me to give an instance—I point to you! Have you not often seen the hand of God? And yet the next time you have needed Divine help, you have been in anxiety and doubt. Remember how Israel saw the Red Sea divided and yet the people feared that they would die of thirst? When the riven rock had relieved them, they were next, afraid of hunger! And after the heavens had rained them bread, they became alarmed at the size of the giants who dwelt in Canaan. All that God had done seemed to go for nothing with them—they relapsed into their old unbelief. Are you and I much better? Alas, we may here see ourselves as in a mirror! Those who have a smooth path often boast of a vast amount of faith, or what they think to be faith. But those who follow a wilderness way must often confess to their shame that after receiving great mercy they still find unbelief creeping in.
This is shameful to the last degree and should cause us bitter sorrow and great fear lest we should provoke the Lord to anger! Before us must often rise the example of those whose carcasses fell in the wilderness because of their unbelief. All this makes us fear that had we been with our Lord in the desert, we would not have behaved better than Peter and James and John! We, too, might have forgotten the former miracle of the loaves and have anxiously enquired, “How can a man satisfy these men with bread here in the wilderness?”
The question, although it is thus surprising and inexcusable, may, however, be used this morning for our profit. It may at least do this good—as we shall not be able to answer it on any human lines, it will show us our inability—and that is what our Lord would make most clear before His power is revealed. I should not wonder but what He drew those
people into the desert on purpose that there might be no suspicion that when they were fed, they had not been supplied from fields or gardens, or by the charity of inhabitants. It was a barren spot, out of which nothing could be grown! The disciples had to feel this and recognize this and state this—and then the Lord had a clear platform for working His miracle. He wants to clear you out, Brothers and Sisters! He wants to make you see what a weak, poor, petty, miserable thing you are! And when He has brought you to that, then His own arm shall be revealed in the eyes of all the people—and all who behold it shall give Him the Glory due unto His name.
Let us come, then, to our question with the hope that it may be sanctified to holy ends.
“How can a man satisfy these men with bread here in the wilderness?” First, this is a pressing problem—how to meet the needs of the multitude. Secondly, press as it may, it is one of tremendous difficulty. But thirdly, and cheeringly, it is capable of a very glorious answer. There is a Man who, from His infinite resources, can satisfy the countless myriads of our race even in this wilderness!