Bring Your Gifts to Christ - July 25, 2021

Gospel of John

6:1-15

Jesus went across the Sea of Galilee.
A large crowd followed him,
because they saw the signs he was performing on the sick.
Jesus went up on the mountain,
and there he sat down with his disciples.
The Jewish feast of Passover was near.
When Jesus raised his eyes
and saw that a large crowd was coming to him,
he said to Philip,

“Where can we buy enough food for them to eat?”
He said this to test him,
because he himself knew what he was going to do.
Philip answered him,
“Two hundred days’ wages worth of food would not be enough
for each of them to have a little.”
One of his disciples,
Andrew, the brother of Simon Peter, said to him,
“There is a boy here who has five barley loaves and two fish;
but what good are these for so many?”
Jesus said, “Have the people recline.”
Now there was a great deal of grass in that place.
So the men reclined, about five thousand in number.
Then Jesus took the loaves, gave thanks,
and distributed them to those who were reclining,
and also as much of the fish as they wanted.
When they had had their fill, he said to his disciples,
“Gather the fragments left over,
so that nothing will be wasted.”
So they collected them,
and filled twelve wicker baskets with fragments
from the five barley loaves
that had been more than they could eat.
When the people saw the sign he had done, they said,
“This is truly the Prophet, the one who is to come into the world.”
Since Jesus knew that they were going to come and carry him off
to make him king,
he withdrew again to the mountain alone.

This week’s Gospel reminds us of what God can truly do with the gifts that we bring to Him. When I reflect on this Gospel, I like to think of the boy that brought the loaves and fish to share. With such a large number of people, his gift could have been perceived as insignificant and dismissed as a useless contribution.

However, Christ took what the boy brought to Him and performed miracles with it. I think the lesson here is that Christ works with what we bring to Him. We may view ourselves as insignificant or our talents as unimportant. We can see needs in our community and dismiss the impact that our talents and skills will have on improving anything. It is easy to think that we need a significant amount of money, a degree in theology, or some saintly level of holiness to make a difference, but this is a lie. We have many saints who serve as an example of how small and silent acts have an incredibly far-reaching impact.

No matter how small or insignificant we think we are, or our talents are, God will take them and make great things happen because they are offered. He will take our offering and change, develop, and perfect it. We always have something important to contribute to the Body of Christ and no offering is too small, unimportant, or insignificant.

If we continue to offer ourselves and our gifts to Christ, we will continue to be like the boy in today’s Gospel who’s offering was loved by God and used to feed five thousand.