By Bishop Hwa Yung

Over the month of November, I attended a total of eight Annual Conference sessions. It began with the Sengoi Mission Conference in Kampar and ended with that of the Chinese Methodist Church in Australia in Brisbane, where I participated in the consecration of the new bishop. At each of the Annual Conference sessions, with one exception, I preached on the story of Jesus feeding the 5,000. I thought I should share the same message with our Pelita readers this Christmas as well.

The story of the feeding of 5,000 is one of the few episodes in the life of Jesus which is found in all four gospels. But it is only in John 6:1-15 that we are told that it was a little boy’s dinner that Jesus used for His miracle! Most of us are familiar with the outline of the story. A crowd had followed Jesus into a desolate place, drawn by His power to heal. Mark 6:35 tells us that it was getting late in the day. The crowd must have been getting restless and hungry. Jesus, wanting to train His disciples, asked them what they thought should be done. Philip’s answer (John 6:7) was that eight months’ of a labourer’s salary would still not be enough to buy dinner for all. In any case, where would they buy food in the wilderness? Incidentally, the number of 5,000 almost certainly applies to the men alone. When women and children are added, you are talking of a crowd of some 10-15,000 at least.

Then Andrew comes along with the little boy and his dinner of five loaves and two fish. Again, ‘loaves’ are not what we usually get in the supermarkets today. Rather they are more like small pieces of Indian chapatti or pancake of sorts. Two things immediately become evident. First, it was the dinner of a little boy that Jesus used, not that of some adult or some ‘orang besar’. In the days of Jesus, as it is now, children are not ‘important’ in the eyes of the world. Yet it was one such that the Lord used! Second, what the little boy had to offer was not much. What are five loaves and two fish in a crowd of 10-15,000? Yet the amazing thing about the story is that Jesus used someone unimportant who had only a little to offer!

Were five loaves and two fish enough for Jesus? Absolutely! Yet it is easy to miss the point. After all, in light of the abundance of food produced in the miracle, what were five loaves and two fish? But imagine yourself at the scene before the miraculous multiplication of food took place. Some in the crowd probably did bring food along. But it had been a long day. Whatever food that might have been brought along had long been eaten up. Caught up in the excitement of all the preaching and healing that were taking place—like at some modern day revival meetings—everyone had forgotten about the time. Thus the five loaves and two fish were the only food available for miles around.

I wonder what you would have done if you were the little boy? After all it is your dinner which mummy had lovingly packed for you! And those big fellows had all eaten whatever they brought along. And this Jesus now wants you to share your dinner with them!? Would you have handed over your dinner to Jesus? Or, would you have said something like, ‘You take three loaves and one fish lah… But please leave something for me’?

When our children were little, we sometimes would buy them ice-cream. And, like many parents, we would sometimes tease them as they ate their ice-cream by asking, ‘Can I have some also?’ Once when I asked one of them for some ice-cream, our three or four-year old darling looked at me hesitantly. Then stretching out her ice-cream, she said, ‘Lick only huh … cannot bite!’ We laugh at such incidents. But does this not remind us that, had we been in the little boy’s shoes, we might not have parted so easily with our dinner too?

The veteran Methodist missionary, E Stanley Jones, who was greatly used by God as a missionary for over fifty years in India and had even preached in Malaysia in the 1950s and 60s, tells of an incident in his early life. In his search for a deeper life in Christ, one day God’s word came to him, ‘Will you give me your all?’ After some hesitation, he replied, ‘Yes, Lord, of course I will. I will give you my all …’ He goes on to tell of how the Holy Spirit then came in waves after waves, sweeping through him as a cleansing fire! God’s blessing came after he yielded his all. In the same way, the story of Jesus’ miraculous feeding of the multitudes tells us that the little boy handed his whole dinner, his all, to Jesus! That was an essential part of the miracle. His total yielding made the miracle possible.

The message of Christmas is also about giving: God graciously and generously gave us His Son that we may have life eternal. God gave us His all! ‘He who did not spare his own Son but gave him up for us all, how will he not also with him graciously give us all things’ (Rom 8:32)? What would you and I give to Jesus in return this Christmas? Would we give our five loaves and two fish?

Down the ages, there have been examples of those who were brilliant, rich and powerful by the standards of this world who gave their all to Jesus. And Jesus used such examples of consecration wonderfully. But the truth is that most of those whom Jesus has used were not brilliant or rich or powerful. Rather like the little boy’s five loaves and two fish, often all they could bring to Jesus was something unimportant and little in comparison with the needs of this world. Yet, just as in the feeding of the five thousand, Jesus took ‘the all’ that each one brought and brought forth a great abundance of blessings for the hungry, needy, sick, lost and unsaved of our broken world.

For example, think of Wang Ming Dao, the Beijing pastor who was imprisoned for years for his faith. He had nothing of the brilliance of John Sung, his contemporary and China’s most famous evangelist before the 2nd World War. Yet through faithful witness and refusal to compromise, he became an inspiration to the whole house church movement in present day China. Or think of Sadhu Sundar Singh, who never even finished high school proper. Yet he just gave himself to Jesus. Walking the streets of India and the mountain paths through the Himalayas to Tibet, he told all he met the good news of salvation in Christ. His impact was such that he has been rightly described as the most important Indian Christian who ever lived. Yes, five loaves and two fish have always been enough for Jesus.

Some of you may be saying, ‘You keep talking of those who are pastors and in full-time ministry. But what about us lay-people who are working in the world outside the church? What does giving our all mean for us?’ Let me therefore share the story of a man I happen to know personally. (The details can be found in an article, ‘When Opportunity Knocks,’ Reader’s Digest, Australia, Jan 1995.)

David Bussau was an orphan from New Zealand. But in his own words, ‘I decided early on that no-one had the right to push me around and that I would stand on my own two feet.’ At 16, he bought his first hotdog stand, and within months he had leased three more. With natural business acumen, he expanded from one business to another. By 35 he was a happily married multi-millionaire! But he was not satisfied and instead sought God for His plan for his life.

He sold off his businesses and put all his money into a trust. And from the 1970s onwards, together with an American partner, he developed Opportunity International, which became a pioneer in what is now known throughout the world as micro enterprise finance. This was a method of lending money to poor people, without collateral, who needed small amounts of capital to run small businesses like roadside hawker stores or simple retail outlets in the local markets or villages.

In a study by the University of Manchester in 1992, commissioned by the British government, it was found that every job created by Opportunity International benefited directly 13 other persons (not counting dependents)! Today millions of poor people are being lifted out of poverty throughout the world through micro finance. Further, it is now generally agreed that this is one of the most effective means of attacking poverty everywhere in the developing world. One man gave his five loaves and two fish, and Jesus multiplied it wonderfully to bless millions and millions today.

Would your five loaves and two fish be enough for Jesus this Christmas? Absolutely! But have they been handed over to Him?