Being Part of the Solution

My dear brothers and sisters, have you ever thought if you could ask from God anything, what would you ask for? During the many years I was a teacher, I had many chances to talk to young children about their dreams and hopes. It is common to hear from them about their ambition – to become a doctor, a lawyer, an engineer, and for most of them, it was to have a job that paid well, one that allowed them to live comfortably. In terms of more general living, many of them would emphasize that they think freedom is most important, that they wanted a life which they had the freedom to choose what they wanted to do, when they wanted to do it. Many of them wanted to be able to travel the world, to see the different cultures, others wanted their own powerful computers, PlayStation, Xbox, and still some others, sports car or their own motorbike. In all their dreams and hopes, very few actually talked about what the LORD was offering Israel, water, grain, wine and milk, and to eat well. Then again, in the response for the responsorial psalm, we repeated, “The hand of the Lord feeds us; he answers all our needs.” Once again, the scriptures imply that God’s concern for us is about food. Did God get it wrong? Are the things that God is offering not what the people wanted? Does God understand our needs?

Actually, when we look more carefully at chapters 51 to 56 of the Book of Prophet Isaiah, we would realized that God was telling the people of Isreal all the blessings that God was willing to offer to them, to offer to those who listened to Him. It was. Never just about food and drinks, it was about God assuring them that God loves them, and if they followed Him whole-heartedly, they would be blessed. In fact, if we are not familiar with the Bible, we might easily think that God is offering everything to His people. It was like he was ready to give His people everything and anything they wanted. Is that true?

Well, my brothers and sisters, it is important to understand what exactly God was offering to the Israelites, and what God continues to offer to us each and every day. All of us know, that God promised more than water, grain, wine and milk, eating well or to delight in rich fare to David. But are we familiar with exactly what benefits God promised King David?

God promised to David an heir to his royal and eternal kingdom and we know that this inheritance was fulfilled through the coming of Jesus into our world, with Jesus coming as a Son of David and now sits on the throne of the heavenly kingdom. God promised David rest from his enemies, and most importantly, all these are promised to David through God’s unchanging love for His people, God fidelity to His promises to His people. And it is in this context that we understand God’s blessings and God’s offer to His people, to us, that He would give us all, that helps us accomplish the promises that God made to David. In other words, when we pray and pray and we don’t get what we ask for, it may not be that God is not listening to us, nor that God thinks that we don’t deserve His blessings, but more likely, it is because what we are asking isn’t exactly what God thinks is best for us, or that what we want, wouldn’t lead us toward the eternal kingdom or even to draw us closer to God. And what is our response when we experience such experiences in prayers? Do we feel sad, disappointed, angry with God? Have you every felt that? That God no longer listens to your prayers? That God has been separated from you?

The truth is that all of us, if not, most of us, have had moments that we feel separated from God… especially in those moments that we feel like God is not present to us because we are not getting what we are asking for in our prayers. It may even seem so when we read scriptures like today’s and we wonder if God really understands what we need in our lives. But Saint Paul, asks us to think more deeply how we are to encounter the negative experiences in our lives by examining how and how much God loves us… and when we do, nothing in this world would be able to separate us.

To help us, let us think about how Jesus responded to the people even when he was grieving the death of his cousin, John the Baptist. He was mourning for his death and wanted to withdraw to a deserted place by himself, and yet, the people followed him. Then as Jesus saw the crowd approach with all their suffering and needs, his heart was moved with pity for them, and he set aside the pain and grief he had for John the Baptist, and started to heal and teach these people. This is the love that God has for us, his compassion for us allows him to feel the pain, the sadness, the anger that we are feeling and it moves him to do what is needed to heal us, what is needed to improve the situation that we are going to.

However, there is an important lesson that he offers to us through this feeding through the multiplication of the 5 loaves and 2 fish. After doing all the healing and teaching, his disciples were worried that the great crowd would not have food if they continued to stay in this wilderness, and asked Jesus to dismiss the crowds so that they can go to the villages and buy food for themselves. Jesus probably recognized the good intentions that his disciples had, but he replies, “There is no need for them to go away; give them some food yourselves.”

My brothers and sisters, “give them some food yourselves”. What a fascinating command! The disciples didn’t have much, they thought to themselves that they only had five loaves and two fish. In the gospel, the disciples did not protest, but merely said, “Five loaves and two fish are all we have here.” In this reply, it sounds like they were ready to give it all according to Jesus’ request… and indeed, they offer it up to Jesus when he asked of them. Then, Jesus blessed the food and broke the loaves and gave them to his disciples… and then, the disciples in turn gave them to the crowds. We all know what happened next because we call this encounter, the miracles of the multiplication of the loaves. There are many Biblical scholars who try to explain this miracle, but for today, for us, perhaps we need to hear again, “give them some food yourselves”.

I think Jesus is reminding us today that after we prayed, after we ask from God what we hope that God would help us with, we need to also continue to work with God to do what we can about the situation that we are asking God for help. If we are struggling to make ends meet, God is not going to send money into our lives, we need to also reach out to people trusting God will move their hearts, maybe they will be able to offer something, like a temporary job, or some immediate load, but if we do nothing, how can God’s grace move to meet our needs? Or if we are troubled with the suffering and pain that we see our loved ones going through and we ask God for help and nothing happens, I think it is fair to also ask, God, what can I do with my limited abilities? And we might be surprised when we finally just sit and listen to our loved ones quietly, that that is all that they needed.

My brothers and sisters, God is not ignoring our prayers, in fact, the late Pope Francis reminds us that God never tires of listening to us. We need to truly believe that God loves us and so God will try to help us in every way possible and to give us what we need most. However, we need to be aware that God is not going to spoil us by giving us everything we want. Like what we said earlier, He will give to us, the benefits He promised to David. He will give to us all that we need to follow Him, to make the heavenly kingdom present here on earth, together with Him, together with Him, with us, as his hands and feet, with us, as his lips and love, with us, as His witnesses.

My brothers and sisters, WE are the food and drink of living water that is needed in this world. WE are the food and drink that nourishes the people in our lives. This is our baptismal call – that we are baptized to be a presence of God’s love in the world, to feed the poor with love, to challenge injustice with love, to offer consolation with love to those who are mourning, suffering and in pain. We are called to be together so that we can be God’s love to one and other.

It will not be an easy task, it is definitely an impossible task if we think we can do it alone. And that is why we are here together here and now. We are here together to receive the Body of Christ so that Jesus may dwell within us, to fill us with the grace and strength we need to respond to the challenges in our lives, at the same time, we are here so that the Body of Christ can help us understand our gifts so that we can be food for others, so that they may too, feel God’s love, and begin to know God through us. And we are here together because God has called us to be His loving presences to one another and to remind us that WE are His hands and feet, WE are the solution to the different challenges each and every one of us face. But let us never be worried that God is tired of listening to our prayers, ask and it shall be given, my friends, tell God, tell each other what we need, and God will find a way through this mystical Body of Christ, multiplying the gifts we are willing to offer.

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