Five Lessons... Part 2

Quick Recap: Jesus had gone away with His disciple and the multitudes had followed. It was dinner time and Jesus took charge to feed all the people. In the last post I noted that the first lesson we can learn from this miracle of Jesus is ATTITUDE. In order to be all you can be for Jesus you have to take on the right attitude. With God ALL things are possible. God has put us where we are for a purpose and He has placed large tasks in our lives. We have to take on the correct attitude in order for God to use us and conquer these big tasks.

Here we go...to the scriptures~ John 6:9-11

"Here is a boy with five small barley loaves and two small fish, but how far will they go among so many?" Jesus said, "Have the people sit down." There was plenty of grass in that place, and the men sat down, about five thousand of them. Jesus then took the loaves, gave thanks, and distributed to those who were seated as much as they wanted. He did the same with the fish.

Andrew had found a young boy who had brought a meal with him. The young boys meal consisted of 2 fish and 5 loaves of bread. Now lets think about this for a second. John tells us that it was a "boy." No age is given, but in my brain (and most others) a boy is a child. Now this boy could have been a teenager or he could of been elementary age, but none the less I believe he was young. With that thought in mind lets think about what this boy was caring. John tells us that he had 2 fish. No matter what size the boy way, we know his fish could not have been too large. Number one John refers to them as "small" and number two if he was a boy we know he was not caring mammoth size fish such as whales. He simply had 2 small fish. As far as the loaves of bread goes, I cannot imagine them being too large. Anyway, the boy was caring enough food for him to enjoy a nice meal. I'm pretty sure that when he or his mom or whoever packed it they thought about satisfying his hunger, not the hunger of over 5,000 people.

As the disciples were trying to figure out how to feed all of these people, the little boy offered a solution. If I would have been there this would not have been the ideal solution. I mean how many people can you really feed with that amount of food? It can't be too many. Although the food did not appear to be enough, the boy still gave it ALL. If I was put in this situation you could bet money on the fact that I would have stuck a loaf of bread and part of a fish in my pocket. It's MY food and I want to make sure that I get what I want. I do not want to go around hungry. However, this was not the mentality of the little boy. HE GAVE IT ALL. Every fish and every crumb of bread, all of it. He kept NOTHING for himself.

LESSON 2~ Give it All

I know in my life there are many things that I want to hang on to. I want to do this or I want to that or I want it my way. So many times we think that if we give God our Sundays, Wednesday nights, a 30 sec blessing before each meal, and a maybe few minutes of reading scriptures then a few prayers thrown out here or there that it is enough. IT'S NOT! God wants it all. Every aspect of our lives, every moment that we live, everything that we do. He wants it all; the good, the bad, and the ugly. He doesn't want 1/2 or a 1/4 or even all of one or two days a week. He wants all of you to be all about Him 24 hours a day 365 days a year.

Does this mean that we have to give everything up and move to a foreign country and talk about Jesus all the time. NO, but it does mean that we have to die. We have to die to ourselves. Each and everyday we have to make the conscience decision to give all that we are to God. We have to empty our hands and put it all in His hands. I'm not just talking about giving our material stuff, I'm talking everything. Our attitude, our will, our desires, our loves, EVERYTHING. Is it easy? No, if it was easy everyone would be doing it.

When we give our whole-self's to God it's then and only then that He can use us to our maximum potential. The boy gave everything he had and God did something extraordinary with it. Just imagine what God could do if we gave Him everything we have and everything we do. Think about the life's that could be impacted. I mean, he fed over 5,000 with a small meal, just think what would happen if 10 "stars" in Hollywood decided to give God their all and live sold out for Him. Think of the amount of people they could reach. God wants you to be all you can be, but in order to do that you have to give Him your all.

Everything you say (or sing, a choir is just not for show): He's given you the ability to speak/sing why not give that talent back and use it for His glory and honor.

Everything we do: Every action and every reason for doing that action should be about God and His business, not what we want or for our business.

EVERYTHING- thoughts, actions, friends, family, sports, material objects...

Give it all over to God and let Him control what is going on. Let Him be the tour guide and you simply soak up the incredible scenes, adventures, rides, and experiences that God wants to take you through. It's not going to be pleasant at times and the road will get a little bumpy, but everyday give everything to God.

In John 3:30 John the Baptist says that "He must become more important. I must become less important." It's not about me. It's all about Him. God WANTS to do great things with you, but you have got to give Him your all.

Everything... Every small thing... All of it... Hold on to nothing... GIVE IT ALL...

Pressing on.