But Jesus said, “You feed them.”  “With what?” they asked. “We’d have to work for months to earn enough money to buy food for all these people!”
(Mark 6:37 NLT)

Amidst any group of people, God has provided all the resources to sustain us. With God, what you have is always enough.

The disciples were trying to problem solve based on the only resource they had, human reason. They needed help figuring out how to get the money to buy food for this massive crowd. Jesus was planning to transcend the natural with the supernatural. Nonetheless, he starts with the natural and brings forth the supernatural. Jesus asked his disciples to give him what they had, not what they didn’t have. In turn, he would provide what they didn’t have, enough food to feed the people.

There are a couple of principles at play in this story. First, God often takes the ordinary and works the extraordinary. An example of this is Jesus turning the water into wine. The wedding organizers could not provide the wine, but they could fill the jars with water. Jesus often asks us for what we have and provides what we don’t possess. Or what we can see and gives us what we can’t visualize. There must always be an act of faith or obedience as a precursor to a miracle.

Second, often there is an act of giving or generosity before a miracle—back to the feeding of the five thousand. A boy gave up his five loaves and two fish. He must have realized that with a small portion of food and so many people, none would be left for him. Faith always has the possibility of loss with it. Yet, the Bible says in Luke 6:38 NLT, “If you give, you will receive...”

Are you in a situation where human effort will not suffice? You do the possible and expect God to do the impossible. Hold lightly to what you have, obey God in detail, and watch God work.  What you have, plus God, is always enough.

I worked for seventeen years as a missionary with Youth With A Mission.  My missionary work has taken me to Mexico, Canada, Chile, Argentina, Bolivia, Spain, and Ukraine.  I hold a Masters of Education in curriculum and instruction from Virginia Commonwealth University.  [email protected]