Lord Jesus, it's our prayer that you may
speak to us.
We need you and your speaking.
Only that brings life.
And we pray, Lord, that anything that may
hinder you from speaking to us, that you
may remove it.
Anything which may hinder us from hearing your
voice, would you remove it?
We ask this in your name.
Now it's my prayer that what I want
to feel to share with you may be
like that five loaves of bread and two
fish which the Lord may take and break
it and feed his people.
We turn to the gospel of Mark chapter
6.
We'll read from verse 30.
The apostles gathered around Jesus and reported to
him all they had done and taught.
Then because so many people were coming and
going that they did not even have a
chance to eat, he said to them, come
with me by yourselves to a quiet place
and get some rest.
So they went away by themselves in a
boat to a solitary place.
But many who saw them leaving recognized them
and ran on foot from all the towns
and got there ahead of them.
When Jesus landed and saw a large crowd,
he had compassion on them because they were
like sheep without a shepherd.
So he began teaching them many things.
By this time it was late in the
day, so his disciples came to him.
This is a remote place, they said, and
it's already very late.
He sent the people away so they can
go to the surrounding countryside and villages and
buy themselves something to eat.
But he answered, you give them something to
eat.
They said to him, that would take eight
months of a man's wages.
Are we to go and spend that much
on bread and give it to them to
eat?
And then followed how the Lord Jesus multiplied
the bread and the fish and he fed
the multitude, 5,000 men without the women
and children.
So it could be maybe 15 or 20
,000 if the others are included.
Immediately Jesus made his disciples get into the
boat and go on ahead of him to
Bethsaida while he dismissed the crowd.
After leaving them, he went up on a
mountain, on a mountainside to pray.
I'd like us to focus on verse 34.
When Jesus landed and saw a large crowd,
he had compassion on them because they were
like sheep without a shepherd.
In verse 30, we read that the apostles,
they had gathered around the Lord Jesus.
They had had a very busy time.
The Lord had sent them out to preach,
to heal the sick, to help the people.
And they just arrived back and they gathered
around him to report on what they had
taught and done.
But when they'd arrived back and they were
with the Lord Jesus again, it was very
busy.
Many people coming and going, we read here
in verse 31.
They didn't even have a time to eat.
And then the Lord Jesus said, come by
yourselves with me that you can have a
rest.
The Lord Jesus wanted to give them a
little holiday.
And they departed on a boat.
But the people saw them going and they
followed on foot along the shore of the
Lake of Galilee.
That was how their holiday started.
There were crowds of people waiting for them.
What would have been our reaction?
Oh no, all these people.
Don't they know we are on holiday?
How did the Lord Jesus react?
When he saw the crowd, he did something
to his heart.
He felt something inside.
He felt sorry for them.
He had pity in his heart for these
people.
The Bible says he felt compassion for the
crowd.
And the reason why, he saw that they
are lost.
In Palestine, a sheep without a shepherd was
a lost thing.
In that part of the world, when a
sheep wouldn't have a shepherd, it was in
desperate need.
On its own, the sheep couldn't get to
the parts where there was proper grazing.
It wasn't able to get water to drink.
Palestine, parts of it is desert area, other
parts semi-desert area.
There are parts in the Bible which tell
us how the shepherd would draw water for
the sheep.
Think of Jacob.
If there wasn't a shepherd who could draw
water for them and take them to a
well, they would die of thirst.
A sheep in that part of the country
was in grave danger without a shepherd.
There were many wild animals.
This is a hard and a rough area
and without a shepherd, a sheep was lost.
If a sheep would go from the others
on its own alone, it would get lost.
We know about the parable the Lord Jesus
told about the lost sheep.
I think all of us, or maybe all
of us, know Psalm 23.
And there we see what the shepherd meant
to the sheep.
The green pastures, the waters of rest, and
the protection against the enemy.
Now here the Lord Jesus saw the people
and when he looked at them he knew
they are like sheep without a shepherd.
And it did something to his heart.
He didn't only do something to his heart
but he, after that, did something for these
people.
I don't know what the Lord Jesus must
feel this morning when he looks at us.
Can't he but feel a deep compassion?
Can't he but feel deeply sorry and have
pity when he looks at you?
You go around hungry and thirsty spiritually because
you go your own way like a sheep
without a shepherd.
Being destroyed by the devil, the murderer, being
destroyed by sin.
But know this, if you live your life
like a sheep without a shepherd, that's how
the Lord Jesus feels about you.
That's why he left heaven and came to
earth and gave his life, gave his blood,
because that is what he feels for you.
We also read in the gospel of John
about the feeding of the multitude.
And we know that later on when the
people were seeking the Lord Jesus because they
had eaten bread, the Lord Jesus spoke very
sternly to them.
Yes, in his love and compassion he reaches
out to us.
But if we don't listen, if we remain
blind and don't open our eyes, with those
people it happened that very sternly he spoke
to them and he rebuked them.
He said to them, you are not looking
for me because you've seen a sign, but
because you've eaten bread.
In other words, they were concerned about these
earthly things, the bread they could eat, but
their eyes haven't been opened to see the
sign that he is the bread of life.
It is wonderful to know that God has
love for a sinner.
It's wonderful to know that Jesus loves us,
that he has compassion on a sinner in
his lost state.
But then we must listen and pay attention
to what he tells us and we must
obey him.
And we must react to his invitation when
he says, come to me.
He pours his life out, he poured it
out in love, but he's also the God
who judges.
There is a time of grace for each
one of us, but if we despise that
time, if we don't bow under God's hand,
if we don't accept that invitation, the time
of judgment is sure to come.
Now it's also known at that time that
the shepherd in the evening would take his
sheep to the crawl or to the stable.
And at the gate of the stable, the
sheep one by one would pass underneath his
hand.
His hand would move over the back of
that sheep.
And the shepherd knew his sheep so well
that only one strike of the hand over
the back of that sheep would tell the
shepherd what the condition was of that sheep.
Whether it
was sick, whether it maybe got injured in
some way, and then the shepherd would attend
to that specific sheep to its need.
Do you experience that in your life?
The hand of the shepherd on you, caring
for your needs.
But I think sometimes we are afraid of
the shepherd, we are not willing to come
so close to him that he can move
his hand over our back and that he
can pay attention to our need.
Perhaps we are too busy, can't come close
to the shepherds.
Maybe only now and then so that he
can show us what is our need and
that need can be met.
Those people, they didn't know that to have
a shepherd in their lives.
Hurt by this world, hurt by sin, destroyed
by sin, sick of it, but without a
shepherd who can tend to their need.
Let us look again at how the Lord
Jesus felt.
We read here he felt compassion on them,
full of pity.
That is how he felt when he saw
people in this world in their lost state.
Are we one with the Lord Jesus?
Or do we have a lot of other
worries?
Other things keeping us busy.
Things which fill our hearts and about those
things we think.
If only we could
have a little bit of the heart of
the Lord Jesus in us.
I remember one night I was driving along
alone in a pickup.
I don't know whether it was one o
'clock or two o'clock, but it was
quite late.
It was on a Sunday night.
By that time it was Monday morning already.
The previous day was a very full day.
It was about 20 or more years ago.
There where I was a missionary, I had
some co-workers, and there was an evangelist,
and he said farewell to the congregation.
He felt led to go and study further
to become a minister.
That Sunday was one of the days when
the whole congregation gathered, and it was a
matter of the whole day.
I knew that at the end of that
day we have to pack the furniture and
the luggage of this co-worker, and I
had to help him to get to his
home.
By myself I thought maybe he would say,
I, it's too late now, can't we leave
it, can't we do it tomorrow?
But eventually when I got there, he was
there ready, and we had to pack and
go.
And by the time we've arrived there at
his home and offloaded everything, I had to
come back, it was quite late.
He was a dear man, a dear brother
in the Lord.
When I arrived at that, in that congregation,
one of the elders, one day he spoke
to me about this man, and he said,
there they don't say Mfundi, they say Muruti.
He says, Muruti, this man, he is one
out of a thousand.
And during the few years I got to
know him, I realized the truth of the
words of that elder who said, this man,
he's one out of a thousand.
I can remember different things out of his
life.
One day how he shared his testimony, he
was working for the Lord already, but he
was still smoking.
And how he had a battle with it.
One day he shared his testimony with a
group of young people, how God helped him,
how he realized how sinful he is that
although having asked the Lord to help him,
he still kept on smoking.
He said, I've prayed and asked God to
help me, but in spite of having prayed
that, I'm still smoking.
But then came the day when he threw
the cigarettes away.
I think he threw them out the window
of a taxi.
He never took cigarettes again.
I remember another day when he was already
studying, then he would come back to that
congregation and he would do practical work there.
Then one day he went with me to
a little farm school and he spoke to
the children.
He asked the children, children, where is your
joy?
He read from Philippians.
Rejoice in the Lord.
Where do you find your joy?
Is it in the Lord?
Now he was a very soft man, softly
spoken, a very gentle soft man.
But when he was on the pulpit, I
heard him preach a few times, it was
like thunder.
He was a man, really a man out
of thousands, who stood.
Some of the people at that time suffered
from, one can say, the spirit of politics.
Even the spirit of racism.
He didn't allow those things to throw him
around.
Some people suffered of the spirit of tolerating
sin right in the church.
He stood like a pillar.
He went to a certain man who had
great authority among the people there, a leader,
a strong man.
He went to him and he said, you
are not doing the right thing.
A man one out of a thousand.
Now it was this man's furniture and luggage
that I was transporting that evening.
And on my way back, I experienced something.
I don't know whether he and his wife,
they also realized it's late, we are all
tired, I have to drive, I don't know,
maybe 180 kilometers back home.
I don't know whether they maybe prayed and
said, oh God, please bless him on his
way back.
But on the way back, in the pickup
while I was driving, I remember I had
to fight against drowsiness.
I wanted to fall asleep.
It was as if the Lord visited me
in the pickup.
And I thought and I prayed, Lord, if
it is true that there is a hell,
and if it is true that multitudes of
people are going to hell, then something must
be done.
As I was driving along, I wept.
Because it is true that there is a
hell.
And it is true that thousands upon thousands
are heading for hell.
Now, it's good to weep for the lost.
The Lord Jesus wept over Jerusalem.
But it's not enough that drops of tears
fall to the ground.
Also, drops of sweat must fall to the
ground.
Just being emotional isn't enough.
And talking about it and thinking about it
isn't enough.
There is hard work to be done.
I wish that the freshness of the reality
of the lost state of people in this
world would always be so fresh in my
mind.
That we can always be one with the
Lord when in his heart he has compassion
and he feels sorry for lost people without
a shepherd.
Now, we read here how the disciples' holiday
took another direction.
Why?
Because they were with Jesus.
And he wasn't serving himself.
He was serving his heavenly father.
And he was serving people in this world,
lost people.
Has the Lord Jesus got the right to
come and change your holiday?
If we go according to our own sinful
nature, we'll have a permanent holiday.
Not only a free weekend here and there
or maybe sometimes seven days.
If we can't deny ourselves and take up
our cross, we'll have a holiday till the
day we die.
It's now only less than a week then
the children will have holiday.
The schools, the school will close.
Children, when you think of your holiday, can
you only think of how you'll ride your
bicycle?
Can you only think of how you'll swim
in the sea?
Or how you'll ride your horse?
Or how you'll go hunting?
I don't say that is wrong.
It can be a blessed thing.
Those things can be a blessed thing if
it fits into God's program for us.
Have our eyes been opened by the Lord
Jesus that we see this world and the
lost multitudes, lost like sheep without a shepherd?
Are we with the Lord Jesus?
So that he can show us the harvest
and say it's time.
The harvest is ripe.
Now the disciples were with the Lord Jesus.
And I don't know how much they sensed
of what was going in in his heart
when he saw the multitudes.
The Lord Jesus taught them many things.
Taught them about the kingdom of God.
And he fed them.
And his disciples was a help to him.
They were the ones who distributed the food.
The Lord Jesus needed them there.
When they thought it's impossible they have to
go and find something for themselves, he said
no you give them something to eat.
It was a good thing that they were
with him.
But there was also something lacking.
We read in verse 45.
That was after the feeding of the multitude.
Immediately Jesus made his disciples get into the
boat and go on ahead of him to
Bethsaida while he dismissed the crowd.
The Lord Jesus knew now I can't use
them.
They shouldn't be with me.
I must be alone with the crowd.
In that moment they would be a hindrance.
They would be a stumbling block for the
Lord Jesus.
Maybe you can read it for yourself a
few verses further on.
When he talked on the water and they
thought he was a ghost.
And they had taken him into the boat
again.
They were amazed and then it says because
their hearts were hardened.
They didn't understand with the multiplication of the
bread.
They didn't understand yet their hearts were hardened.
Now I find it like I'm a vessel
and they lie a lot.
What do you chase?
Why am I going down?
Please go on dinner.
No good.
But I'm going down.
I'm tired.
I've been getting the same cuisine.
But I'm going to eat Tonga.
Go to a corner.
Pauly Gallop booty.
I'm a colonel.
I'm getting a good thing.
He's usable.
That's cool.
He's been in.
We have one argument.
You booty.
No, my baby.
When's the ghillie?
Let's ask manga.
So sooties away.
Well, come on, daughter.
Lawana.
Good thing.
He's usable.
It was 52 for they had not understood
about the loaves.
Their hearts were hardened.
Now the crowd was very enthusiastic, having experienced
how they were miraculously fed.
This is man.
There was the belief among the Jews that
when the Messiah, when the king comes, he
would give them bread.
And they were on the point of making
him king.
Now, but then he would just be an
earthly king to help them to chase away
the Romans and fight for them.
And here the disciples, they hadn't gained insight
yet.
They would be one with the multitude.
Jesus must be made king.
That's why the Lord Jesus had to send
them away.
He couldn't use them at that moment.
He had to be alone with the people
to stay on God's way.
The disciples should have seen, but this bread
isn't the main thing.
Jesus is the bread.
He would be the bread that would be
broken so that the multitudes could be fed
so that the whole world could be be
fed.
Later on, according to John, when the Lord
Jesus explained to the multitude, I am the
bread of life.
You must eat the flesh of the son
of man and drink his blood.
That was too much for the people.
Even many disciples turned and left the Lord.
And at this point here with this miracle,
their hearts had been hardened.
They hadn't gained insight yet and they couldn't
be a help to the Lord there.
He had to send them into the boat.
There's a translation in Afrikaans which says he
had to force them into the boat, sent
them away.
Now to be enthusiastic for the Lord, to
work for the Lord, to go for him
is a good thing.
But to be with him while he's busy
in this world like the disciples who were
with him, that's what we need.
But if we are not on the right
frequency, if we are not spiritually one with
the Lord Jesus, in touch with him, that
we feel what we feel what he feels,
then we can be a hindrance and we
can do more harm than good.
We need the Lord Jesus every step.
So that we can be in step with
him, one with him, as he's working, that
we are available, that he can use us,
that he shouldn't leave us aside so that
we won't be a stumbling block or do
more harm than good.
We need to pass under his hand day
by day, getting close to him, so that
he can show us where we are lacking,
that he can work on us.
Nothing should come in between us and the
Lord so that we can be in step
with him, one with him, all the way.
Then he can use us.
Now maybe you've also noticed that there are
people going day and night.
People whose eyes have been opened to see
the sheep without a shepherd, and they are
pressing on, working for the Lord, trying to
win the lost.
Maybe we can't do what they do.
We can't undertake the trips they take, working
for the Lord, spreading the gospel, winning people
for the Lord.
Maybe we can't do that.
But do we do what we can?
Do we have that heart which the Lord
had for the lost?
And are our lives like the morning dew
to his servants who are toiling day and
night?
Are our lives strengthening them, refreshing them?
When they come back in our midst, they
are strengthened to go out again.
There are some children in our midst.
Do you see how hard your parents work?
Do you notice how busy they are working
for the Lord, trying to do what they
can to reach people, to introduce the Lord
Jesus to them so that they can find
a shepherd in their lives?
What does your life mean to your parents
there in your home?
Is your life a burden to them, a
worry to them?
They've got many other worries.
They have to look after God's work.
They have to look after God's people.
And instead of strengthening them, refreshing them through
your life, you are just another burden upon
them, worrying them, pulling them down.
Have your eyes not been opened to see
the lost state of this world?
And don't you appreciate what your parents do,
preaching, counselling people, working for the Lord?
We also have spiritual parents in this work,
in this congregation.
As I've asked, our lives, our daily lives,
is it like the mourning due to them,
strengthening them, urging them on to work for
the Lord?
Maybe you'll say, but I don't see the
gospel the way they see it.
I'm not so convinced about this gospel they
are preaching.
And that can be a reason for you
to be naughty, do things you shouldn't do.
But what you are today, what you've received,
maybe in terms of education, the privileges you
have, what you are today, through which gospel
have you received it?
And if you have another gospel, what is
that gospel of yours doing in your life?
Is it driving you on, urging you on
to work for the Lord and save the
lost?
You may be saying, no, I see the
gospel in another way.
How many people's lives have been changed?
How many people have been made new through
your gospel?
Do you stand behind those, strengthening those, helping
those who are preaching the gospel?
And why do you want another gospel, if
all you've received, the way you've been blessed,
the way you are privileged above many other
people, if you've received it through this gospel?
The gospel of the grace of God, through
which our lives are cleansed, we are made
holy.
Not only forgiven, but through which we are
made holy.
We find here that what the disciples looked
forward to, he didn't realize because they were
with the Lord Jesus.
Are we totally surrendered to him?
That he can change anything in our lives.
Not only a holiday, that he can change
everything.
And that through his grace, we are with
him in the same mind as he is,
so that the lost can be saved.
Now I want to close with this thought.
I read in Colossians, chapter 1 verse 24,
about Paul's suffering for the sake of the
church.
He says in verse 24 of Colossians 1,
And now I rejoice in what was suffered
for you, and I fill up in my
flesh what is still lacking in regard to
Christ's afflictions for the sake of his body,
which is the church.
In Colossians 1 verse 24, We
know the Lord Jesus' afflictions, his suffering, shedding
his blood to save people out of this
world.
For the sake of his church.
Now nobody can add to that sacrifice.
He paid the full price.
But Paul said there is still some suffering
remaining for the sake of the church, in
order to gather the church, to look after
the church.
There is suffering.
In 2 Timothy 2 verse 10, he says,
I endure everything for the sake of the
elect, that they too may obtain the salvation
which is in Christ Jesus with eternal glory.
In order to gather the church out of
this world, in order to care for the
church, to look after the church, Paul says,
what is still lacking in regards to Christ's
affliction, he says, I fill up in my
flesh.
He was suffering, he was sacrificing in order
to gather the church out of this world
and to look after them.
He says, I endure everything for the sake
of the elect, that they may obtain the
salvation in Christ Jesus.
Yes, the Lord Jesus brought the full sacrifice.
But there are still sacrifices to be made
in our lives.
There are still things to be suffered, where
we have to deny ourselves, where we have
to change our plans and take up our
cross, so that God's people can be gathered
out of this world and saved and they
can be looked after.
Are we prepared for that?
Or do we rather choose to be on
holiday, a permanent holiday?
And are we better in looking at the
mistakes of those who are toiling, working hard,
are we better in that than to pull
up our socks ourselves and become part of
it?
When the Lord Jesus saw the multitudes, he
was filled with compassion and he did something
for them.
May the Lord help us.
Good job.
Thank you very much to Dominic Kombrenk for
sharing the insight of the Great Shepherd with
us.
We're going to close now in prayer, but
let me just add a thought or two.
I wonder where this crowd was a year
or so later.
After having eaten, because after this incident, Jesus,
after he saw them and had compassion, he
taught them and then he fed them.
I wonder how many really responded and came
to the shepherd.
Were some of them perhaps in the crowd
during the Passover where Jesus was to be
crucified?
I wonder where you'll be in a year
or two.
The only safe place to be is in
the presence of the shepherd coming to him
properly, fully, totally.
It's not enough to be taught by him.
It's not enough to be fed by him.
You might be a come and go type
of person.
You're part of the crowds.
You come and you listen.
You are blessed.
You get fed, but then you go again
and it's lost on you and you might
even find yourself in the crowd that calls
for his blood one day.
In Matthew 9.36, it speaks of Jesus
going through the towns and the villages, and
as he saw the crowds of people, he
had compassion of them for they were weary
and scattered like sheep without a shepherd.
Why were they weary?
Because they were scattered.
They were not with the shepherd.
You might be experiencing a weariness and a
fatigue that is not of God.
It's not because of fatigue in the work
of the Lord.
It's fatigue because of separation from the shepherd.
Jesus says to a specific group of people,
those who are tired, those who are heavily
laden, the Lord says to them, Matthew 11,
come to me.
If you are fatigued because of separation from
the shepherd, you are just run down and
you are heavily laden as a result because
it's tough living without the shepherd.
And sin isn't an easy load.
It's burdensome and it gets heavier every day.
If you want to be safe in a
year or two's time, or right till your
last breath, you need to be with the
shepherd today and stay there.
Are you the type of sheep that is
prone to wander again and again?
Middle Eastern shepherds are known to have the
habit of every now and then, if there's
a young sheep that just is prone to
wander too much and just loves getting away,
it has a rebellious spirit, that shepherd will
even break a leg of that sheep so
that it's forced to be in splinters, so
to say, and has to be carried by
the shepherd.
So if you are tired and burdened, then
come to the shepherd.
Let's pray.
Lord Jesus, we thank you for such clarity
of your word that speaks so clearly and
touches right into the very depths of our
being.
Thank you, good shepherd, that you were willing
to lay down your life for your sheep.
Lord, be gracious to us.
Grant that we would feel that tug, that
pull towards you, that would come and surrender
to you.
And learn of you.
And stay in your presence.
Lord, also in this coming week, we need
to have fellowship with you.
Please, Lord, keep us close to yourself.
Amen.