This transcript was generated by whisper.ai.

I want to welcome you to week 16 of our look through the book of Matthew. We are
going to look at chapter 14 this week. Chapter 14 has some of the greatest
miracles that Jesus ever accomplished.

The miracle of the feeding of the 5,000, the miracle of walking on water. But
the beginning of the chapter, there is a prelude in a sense to these great
miracles that Jesus is going to work. In a very strange way, what is said at the
beginning, what happens at the beginning sets up what Jesus is going to do.

It is the atmosphere in which Jesus works these miracles. Listen to what happens
in verses 1 to 13. At that time Herod the Tetrarch heard the reports about Jesus
and he said to his attendants, this is John the Baptist.

He's risen from the dead. This is why miraculous powers are at work in him. Now
Herod had arrested John and bound him and put him in prison because of Herodias,
his brother Philip's wife.

For John had been saying to him, it's not lawful for you to have her. Herod
wanted to kill John but he was afraid of the people because they considered him
a prophet. On Herod's birthday the daughter of Herodias danced for them and
pleased Herod so much that he promised with an oath to give her whatever she
asked.

Prompted by her mother she said, give me here on a platter the head of John the
Baptist. The king was distressed but because of his oaths and his dinner guests,
he ordered that her request be granted and had John beheaded in the prison. His
head was brought in on a platter and given to the girl and carried to her
mother.

John's disciples came and took his body and buried it. And then they went and
they told Jesus. When Jesus heard what had happened he withdrew by boat
privately to a solitary place.

Hearing of this the crowds followed him on foot from the towns. Now first before
we look at the atmosphere of these miracles, a few lessons from the life of
Herod. Here's a man who was driven by his sin and you see in his life the power
of sin to color everything.

He gets involved with his brother's wife. John the Baptist says this is not
lawful according to God's law. And because of that he has John killed.

But then he sees in Jesus John the Baptist. Because he's feeling so guilty about
killing John he starts to see in everything that Jesus does John the Baptist.
Jesus heals a little child and Herod feels hate.

Jesus feeds 5,000, Herod feels fear. Jesus forgives, Herod feels guilt. Jesus
makes a blind man see, but Herod can only see the ghost of John the Baptist.

Now turning from Herod, let's look at Jesus here. Jesus hears about John's death
and he goes to a place to be alone by himself. Jesus did not go to a solitary
place to do a miracle.

He went there because of the death of his friend John. He wanted some time to
consider the ministry of John and what John had meant and the needs of this
world. But he was not allowed to do that.

In verses 14 to 15 listen to what happened. When Jesus landed and he saw a large
crowd, he had compassion on them and he healed their sick. As evening approached
the disciples came to him and said this is a remote place and it's already
getting late.

Send the crowds away so they can go to the villages and buy themselves some
food. So Jesus is intending to get away to be able to pray, to consider what has
happened with John the Baptist, his friend who's been killed. And he sees these
huge crowds who beat him there in essence.

And instead of being angry, he has compassion. In fact, compassion is the
starting place of every one of Jesus' miracles. Miracles don't happen because
you want to see a miracle.

Miracles don't happen because you want to be impressed by God's power. Miracles
happen because you have compassion on somebody God loves. And here we see the
beginning, the setup for the feeding of the 5,000.

In just a moment Jesus is going to feed 5,000. And we see the miracle, but
there's a lot more going on here. Jesus had these 12 disciples that he's trying
to teach about life and faith and leadership.

And his object lessons are much better than our object lessons. He used miracles
as his object lessons. It's clear from the very beginning of this miracle that
Jesus wants to teach them something because he starts to ask them questions when
they ask questions.

You see here they're saying, "It's a remote place. We've got to send them away.
" You get this sense that the disciples have been discussing.

Dinner time. It's getting closer and closer. There are a lot of people here
who've got this logistical problem.

Jesus, you know, they're thinking almost he's a visionary type thinker. He
doesn't think about the practical things. He doesn't see it.

So how do we get Jesus to quit talking so we can send the people home so they
won't be hungry? They don't know that they're about to see one of the most
memorable miracles of their entire ministry with Jesus. Such a powerful miracle
that it's the one miracle that's repeated in all four gospels so you and I can
clearly see the truth of it.

In seeing this miracle they're about to learn together some of the greatest
lessons on living a life of faith that have ever been taught. We're going to
talk these next few days about three of those lessons. Lesson number one.

Don't measure a problem or challenge according to your own abilities. In verse
16, after they said, "Let's get them something to eat," in verse 16 and 17,
Jesus replied, "They do not need to go away. You give them something to eat.

We have here only five loaves of bread and two fish," they answered. Now the
truth is we all use the wrong measuring stick in life. We've all done this.

You look at the problem, you measure your ability to solve that problem, and
then you panic when you see the gap between your ability and the problem. Or you
feel good if you feel like, "I've got the ability to solve this one. " This is
an impossible situation.

There are all these people here and they say, "There's no golden arches here.
There's no McDonald's. " In what was possibly a greater miracle than the feeding
of the 5,000, there's not even a Starbucks nearby.

I mean, there's nothing there for these people to eat or to drink or anything.
It's an impossible circumstance, and Jesus loves impossible circumstances.
Impossible doesn't bother God.

Can you imagine Jesus chewing his fingernails, "Oh, this is a bad one. I don't
know how we're going to solve this one. " Can you imagine Jesus pacing,
wondering how this is going to happen?

No, this is the Jesus who healed a woman who had been sick for 12 years. Every
doctor had tried and couldn't, but Jesus healed that woman. This is Jesus who
healed a man who had been sick for 38 years.

This is Jesus who is going to bring back from the dead a man who had been dead
for four days. Impossible doesn't bother him. So how about you?

Do you have an impossible situation in your life right now? First, you've got to
remember that God has allowed that impossible situation to come into your life.
Problems you can't solve, circumstances that are outside of your control, God
actually allows those into our life.

Why? Why would he do that? Why would he allow this to happen?

I don't know all of the reasons in your circumstance, but I know one of the
reasons often is because it provides a perfect test. Jesus allows his disciples
to struggle with this problem before he works the miracle. He does the same
thing in our lives today because he wants to grow us.

Whenever God tests us, it's not to grade us, it's to grow us. God already has
given you a perfect grade in Jesus Christ. You're going to be in eternity with
him.

So his tests are for the purpose of growing us, to help us to learn. He puts us
in impossible situations to stretch our undeveloped faith. He puts you in
impossible situations to strengthen your eternal hope.

He puts you in impossible situations to show his incredible love. If you're in
an impossible situation right now, let me invite you to do this. Sit down
sometime when you can, soon, and make a list of what you cannot do about your
biggest problem, your impossible problem.

I can't force another person to change their mind. I can't rewrite the past. I
can't always figure out why.

I can't get the resources together to make this work. What is it that you can't
do? Let's make a list of it.

And then at the bottom of that list, you just write these three words, "I need
help. " God, I can't do this. This is not going to happen without your power.

Maybe God wants it to happen. Maybe he doesn't want it to happen. If he does
want it to happen, the only way it is going to happen is by his power.

When you and I feel inadequate for something, and who doesn't at times? We've
got two choices. We can take the comfort and control route.

I try to feel more comfortable. I try to control everything so I can feel better
about it. Or I take the release and trust route.

I release it to God and I trust in him. I take the "it's all about me" route.
I'm trusting in me.

I hold on to it tighter and tighter. Or it's all about him. I release it to him.

Let's pray together. Our Father, we pray that when the tests come, we pray that
we be men and women of faith. Lord, we all want to get more comfortable by being
better in control of the situation.

But when we're in control, that means you're not. You are the only one who can
do something impossible. And so we release it to you.

We say to you, "I need help. " We release it to you. We ask you to do what only
you can do.

We're worn out by trying to do what only we can do. God, if you've got something
for us to do with this, we'll do it. But we take it off of our shoulders and we
put it into your hands.

We trust you. In Jesus' name, Amen. Tomorrow these lessons from the Feeding of
the 5,000 continue.