Sermon Notes for Sunday, July 5th, 2009

The Loaves

1 Samuel 21 – David flees King Saul…

¹ David went to Nob, to Ahimelech the priest. Ahimelech trembled when he met him, and asked, "Why are you alone? Why is no one with you?"

² David answered Ahimelech the priest, "King Saul charged me with a certain matter and said to me, 'No one is to know anything about your mission and your instructions.' As for my men, I have told them to meet me at a certain place. ³ Now then, what do you have on hand? Give me five loaves of bread, or whatever you can find."

⁴ But the priest answered David, "I don't have any ordinary bread on hand; however, there is some consecrated bread here—provided the men have kept themselves from women."

⁵ David replied, "Indeed women have been kept from us, as usual whenever I set out. The men's things are holy even on missions that are not holy. [This is true even] more so today!" ⁶ So the priest gave him the consecrated bread, since there was no bread there except the bread of the Presence that had been removed from before the LORD and replaced by hot bread on the day it was taken away.

· Food for the journey

· Food for a mission

· Food for warfare

· Food for members of the king’s army

Mark 6:30-44 - Jesus Feeds the Five Thousand…

³⁰The Twelve apostles gathered around Jesus and reported to him all they had done and taught. ³¹Then, 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."

³²So they went away by themselves in a boat to a solitary place. ³³But many who saw them leaving recognized them and ran on foot from all the towns and got there ahead of them. ³⁴When 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.

³⁵By 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. ³⁶Send the people away so they can go to the surrounding countryside and villages and buy themselves something to eat."

³⁷But 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?"

³⁸"How many loaves do you have?" he asked. "Go and see."
When they found out, they said, "Five—and two fish."

³⁹Then Jesus directed them to have all the people sit down in groups on the green grass. ⁴⁰So they sat down in groups of hundreds and fifties. ⁴¹Taking the five loaves and the two fish and looking up to heaven, he gave thanks and broke the loaves. Then he gave them to his disciples to set before the people. He also divided the two fish among them all. ⁴²They all ate and were satisfied, ⁴³and the disciples picked up twelve basketfuls of broken pieces of bread and fish. ⁴⁴The number of the men who had eaten was five thousand.

· Jesus consecrated the bread, which became five consecrated loaves…

· Food for the journey

· Food for a mission

· Food for spiritual warfare

· Food for members of the army of the King of Kings

Note that 5 + 2 = 7, which is the number of Creation; John 1 says Jesus is the creator of the universe, which was created by his spoken word. His spoken word, recorded in Scripture is now our bread of life – our food for our journey, our mission, for spiritual warfare, for we are members of the army of the King of Kings, and Lord of Lords…