Today’s scripture: John 6:1-14 (NRSV) (The Message) (KJV) What might God be saying to me?
My thoughts (Ben Lamb):
When reading a Bible passage, I often end up turning the moment into a documentary in my mind. I visualize what the people are doing, watch them in action, see the scenery all around the location, hear everyone speaking, etcetera. It’s a do-it-yourself movie!
Today, I’m seeing Jesus walking up the hill after he’d already had a busy day of miracle-working and dealing with vicious accusers (John 5). I’m also thinking that if he went to the trouble of crossing an inland sea before heading up the hill, he probably wanted some privacy for a while. But fans were following him anyway. The rest of the story seems straightforward. Except…
“When he looked up…” (v5) caught my attention. If Jesus “went up the mountain and sat down” (v3) he would have been high up enough to see the crowd following from below merely by looking down.
From what sitting position would a person need to “look up” in order to see what’s going on at the bottom of a mountain? One position would be that of sitting with a head bowed in prayer. If this is so, what was Jesus praying about? How to feed the people, maybe?
I’m reminded of my need to talk to God about what’s on my heart and to share what my needs are. It appear to me that Jesus may have done exactly that before knowing that he was suppose to go ahead and perform the miracle for those 5,000 people.
Thought for the day: As the saying goes: “Two heads are better than one” for solving a problem. You can’t get a better “second head” than the Creator of the Universe!
We encourage you to include a time of prayer with this reading. If you need a place to get started, consider the guidelines on the How to Pray page.