Messianic Banquet Luke 9:10-17

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Welcome morning everyone and welcome to Faith Bible Church and we're glad you're here this morning to worship the

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Lord together and as I was sharing with Eliezer who's blessing us with a couple songs accompaniment this morning, you know, we really kind of have an audience of one and that's the

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Lord, that we're here to serve the Lord, to worship Him, but we get the blessing of being able to collectively and corporately do that together.

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So we're just, it's a, it's a great thing to gather on the

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Lord's Day and so good to see you all here this morning. For announcements, prayer meeting tonight at 6, there's a leadership meeting this

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Wednesday at 6 for the men, they know who they are. Bible study

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Sunday continuing in Hebrews at 5 .30 on Fridays. Biblical counseling next course is on Saturday at 11 o 'clock.

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Missionary of the month, you've probably been seeing that scrolling up there, is Darcy Berglund.

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She's a Bible translator in Indonesia and it just, it's a, there's so many ways to serve as missionaries.

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Some are actually in the field with, you know, just toe -to -toe with the people that live there and some are in this, in the back off to the side doing translation and support groups.

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So there's, it's a whole body that it takes to do missions work and so she's in the translation side of it.

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I'm sure she's interacting with the folks that live there as well, but she's, there's some prayer requests in your bulletin that I don't need to go over them, but you could be praying for her and her ministry and her, she's kind of going, continuing on with her parents that were involved in ministry in years before that as well.

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So she's continuing on that legacy. So praise God and we appreciate people that are committing their lives like that to serve the

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Lord and to spread the gospel. We can all be missionaries right where we're at, too, and it's, it takes reminding yourself that, you know,

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I'm an ambassador of Christ. I'm a Christ follower. How am I, how am I going to interact with people?

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How am I going to engage with the people around me for eternal purposes, for Christ's sake?

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And so I think we could, I could do more in that area. I think maybe we can all look in the mirror and say the same thing.

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But anyway, so I wanted to, I was encouraged this week and I wanted to read just a few verses before we go to the

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Lord in prayer and as we prepare our hearts for communion afterwards. This is from Romans 8.

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I'm going to read, starting at verse 35, who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation or distress or persecution or famine or nakedness or peril or sword?

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As it is written, for your sake, we are killed all day long. We are counted as sheep for the slaughter.

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Yet in all these things, we are more than conquerors through him who loved us.

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For I am persuaded that neither death nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor height, nor depth, nor any other created thing shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus, our

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Lord. Nothing can separate us. Amen. And boy, if that doesn't, that's such an encouragement to me and I'm sure to you that we do have a higher cause, a higher calling, and Christ has gone before us and we can go boldly forward.

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So let's go to the Lord in prayer. Lord God, we thank you that we can go into this world boldly, boldly knowing that you are with us, that you are our

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Lord and Savior, that you are the creator of the universe, that Father, you have given us your

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Son, Jesus Christ, to trust and to guide us and to be our salvation, Father.

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God, we pray this morning that our hearts would be right before you, that you would allow us to search our own lives and our own hearts,

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Father, so that we may be right before you, that we would confess any sin, Father, that has been festering in our hearts and in our souls,

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Father, so that we can commune with a holy God. You are holy, Father. You are set apart for us to worship and to adore,

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Lord. So God, this morning as we hear the songs sung, as the musicians share what you have placed, that you have given them to practice and to present,

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Father, Lord, we thank you for their energies and their efforts, Father, to want to serve in this worthy manner.

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So, God, we pray that Pastor would just have all liberty to present what you have given him and laid upon his heart, that we would be good listeners, that we would be receptive to the truth of your word,

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Father, that our lives would be changed, Father. We pray for those that aren't here today that are sick at home, infirmed, or away,

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Lord, bless them, Father, for they are on our hearts as we think of them,

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Lord, but as they are there isolated, Father, may you minister to them as only you can,

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Father. You are the God of the universe, and you are there in their midst. So, God, go before us today,

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Lord, may you bless all that we do to your glory in Jesus' name. Amen.

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And make a joyful noise unto God all ye lands. Sing forth the honor of his name.

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Make his praise glorious. And let's stand together. Right, so today

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I'll be reading John 6, 35 through 40.

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You guys second? Again, that's John 6, 35 through 40, and I'm reading

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NKJV. And Jesus said to them, I am the bread of life.

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He who comes to me shall never hunger, and he who believes in me shall never thirst. But I said to you that you have seen me and yet do not believe.

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All that the Father gives me will come to me, and the one who comes to me

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I will by no means cast out, for I have come down from heaven, not to do my own will, but the will of him who sent me.

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This is the will of the Father who sent me, that of all he has given me

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I should lose nothing, but should raise it up at the last day. And this is the will of him who sent me, that everyone who sees the

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Son and believes in him may have everlasting life, and I will raise him up at the last day.

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Thank the Lord for the blessing of his word. Please turn with me to Luke chapter 9, verses 10 through 17.

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Luke chapter 9, verses 10 through 17. And the apostles, when they had returned, told him all that they had done.

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Then he took them and went aside privately into a deserted place belonging to the city called Bethsaida.

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But when the multitudes knew it, they followed him, and he received them and spoke to them about the kingdom of God and healed those who had need of healing.

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When the day began to wear away, the twelve came and said to him, send the multitude away, that they may go into the surrounding towns and country and lodge and get provisions, for we are in a deserted place.

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But he said to them, you give them something to eat. And they said, we have no more than five loaves and two fish, unless we go and buy food for all these people.

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For there were about five thousand men. Then he said to his disciples, make them sit down in groups of fifty.

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And they did so, and made them all sit down. Then he took the five loaves and the two fish, and looking up to heaven, he blessed and broke them and gave them to the disciples to set before the multitude.

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So they all ate and were filled, and twelve baskets of the leftover fragments were taken up by them.

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This is the word of the Lord. Let us pray. Father, we are thankful that we worship a

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God who provides, and his hand is never shortened, that he provides not just enough, but for his people he provides sufficiently and overflowingly.

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We pray that we would encounter Jesus this morning through his word, and may we all be touched in our hearts, and may our eyes see how great and compassionate he is, in Jesus name.

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Amen. So, the bread miracle here,

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I do want to point out that it's not related to the communion table. It happens to be the text for this morning, but the miracle of multiplying the bread is not related to the communion table, or as the

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Catholics call it, the Eucharist. And the reason why I mention this is because John 6, which

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Brendan read to us this morning, often gets used to push this false doctrine that the

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Catholics hold, called the transubstantiation. Transubstantiation is this view that whenever the communion table is celebrated, the bread, the substance of the bread changes to the body of Christ.

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And in the same way, the wine gets changed into blood, the blood of Christ.

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There's a transubstantiation, trans, right, turning, changing of the substance.

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And the reason I want to mention that this is not about the Eucharist is, first of all, wine is not mentioned.

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The drink is not mentioned in any of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. So, this miracle is attested in all four of the gospel accounts.

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Wine is not mentioned. Second, when did we ever have fish at the communion table?

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So, because of the difference in even the elements, it's inappropriate to tie it to the

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Eucharist. Now, of course, the Catholic argument is, well, when you read

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John 6, Jesus mentions that it's his body, right? You must eat this body. However, what

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I want to point out here is that in John 6, after the ancient

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Israelites received the multiplying bread, what they missed was that they missed this context of Exodus 16 in which

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God gave manna, the bread from heaven, to the ancient Israelites as provision.

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And what we do find out in the Old Testament from Exodus 16 to Deuteronomy 8,

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Moses points out it's not about the bread that gives life, but men shall not have bread alone.

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Men shall not live on bread alone, but every word that comes out of the mouth of God.

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In the end, the bread from heaven pointed to the true source of life, which is

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God's word. And what John does is, of course, for many of you who have read the gospel according to John, John starts with the word of God, right?

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In the beginning was the word. And what Jesus does here is the bread, which points to the word that came from the heaven, and that ultimate word of God is standing right before you, and that is

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Christ himself, the word of God made flesh. And that's why

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Jesus actually says, right, you must eat this body, right? This is not about transubstantiation, but rather, how do you eat the body?

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You must believe in the bread of God from heaven, Jesus himself, right? So John 6, 35,

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I am the bread of life. He who comes to me shall never hunger. So it's not about eating here.

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It's coming to Christ. And he who believes in me shall never thirst. It's not about drinking blood here.

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It is coming to Christ in belief in which that someone has life, right?

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So John 6 often gets misused to proof text transubstantiation, but in the context, the body and the blood are metaphors for what people need to do in order to have life, which is to receive, to believe the true bread of heaven.

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What even manna pointed to, right? The manna in the desert pointed to.

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So in order to live, one must believe in the ultimate word of God who came down from heaven.

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And we have to believe Jesus' gift of salvation when he gave his body on the cross for our sin, right?

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So this text is not about the communion table. It's not about transubstantiation.

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It's really about who Jesus is and what he came to do. The second important thing we need to consider is that this miracle of the multiplication of the bread and fish, it has to be a real miracle.

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The reason why I highlight this is, first of all, the

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Bible said so, and scripture when it said so, even if it's the most supernatural thing you can imagine, it happened.

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But second of all, in the context of Luke 9, remember, right after this miracle of bread multiplication,

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Peter is going to confess that Jesus is the Messiah, right? So if this miracle actually didn't happen,

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Peter's confession kind of loses its punch. And I'll give you the reason why this has to be the miracle and why

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I need to remind you of this. And the reason is a lot of liberal Christians in the last century and also this century affected by the

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German modernism have tried to find a natural reason, a natural reading of this text, as in there can't be any supernatural miracle happening here.

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So I'll give you a few lists. The feeding of the 5 ,000 was a form of hypnosis.

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So they weren't actually fed, they just thought they were. Another one, when

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Jesus, you know, cut up the pieces, right, tore off the pieces of bread and handed out to 5 ,000, it's just that everyone got a little piece of bread, but they weren't really filled, right?

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It's kind of like maybe the loaves were so big, but Jesus gave a tiny bit to each of the 5 ,000.

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The third one is just as ridiculous. There are some wealthy ladies who bought the bread and sponsored the event, but of course it's nowhere in the text, right?

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I mean, all three of them, there's nowhere in the text, but what they're trying to do is trying to read the supernatural word of God with the lens of European modernism, right?

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One theologian, Vanderloos, actually mocks these readings and he says this, it is without doubt a fascinating business to investigate how human ingenuity reaches new heights in its efforts to eliminate the supernatural from the story of the feeding, right?

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The sarcasm there, of course, right? Human ingenuity reaches its new heights to explain away the supernatural in the story of the feeding.

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Now, this morning, we will hold to what scripture, what the author of scripture,

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God himself has intended, which is that Jesus is showing another part of himself, his authority and power to provide for his people, right?

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So far, we have seen his authority and power over the natural disasters, supernatural demons, diseases, and even death.

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Now, we're going to see Jesus' ability, his authority and power to provide for his people, and this is important because in the

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Old Testament, whenever there was a feeding of a great mass of people, the main subject of feeding has been the

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Lord alone, right? It's the Lord who provided the manna in the desert.

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It's the Lord who provides of bread for the hundred people in 2

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Kings 4, right? And then we see a repeat of that, but more so an intensification, right?

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It's more than just a hundred people, it's 5 ,000 people. So, the main point of this text is that Jesus' messianic provision overflows to all who come to him.

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Jesus' messianic provision overflows to all who come to him.

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First, Jesus will satisfy the needs of those who seek him no matter the situation.

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Jesus will satisfy the needs of those who seek him no matter the situation. Now, this passage, right, follows immediately the commissioning of the apostles and even

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Herod hearing about it. Now, here we pick up what happens when the apostles come back.

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Verse 10, and the apostles, when they had returned, told him all that they had done.

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So, what's happening is that the apostles coming back to Jesus, after they come back, they share their missionary experiences with their master,

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Jesus. Now, although we do not hear much of the detail, we can assume there were a lot of miracles because they talked about it, right?

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It's not like there was nothing. They talked about it, healing miracles, exorcism, and, of course, the proclamation of the gospel.

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Now, to give them a break, Jesus takes them to a new location.

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Then he took them and went aside privately into a deserted place belonging to the city of Bethsaida.

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Here, a deserted place does not mean desert, and I have to mention this because in John's account, they're sitting on grass.

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Deserted place actually means it's a location in which they're isolated.

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They're alone. They're to be alone, right? It's not talking about the climate. It's talking about the isolation that this place represents.

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Now, it's a little retreat after their first missionary experience, right?

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They must be tired. They've been gone for multiple days. Now, Bethsaida is the northeastern part of the

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Sea of Galilee, so they do have to travel farther. Now, we see in the next verse that their ministry has actually rather become really popular, but when the multitudes knew it, they followed him.

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What was supposed to be a relaxing getaway has become more ministry just farther away, right?

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However, Jesus did not view the newly formed crowd as more work to be done, right?

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And he received them and spoke to them about the kingdom of God and healed those who had need of healing, right?

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Despite the planned vacation, when people who needed to hear the gospel gathered around him,

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Jesus made time for them. This is utterly different from when your vacation time, when my vacation time really, gets interrupted by an urgent text message or an email that I need to reply because it's time sensitive, right?

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Jesus welcomed them, right? Speaking about the kingdom of God here is the news of what

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God has done or what God is doing to bring his kingdom through Jesus in the domain of darkness, right?

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It is really actually the gospel message because it's

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God's action through Jesus Christ to bring his kingdom in the world that has rejected him, in the world that is dark, in the world that is covered in sin, right?

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And to the very people who are oppressed by sin and death diseases,

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Jesus brought them hope that sin's expiration date has been set since he has arrived to reverse and restore once and for all.

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Now, not only the spiritual needs here, Jesus warmly welcomed them and provided for their physical needs, their diseases, and that's because he can, right?

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After all, he's the son of God. And really, this is the glimpse of Jesus' priorities.

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Jesus did not see these people as an obstacle to avoid, but rather the core of his earthly ministry.

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He proclaimed to them God's salvation for his people through himself so that they may be rescued from the kingdom of sin and darkness and be transferred to God's kingdom of light.

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And he showed them the reality of his kingdom that overrides death and sickness and sin by healing them.

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They were able to see firsthand, they were able to get a glimpse, get a foretaste of the full restoration to come when they were healed by Jesus' touch.

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Now, although Jesus does not physically minister to us right now, we get to see his heart toward his people.

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First, Jesus is never too busy to tend to your needs. I say needs in terms of your basic necessities, right?

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We say, oh, I need chocolate. No, no, no, you don't need chocolate, right? Needs are things that you have to have or you will die, right?

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So first, Jesus is never too busy to tend to your needs, right?

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He does not shut the gate of his kingdom just because it is after hours, right?

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After all, he's on his vacation, right? He doesn't say, please come back the next day when

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I'm more free. Jesus is not inconvenienced by those who need to be restored by him, right?

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This is important because a lot of people in the church or even outside the church believe that they're not worth the attention from Jesus, right?

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They believe, oh, I'm too messed up. They believe I'm not good enough.

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They believe that their past life has disqualified them from Jesus' gracious presence.

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However, what Jesus shows us is that you are not an inconvenience to Christ. You're not bothersome to Christ.

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You're not insignificant to Christ. No matter what time of the day,

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Jesus will warmly welcome you no matter the situation.

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And this is significant because the church must reflect and represent the compassionate heart of Christ as well.

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The direst need that we, the church, can meet, of course, is proclaiming the news of salvation from sin.

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The church must generously and graciously proclaim the gospel of Jesus, right?

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Jesus out of his love for even his enemies gave his life on the cross to face the judgment that we deserved for our sin so that, and then he rose from the dead in order that the dead people like us may live in him.

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That's the gospel message. And there is no charge to receive his gracious gift of salvation.

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It costs us nothing. The gospel proclamation must be free, and that's because Jesus will freely give salvation to those who come to him.

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And in the same way, the church must freely and clearly give out the gospel to those who are overwhelmed and burdened by their sin.

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It is often the most, it is often the cruelest thing to see someone, part of a church, who is burdened by his or her sin.

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It's almost as if dying in front of the hospital with a treatable disease.

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And this is why it's important, because Jesus knew that he must provide the need, the spiritual need, and just as much as physical, to those who are oppressed by sin.

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The kingdom of God that frees people from sin. Frankly, any churches that add to the burden of sin by saying you must be good enough, you must add in the good works, it's just a heretical cult.

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Because Jesus' goal here and the purpose of his ministry we see is that even on his retreat, he will provide freedom of freedom from sin and the proclamation of the gospel to the great crowd who needs it.

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No matter what one's past sins are, no matter how disturbing a person's present state is, no one is out of reach for Jesus' compassionate hand to save.

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And that must be seen in the church as well. We must not withhold the gospel of Jesus Christ to anyone who comes with a heavy burden of sin.

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We must freely proclaim the forgiveness that has been purchased by his blood on the cross. Now, what does

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Jesus' provision signify? Jesus abundantly provides the messianic blessing for his people.

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Jesus abundantly provides the messianic blessing for his people. Now, as Jesus is tenderly caring for those who seek him, a problem arises when the day begins to wear away, right?

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It's becoming dark. The twelve came and said to him, send the multitudes away that they may go into the surrounding towns and country and lodge and get provisions for we are in a deserted place here.

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It is not only that the apostles and Jesus did not get the rest that they desired, right, they hoped for, but this crowd also needs to find a way to get rest that they need, get the provisions that they need for the night.

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And the most important factor here is provision, right? The provision represents the basic needs of these people, right?

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Some of them have been traveling from far. They might not even have food.

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They're not the richest people here, right? They traveled far just to see him because they heard that he's going to be here.

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Now, in fact, because we know what Jesus will do, right, his miracle of multiplying the bread, we often find the apostles response a bit, a bit inconsiderate.

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Like how, how could they say that to send them away, right? But when we consider that they actually don't know what's about to unfold, they are being considerate, right?

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To send the crowd away before it gets dark. Hey, before it gets dark, before it gets dangerous, go out, you know, go home, go to a local town, find lodging, but get some food.

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You've been just following us all day without food. So please come back later.

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Have some rest. We'll be back, right? It's, it's a considerate thing. Yet Jesus takes the compassion up a notch.

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You give them something to eat, right? This is more than just let them go so that they can get the rest and food for the night.

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No, Jesus is saying you provide for them. Now, this answer, of course, will lead to Jesus showing his disciples more of his compassion and capabilities.

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Of course, to this command, Jesus, I mean, the disciples answer, we have no more than five loaves and two fish, unless we go and buy food for all these people.

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For these apostles, there are only two options to feed the multitude, the 5 ,000, right? The hungry crowd.

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Share what they have, which, you know, are five loaves and two fish, or purchase what they need, which is enough food for the 5 ,000.

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Remember, Jesus didn't necessarily pick the apostles from Herod's temple,

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Herod's palace here, right? These are, these are the normal to poor people.

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Now, Jesus' request is impossible to fulfill by the disciples alone.

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And in fact, that's the point. What they do not consider, however, is asking

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Jesus to provide for the 5 ,000. There was a third option.

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You could have asked Jesus to do it. Now, although he was not asked to provide for the crowd,

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Jesus initiates the provision anyway. Make them sit down in the groups of 50.

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Now, it is not explained why that's specifically 50, right? The most probable answer is to make distribution of bread more doable, right?

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Make it easier on the disciples. Instead of just going to one crowd, have them separated into groups of 50 would be more doable.

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However, we need to not allegorize the number 50 here and say 50 is a holy number or anything like that, just because we need, we can't just be adding more significance that the author of the

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Bible is not, right? Certain numbers are special for sure, but here without, in this context, we can't be doing that.

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So, what we do know is that there's not really a magical number to 50, just, it's just that the distribution of the food was easier when it was in the smaller chunks, right?

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Smaller groups of people rather than a huge crowd. Now, after grouping the crowd,

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Jesus takes the five loaves and two fish and looks up to heaven and he blesses and breaks them.

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And one by one, he gives pieces of bread to the disciples, which they in turn hand to the crowd.

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And what's amazing is it keeps on happening. You would think it would stop after the five loaves, but it's not stopping, right?

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That's the miracle. He keeps on giving out bread and people keep on receiving the bread from the disciples' hands.

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Now, in one sense, the disciples are actually following through on Jesus' command from verse 13.

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You give them something to eat, right? By relying on Jesus' power and provision, the disciples do indeed give the crowd something to eat.

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It comes from their hands, the apostles' hands. And before this miracle, they thought it to be impossible to do on their own strength and capabilities.

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Now, they know through Jesus' power and his capability, they are able to provide for the multitudes.

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They're able to provide for all who are in the ministry. Now, verse 17 shows us the result of Jesus' provision.

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So, they all ate and were filled, right? Filled means filled to the brim. They can't get any more bread in them.

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And 12 baskets of the leftover fragments were taken up by them. The baskets here are not some little decorated baskets that you put on your dining room table with a few fruits, right?

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That sometimes go bad because you forget to eat them. Rather, these baskets are huge, large sacks that could even hold 20 rocks, right?

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That's the Roman idea of basket here. These are huge baskets. And the abundant leftovers here signify really the messianic abundance that comes with Jesus.

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Because consider the context here. He has been preaching the coming of the kingdom.

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Even right before the feeding, he's been doing that. And what he's showing is, at the coming of Jesus, there's an abundance of provision.

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Now, why this is important is when we look at the Old Testament, the theme of feeding a large group of people, as I mentioned before, it exists.

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In Exodus 16, the Lord feeds the whole nation of Israel, manna, right? Bread from heaven in the wilderness for decades.

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They're fed just enough though, right? Remember, if they actually collected more manna than they could have in one day, it would spoil.

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It's just enough, just sufficient for that daily meal, right? It was their daily bread.

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Now, the point, however, is there's no lack. They're sufficiently fed.

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Their needs are met, right? God provides sufficiently in the wilderness where there usually cannot, you cannot find food, right?

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Second, the second miracle with food multiplication is 2 Kings 4, 42 through 44.

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When the Lord provides through the prophet Elisha enough food for 100 men using only 20 loaves of barley bread.

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And they actually say that there is some leftover, right? Some. Here, as Jesus is proclaiming the kingdom of God, he provides a messianic feast that surpasses anything that has come before.

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It is not enough for just, it's not just for hundreds of people, right? Who are satisfied, but 5 ,000.

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Not only that, it's not just the right amount to eat, kind of like the manna in the desert.

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It is not even that they have some leftover, sort of like second King's story. Through Jesus, even the leftover is overflowing.

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In the Old Testament, God provided for his people in their needs. In the

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New Testament, Jesus provides for his people richly for their needs. There is an intensification when

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Jesus comes to bring his kingdom down. It's a messianic feast.

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And in this chapter, this is the miracle that leads up to the climax of Peter's confession of Jesus' Messiah title, right?

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And considering all these miracles that happened before, Peter will proclaim

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Jesus to be the Messiah, the chosen one to restore all of Israel.

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Now, how Jesus provides for his people here is actually a foretaste of what kind of Messiah he is and what kind of restoration he has come to accomplish.

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Remember, the ancient Jews were eagerly waiting for their Messiah to restore their nation, right?

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Israel has been under some sort of foreign rule ever since the Babylonian exile.

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Yes, there was some rest under the Maccabeans, right? The Maccabees. But really, it was very short and Rome came in town, right?

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Rome just took them over. And they have a puppet king, Herod, who's not a

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Davidic king, right? So they were eagerly waiting for the Messiah. Maybe we'll be a nation again.

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Maybe we'll be like under King David again. Here, Jesus' ample provision signifies that the restoration of his people will actually exceed all expectations.

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Jesus' eschatological blessing, right? The last day blessing will not just be enough for all, but rather it will bountifully overflow, right?

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His restoration, his redemption is not just sufficient. There's so much more.

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And this is especially significant for us today because most of us here are not

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Jews. And without having to import ourselves as Israel, as some denominations do, really the question is, how do non -Jewish people, the

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Gentiles, right? Us benefit at all from the

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Jewish Messiah? How is that possible? I can see why

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Israel would be excited for sure. They get their nation back. But I'm not

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Jewish. Most of you are not Jewish. How do we partake in the blessing of the

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Messiah? Who came for Israel? Well, remember how it was announced when

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Jesus, for Jesus' birth story, right? When the angel

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Gabriel announces to Mary what Jesus will do, and he will reign over the house of Jacob forever, that's

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Israel, and of his kingdom there will be no end. In one sense,

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Jesus came to restore his people, the Israelites, and that's why the disciples are following him.

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There's a kingdom. There's the Davidic kingdom that's coming. However, in another sense, there is an eschatological blessing that overflows so much that he restores even those who are outside Israel.

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By coming to restore Israel, Jesus' ample redemption and salvation actually flow out to the rest of the world, because that is what kind of Messiah he is.

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His restoration isn't just the right amount, right?

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His salvation is not just adequate. Jesus is the

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Savior of the world precisely because he is the eschatological Messiah for the

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Jews whose blessing of redemption overflows to the Gentiles. And in fact, if you look at Jesus' interaction with the

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Gentiles in the books of Matthew, Mark, and Luke, it's extremely favorable.

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And the question that must be is, how are they blessed even though they're not Israelites? How are they praised for their faith even though they're not

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Israelites? And that's because this Jewish Messiah, when he came to restore his restoration, abundantly overflowed, right?

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That's why the Syrophoenician woman who came to ask Jesus for help. And Jesus says,

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I came for the children of Israel. But she, seeing all the miracles of abundance, blessing, abundant blessing, how she says, yes,

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Lord. But the dogs under the table still get the crumbs.

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And remember what crumbs represent. Crumbs represent overflow, overflowing. There's so much food that there's food going down.

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If there's not enough food, there's no crumbs on the floor. You wouldn't dare spill crumbs on the floor.

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You'll pick it up. But what this Gentile woman saw that now we get to benefit from is that this

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Jewish Messiah, when he came to restore, it overflowed outside of Israel.

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For us today, when we place our trust in Christ, your salvation is not just enough.

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It's not that you get three strikes and you're out. His grace and mercy overflow.

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His compassion is never -ending. And that's because that's who he is.

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That is nature in his character. He saves to the uttermost.

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He does not turn away any who come to him. He will bestow mercy on you, even if it is the umpteenth time you come to him that day.

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And we get to see his huge heart in provision from this miracle as the

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Messiah. Let us pray. Father, we are thankful that we get to worship

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Jesus whose compassion, whose provision do not end, but abundantly overflow.

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I cannot be just limited to or restricted to a certain amount.

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And thank you that it's not just the Jews, but the Gentiles who are saved because his salvation overflows.

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Thank you that we have the privilege of worshiping the Jewish Messiah. Who came not just for Israel, but for the whole world.

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Help us to appreciate and delight in what he has done on the cross for our sin.

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In Jesus' name, amen. When we think about communion, and we're just closing communion,

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I thought of some scriptures our Lord instituted this time in a time when we call the

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Last Supper, you know, at the 12. And you see the pictures and so forth of that happening. And the 12 sat down with him, and then he participated and broke the bread in the cup at that Last Supper.

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But then the thing that struck me, he said, I say to you, I will not drink of this fruit of the vine from now on until the day when

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I drink it new with you in the Father's kingdom. And he expects us to expect the

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Lord's coming when we can participate with him following that portion of scriptures, and I forget it often is, and when they sang a hymn, they went out.

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That was following the instituting. So stand with me and sing a hymn that I feel talks about when we're going to see him again, and we are going to sit down at the table and participate with our

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Lord and our Savior along with the 12. It's a new song probably to many of you.

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And you're dismissed.