The Seventh Sunday after Trinity – Pr. Anderson sermon
St. Mark 8:1-9 “The Food Set Before You”
August 3, 2025 | Christ Lutheran Church
In Nomine Iesu
+ + +
Lord God, heavenly Father, in the wilderness by Your Son You abundantly fed four thousand men, besides women and children, with seven loaves and a few small fish: We beseech You, graciously abide among us with Your blessing, and keep us from covetousness and the cares of this life, that we may seek first Your kingdom and Your righteousness, and in all things needed for body and soul, experience Your ever-present help; through Your Son, our Lord Jesus Christ, who lives and reigns with You and the Holy Spirit, one true God, now and forever. Amen. (Evangelical Lutheran Hymnary, by Veit Dietrich, p. 160)
Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. Amen. (Rom. 1:7, etc.)
The sermon text for today is taken from the 8th chapter of the Gospel according to St. Mark. We read selected verses in Jesus’ name:
And [Jesus] directed the crowd to sit down on the ground. And He took the seven loaves, and having given thanks, He broke them and gave them to His disciples to set before the people; and they set them before the crowd. And they had a few small fish. And having blessed them, He said that these also should be set before them. And they ate and were satisfied. And they took up the broken pieces left over, seven baskets full. And there were about four thousand people. And He sent them away.
These are Your words, heavenly Father. Sanctify us by Your truth, Your Word is truth. Amen. (Joh. 17:17)
In Christ Jesus, who prepares Himself to serve you eternal food from His table, His own body and blood, dear fellow redeemed:
We have a sign in our kitchen that points out what kind of church this is. It reads, “The potluck stops here.” It is well known that Lutherans make delicious food for after church gatherings, potlucks, conventions and the like. The food can range from casseroles, steak feeds, spaghetti suppers, Easter breakfast. When I was in Iowa, the Norwegians would have a night to eat lutefisk and during the winter back home, my church would have a wild game feed where the members brought in what the Lord provided them with during the previous season. Now as I get you hungry for the after-church snacks, the key to our service is what I last said and that is, “we have what the Lord provides us.” As we live in a place where we are greatly provided for, it is so easy to lose sight of how everything we have comes from the Lord. He provides for us even when there are times, we just don’t see it. So, we gather in awe at our Lord’s table and see the food that is set before us by our gracious God.
As we gather at the table for the food set before us, we start with the first course, hearing His Word. In those days, when again a great crowd had gathered, and they had nothing to eat, [Jesus] called His disciples to Him and said to them, “I have compassion on the crowd, because they have been with Me now three days and have nothing to eat. And if I send them away hungry to their homes, they will faint on the way. And some of them have come from far away.” In those days it looked like God’s providence was not that visible in physical items or deeds. The people’s state was a state of being lost and wandering in the world. The people in our text have been found as they are having a great meal of the Words of Jesus, but now it is their bodies that need something to eat. Thankfully the One who is feeding them with the spiritual food has their physical concern in mind.
In both of Jesus’ miracles where He provides a great quantity of food to a great quantity of people, this is not a new mercy of God. God has always cared for His people, yet there are many instances where His mercy was not kindly accepted. When God brought His people out of Egypt, the people witnessed a miracle six out of seven days a week as God made manna fall from heaven. After a while, this was their response. “We remember the fish we ate in Egypt that cost nothing, the cucumbers, the melons, the leeks, the onions, and the garlic. But now our strength is dried up, and there is nothing at all but this manna to look at” (Numbers 11:5-6). Their bellies were not empty. Yet here they are thinking and believing that God is not taking care of them. God would provide meat by sending them quail but some who had hardened their hearts had lost their lives on earth.
It is very difficult not to take for granted all that we have. We very much want to be like the Psalmist and say, I give you thanks, O LORD, with my whole heart (Psalm 138:1a). And as we give thanks to the Lord for all He has done, our eyes can quickly wander away from our possessions. The devil will try and get us to believe that our neighbor’s belongings are better than ours. While wealth can covet more wealth, not having much can sometimes cause us to have pity on ourselves. Couldn’t God just supply me with a few more things? In our pity it looks like we are just like the Israelites of old and the people of Jesus’ day. We are just living off the land in the wilderness and it doesn’t look like it is producing anything for us. When asked how to feed the people, His disciples answered Him, “How can one feed these people with bread here in this desolate place?” It can be easy in our head to try and tell ourselves we are content with what we have, but we know the world is an unfair place and we don’t want to be caught on the unfair end of it.
The Psalmist teaches us that it is alright that life is unfair. He writes, “Better is the little that the righteous has than the abundance of any wicked” (Psalm 37:16). We know to be content with what we own is a teaching from our merciful and loving God, but it is hard to stare at the abundance of the wicked. The temptation of the devil to Christians is to get us to believe that our life is going to be easier. The half truth is, that it is, when we put our complete trust that God will give us exactly what we need when we need it. But godliness with contentment is great gain, for we brought nothing into the world, and we cannot take anything out of the world (1 Timothy 6:6-7). This is easier said than done as our stomachs growl. Even right down to the food we put into our stomach is relying that God is the One who will provide it for us and set it on our table. He tells this to us time and time again, but like our ancestors, it is either the same old food or not enough. Those who met their death are the stark reminder to us all on what we truly deserve. And that place won’t even serve a drop of water on our tongues to cool us.
As the people wandered in the wilderness for not listening to God and here in our text this crowd of four thousand needs physical food to live, Jesus was going to take care of them because He had already taken on the wilderness in their place. Jesus not only reveals that food is possible in the wilderness, but when we are in the wilderness and are wondering if we will be taken care of, God is right there by our side through it all. At the beginning of His ministry, Jesus was led up by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil (Matthew 4:1). God accompanies His people not only in the good moments or bad moments, but in every moment providing for their needs. As Jesus was not alone in His confrontation with the devil, He also demonstrates how the Lord feeds His people. Sure, He could make physical food and feed the people’s substantial hunger, but in the wilderness just like Jesus, the people are getting exactly what they need to be sustained. They are being fed His Holy Word and that is what man needs.
With the people happy to sit and receive the great meal of the Word, they only had to look in the Word to see that Jesus was very serious about His compassion for them. The people would pray, the eyes of all look to you, and you give them their food in due season. You open your hand; you satisfy the desire of every living thing (Psalm 145:15-16). In this moment they looked to Jesus, their Lord and Savior, and He performed a great miracle in front of them. As the giver of life, He set the food before them, and they ate and were satisfied. And they took up the broken pieces left over, seven baskets full. Jesus is the ultimate provider for His people. He would provide them with physical food in the wilderness and then to keep them safe from the eternal fire landscape, He provides them with eternal life. And in this life, they will eat at His banquet forever.
You know this eternal food and the physical food that you receive from your Lord is good for you to eat because every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation or shadow due to change (James 1:17). As you are quick to wander and look for pity, God does not change. He keeps His promise to you that He will sustain you. As you wish to always have an appetite for this delicious food, Jesus makes sure that you are fed and nourished. He continues to call you to come and hear this Word. You hear where man has made mistakes, eating what is forbidden and craving what is unclean. Where you have lost your appetite for what is good, Jesus creates new, bringing nourishment and healing. It is hard to admit when the table has empty chairs around it. The table deserves to have nothing on it because of the empty chairs. Yet, on that table there is always food.
It’s set because where there is a struggle with thanking God for the situations that have been dealt to you, Jesus gave thanks to the Lord with His whole heart, knowing the table that was set before Him had the cup of wrath that was sitting there for Him to drink. A cup you will not see on your table. This is His great compassion for the people and His great compassion for you. He feeds you with His sacrifice of the cross. The once and for all sacrifice that gives you the blessings of eating eternal food. As the One who takes care of you physically and spiritually, He teaches you how He calls you when you are in need. He calls you to ask Him for help. For all the promises of God find their Yes in him. That is why it is through him that we utter our Amen to God for his glory (2 Corinthians 1:20). In Christ Jesus who died for your sins, you see His promises kept keeping you from the harm of your eternal enemies. For His glory is to restore you to glory and He does that through feeding you His kept promises found in the Word and Sacraments.
The Word and Sacraments are your sustaining food for this life. This is the taste of what is to come. Now that you have finished the first course, the second course is prepared for you at the Lord’s table. Here at the altar, your Savior gives you His true body and blood for you to consume. He dwells in you, bringing you the very forgiveness He won for you on the cross where He shed His body and blood. Why can you be refreshed, relieved, and comforted because you have received this? Jesus saw all your faults and instead of leaving you an empty table, the food that has been set before you is Himself. The world will search for relief in these tough times and will look better than you at times. While they have their moments, you will have your moments of rest. You see and hear the blessings your Savior freely gives you. The blessings you have will ultimately end your stomach pains when you fill your stomach with heavenly food at the marriage feast of the lamb. Amen.
Glory be to the Father and to the Son and to the Holy Ghost; as it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be, forevermore. Amen.
+ + +