There’s a story in the New Testament that most of us are familiar with. Jesus calls his disciples to him and gives them a mission. He tells them to go out, two by two, into the various villages throughout Israel and preach His name. (He also gave them power to cast out demons and heal the sick, but that’s another post altogether :P.) When they returned, he told them:

Then, 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.” (Mark 6:31)

You see, Jesus understood the importance of down time. Turning off. Going dark, as they say these days. The disciples had just gotten back from an indeterminate amount of time in intense ministry, and Jesus knew that they needed a break. Sometimes we can get so caught up in “doing” ministry that we forget to take time “off”. Here, Jesus instituted the first “leadership retreat”. So, if anyone in your church says that you shouldn’t waste money or time on a “leadership retreat”, just show them this passage.

Hold on, that was a freebie, we haven’t even gotten to the part of the story that this post is really about. I just needed to give you guys the back story. Ok, so Jesus and the disciples get into their boat and head out to their “secret place”, but when the people from the villages see them leaving, they run after them. Lesson? When you go on your leadership retreat, leave at night and don’t answer your cellphone. Better yet, leave your cell phone at home. Designate one person to be the “phone person” in case of emergency. Think of it as a designated driver, only no one is getting drunk. Well, I guess that depends on the type of retreat… (Freebie #2)

The people follow Jesus and the disciples so far that Jesus finally tells the disciples to dock the boat so that they can minister to the people. After a while, the disciples realize that it’s getting late and people are starting to get hungry. They tell Jesus to send the people away to get some food, but he responds “you feed them”. The diciples are taken off-guard. How are they supposed to feed so many people? They respond:

“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?” (Mark 6:37b)

I know that a bazillion sermons have been preached and will be preached on this passage, but I want to focus on the disciples response. Many times in ministry you’ll be asked the same question that the disciples ask here. “Are we going to spend that much money on (insert item/thing/program/whatever here)?” “Is that really the best use of our money?” “I think we should buy _______ instead.” “The church’s money would be better spent on ______.” Do you think that the disciples would have asked this question if their pockets had been overflowing with cash? Absolutely not. If they had had enough money to do everything they wanted, they wouldn’t have given it a second thought. The solution of buying everyone food was the disciples’ best solution, but it was also the most expensive. Jesus stops them and says: “What do you have?” The disciples produce some bread and fish, but by no means enough to feed the entire crowd. I think we all know how the story ends.

Yesterday, we gave God our fish and bread. We have always wanted to do amazing marketing campaigns. Theatre advertisments, radio advertisements, television advertisements, you name it, we wanted to do it. That is/was our ideal solution. Just as the disciples’ ideal solution was to feed everyone with food they had bought. But Jesus asked us, “what do you have?” And our reply? “250 door hangers, Lord.” So, yesterday, we walked around putting those 250 door hangers on doors throughout a specific section of Cleveland. Was it the huge advertising campaign that we had wanted to put on? No. But a few brave volunteers gave God what they had. 250 door hangers, by no means enough to attract a huge crowd. We’ll see how the story ends, but I’m praying God pretends that our 250 door hangers are a few loaves and fish.