THE HOLY BIBLE (The New Living Translation – John 6:5-9): 5 Jesus soon saw a huge crowd of people coming to look for him. Turning to Philip, he asked, “Where can we buy bread to feed all these people?” 6 He was testing Philip, for he already knew what he was going to do. 7 Philip replied, “Even if we worked for months, we wouldn’t have enough money to feed them!” 8 Then Andrew, Simon Peter’s brother, spoke up. 9 “There’s a young boy here with five barley loaves and two fish. But what good is that with this huge crowd?”
THOUGHTS: When faced with monumental decisions, how do you normally respond? Think about a child. Ask them how they could possibly get something done that may appear ‘huge’ for them, and in most cases they would refer you to their role model – their dad, mom, grandpa, uncle, etc. However, adults are also faced with similar questions every day, just as Philip and Andrew were faced with the very challenging question by Jesus. I believe that our response will be based on our level of faith at the time. In spite of the many miracles Philip would have seen performed by Jesus, still he responded from a human perspective on how much money it would take to purchase the food necessary to feed the crowd. Now, Andrew was able to think ‘outside of the box’, and mentioned to Jesus about a token amount of food that he had seen while walking around the crowd. So Andrew’s response shows a little faith, because if he hadn’t, he would not have mentioned the fish. However, neither of these two disciples showed faith in the awesome power of the man they had followed, and watched perform unimaginable miracles time and time again. I wonder how we will respond to life’s circumstances today. We will be faced with situations that appears like we can easily handle – may I suggest that you seek the will of God and His power so that you might do His will even in those cases? We might also be faced with God-sized challenges today, where we don’t have a clue on how, or what we should do. I would respectfully and faithfully suggest that we surrender our day to God, so that His mighty hand might be upon us – causing us to exercise our faith, depend on Him, and glorify Him for how He will interact in our decision making and in every aspect of our surrendered life. Our response in life shows the unsaved who’s in control of our lives, our thoughts and our decision making.
PRAYER: Lord Jesus, I pray that we will be about our Master’s plan today. I pray that the evidence of who’s inside of us will be evident in all that comes out from us. May our words, our thoughts and our actions reflect the awesome God that You are. May the world know that we’ve been with Jesus, and may they have a growing desire to know You, the more they are around us. As You test our faith today, may we depend on the power of the One within us to pass the test with flying colors! Depending on You as my all in all, I ask these things in the name of Jesus, my King, AMEN!
FOOTNOTE: If you have been challenged to make a decision today after reading this devotional, please speak with a local Bible Teaching pastor, or read through Biblical truths on How To Know Jesus, or contact me at NuggetsFromGodsWord@outlook.com so that we can pray with you and give you help and or encouragement as you begin, or continue your walk with Jesus. Any words underlined above will indicate a link to a song that came to mind as I wrote the devotional. Feel free to click on the link and listen as you continue to read or pray. If this devotional was forwarded to you and you would like to see more, please go to www.nuggetsfromgodsword.org and read more, or you may freely subscribe for a daily email conveniently containing each day’s devotional. If you are anywhere near the Highlands County, Florida area and do not have a church home, I would be thrilled to welcome you at Bible Fellowship Church, Sebring, FL! Click the link to check out service times and/or other special activities. God is at work among us! Please consider coming to worship with us!