Be Still And Know

John 6:8-9 Then Andrew, Simon Peter’s brother, spoke up.  “There’s a young boy here with five barley loaves and two fish. But what good is that with this huge crowd?” I’m sure we are all very familiar with Jesus’ miraculous feeding of the 5,000. It’s an amazing miracle and must have had a profound effect on everyone who witnessed it. But I’m particularly interested in what happened before the miracle took place. John records that Jesus asked Philip where they could buy food for the people. Then John added that Jesus knew exactly what he was going to do, but was merely testing Philip. Philip gave the (not unreasonable) answer that, even if they worked for months, they wouldn’t have sufficient money to pay for enough food for the crowds. And then Andrew pointed out the hopelessness of the situation by highlighting a young boy in the crowd with his packed lunch. But with despair he observed: “What good is that with this huge crowd?” This all feels very familiar. When we look at the problems of our world, or even