Sunday Setup – Matthew 14:13-21

[music] [music] [music] [music] [music] [music] >> Hey Cross Church family and welcome to the Sunday setup. This is our time each week where we digitally gather together Thursdays at 2:00 to pray through our piece of scripture that will be studying this Sunday in order to get our hearts ready for what God's word says, how we are to receive it so we can put it into practice [music] next week. As we continue our series through the miracles, we have two weeks left and we're going to be in Matthew chapter 14 starting in verse 13 and this is a miracle that's very well known. Actually, a miracle that's covered in all four Gospels, which is very rare that we see here. But in Matthew chapter 14 starting in verse 13, [music] this story, the feeding of the 5,000. Let's read this 13 through 21 and have a couple prayer prompts that come out of this. And it starts this way. When Jesus heard about it, he withdrew from there by boat to a remote place to be alone. >> [music] >> When the crowds heard this, they followed him on foot from the towns. When he went ashore, he saw a large crowd. [music] He had compassion on them and he healed their sick. When evening came, the disciples approached him and said, "This place is deserted and it's already late. Send the crowds away so that they can go into the villages and buy food for themselves." "They don't need to go away," Jesus told them. "You give them something to eat." "But we only have five loaves and two fish here," they said to him. "Bring them here to me," he said. Then he commanded the crowds to sit down on the grass. He took the five loaves and the two fish, and looking up to heaven, he blessed them. He broke the loaves, and he gave them to the disciples, and the disciples gave them to the crowds. Everyone ate and was satisfied. They picked up 12 baskets full of leftover pieces. Now, those who ate were about 5,000 men, besides women and children. [music] Here, as we read this story, this miracle that maybe you are very familiar with, where Jesus takes a little boy's lunch and he multiplies it beyond what math and science [music] and physics and everything else can comprehend, truly a miraculous event, and he feeds this large crowd. But in this, I love that the preamble to this, in verse 14, as this whole story set it up, when Jesus looks at the crowd, he had compassion on them. And this is where I want us to start our praying time through this piece of scripture of who Jesus is, is a prayer of thanksgiving, that we have a compassionate God who loves us so much. And this is our prompt is, Jesus, [music] thank you that you have compassion for. Jesus, thank you that you have compassion [music] for. For my sin, for my family, for my neighbors, for whatever it is, Jesus, thank you that you have compassion for. Pray that to our God. >> [music] [music] [music] [music] [music] [music] [music] [music] [music] [music] [music] >> Jesus, thank you that you have compassion for us, for our church, for our families, for our community. Lord, we do not deserve your compassion. We are just like the crowds in this story. Sometimes we follow you because of selfish need. Sometimes we follow you because we want to get closer to you, but in all ways, we still fall short. We sin, we fail, we make mistakes, but you have compassion. You forgive, you heal, and you make us new in you, and that is only because of the love and compassion that you [music] possess. Lord, we thank you that you are compassionate towards us. But, the story does not end there. When Jesus sees the compassion, he feeds them. And he feeds them to give them a temporary need cuz they were hungry. They need to be filled. But, there's this line in here where it says in verse 20 that everyone ate and was satisfied. And what's crazy is they picked up 12 baskets full of leftover pieces. They still had more after they were satisfied. There was an abundance there. And here kind of gets into the central life of this story. Not only forecast that they met their physical need, but Jesus was forecasting the greater satisfaction, the greater bread of life that would come, that would not just satisfy our physical hunger, but our spiritual, our emotional, our mental, and our uh every hunger that we have in our life that would be [music] satisfied by Jesus and him alone. So, here's our prayer prompt as we think about how the Jesus has so much compassion on us to love us, to seek us, to come [music] after us, is often we get distracted because we try to find our satisfaction [music] in other things. And this prayer prompt, I just want you to get personal with Christ and you to reflect on Lord, satisfy me despite my >> [music] >> Lord, satisfy me despite maybe my work my work that just never seems to fulfill, never seems to end, but just keeps on wanting more and more and more. Lord, satisfy me maybe despite an addiction, despite anxiety, despite stress, is Lord, satisfy me despite Just pray this prompt of focusing our satisfaction, our fulfillment, our filling of our lives on Christ and not the things of our world. Jesus, satisfy me despite Pray those to our God. [music] >> [music] [music] [music] [music] [music] [music] >> Lord, hear these prayers. God, satisfy us despite the worldly things that we often fill our lives with that fill us up for a minute and then that emptiness comes. God, satisfy us despite [music] the negative emotions we have, despite the addictions we have, despite the sin that is our life, [music] despite the yearning and the striving that never ends that we have. And Lord, ultimately, satisfy [music] us despite the fact that too often we don't find our true contentment, our true fulfillment in you. And Lord, let us this passage be a reminder that only you are enough, only you can fill us, and only you are the God that we can share with the world around us who is enough for us and for everyone. And God, we just thank you. We thank you for this miracle that you provided sustenance, you provided fish and bread, but Lord, more than that, we thank you that you are the bread of life and you call us to be fishers of men. And Lord, we thank you for this time. Lord, prepare our hearts for this weekend and we just lift all this up in Jesus' name. Amen. Hey, thank you for joining us today. We'll see you this Sunday. >> [music] [music] [music] [music] [music] [music] [music] [music] [music] [music] [music] >> Mhm.