Tenth Sunday After Pentecost | 02.08.2026 | Matthew 14:13–21 | Carl A. Voges |

The Passage

Now when Jesus heard this [the death of John the Baptizer, verses 6-12], he withdrew from there in a boat to a lonely place apart.  But when the crowds heard it, they followed him on foot from the town.  As he went ashore he saw a great throng; and he had compassion on them, and healed their sick. 

When it was evening, the disciples came to him and said, “This is a lonely place, and the day is now over; send the crowds away to go into the villages and buy food for themselves.”  Jesus said, “They need not go away; you give them something to eat.”  They said to him, “We have only five loaves here and two fish.”  And he said, “Bring them here to me.”

Then he ordered the crowds to sit down on the grass; and taking the five loaves and the two fish he looked up to heaven, and blessed, and broke and gave the loaves to the disciples, and the disciples gave them to the crowds.

And they all ate and were satisfied. And they took up twelve baskets full of the broken pieces left over. And those who ate were about five thousand men, besides women and children.
[Revised Standard Version, Oxford University Press]

“The LORD will be a refuge for the oppressed, a refuge in the time of trouble.  Those who know your Name will put their trust in you, for you never forsake those who seek you, O LORD.” [Psalm 9.9-10]

In the Name of Christ + Jesus Our Lord

As the Lord’s baptized and ordained people make their way through the six months of the Pentecost season, our Life in him deepens through our exposures to his Scriptures and Sacraments.  Through the Old Testament books, the New Testament letters and the four Gospels of the Holy Writings we actually come face-to-face with the realities of the Lord’s Life!  Through the Baptism, Forgiveness and Supper of the Lord such confrontations are intensified!

This is excellent for us because it is tough to live as the Lord’s people in the world.  From its beginning the world is fully wrapped up in itself.  It gets its stuff done through its realities of money and power.  It puts an attractive front on its things, but is unable to prevent their destructive side from leaking out.  While the world is skilled at noticing when things are wrong, it flounders when those wrongs need to be addressed.  The world, ultimately, leaves us with poor leaders and sorry economic models.  Its money and power leaves its people floundering and mis-directed!

Thankfully, the Lord’s people have continual access to the holy places of his Scriptures and Sacraments.  In them we participate in the Life which comes from eternity.  In them we are deepened and strengthened to deal with the realities of the world in which we live.  This surfaces clearly in today’s Gospel where we see the Lord’s compassion impacting thousands of people.

We begin with what occurs in the front of this passage from Matthew – the description of John the Baptizer’s death.  John had announced the Son of God’s entrance into this world, he had pointed to Jesus as the anticipated Messiah.  But John had been put into prison because he spoke honestly of the king’s immoral behavior in securing another wife.  John was abruptly killed, though, because the king had made a drunken promise to his niece after her dancing before his banquet guests.  With this event in the background Jesus withdraws, by boat, to a lonely place.

Such a place recalls a wilderness, it probably looks like portions of Nevada, Arizona or California.  Such a place is inhospitable; it is not possible for people to live there for lengths of time; it is hard on people who try to make their way through it.  The Greek word for “lonely” refers to a “deserted place,” a “desert,” an “uninhabited region.”  Our world, built up and maintained by the gods it creates, ends up being that way.  It doesn’t start out that way (its approach is to make it look pleasant, attractive and promising).  But then it stumbles.  Wrapped up in its own life, living off its money and power, it falls back into its own life, creating an area, a region, where life becomes extremely difficult to establish and maintain.

Biblically understood, it is striking that Jesus’ withdrawals are described in this fashion.  The withdrawals, though, give Jesus the opportunities to be with his Father before re-entering the blasted areas of the world’s life, the surroundings where the world’s gods dominate the people in them.

Hearing of Jesus’ action, the crowds from the various towns follow him on foot.  When Jesus returns from his withdrawal and comes ashore, he sees this great crowd.  He has compassion for them and cures those who are ill.  The Greek word for “compassion” runs deeply, it is much more than our Lord feeling sorry for them.  It is not a shallow empathy; visually, it’s like the difference between a shovel barely cutting into the ground and the shovel going into dirt twelve inches or more!  Jesus’ penetrating compassion also recalls the passage in Isaiah where a barely-burning fire is not to be snuffed out and a damaged bone is not to be broken!

Jesus’ curing of the sick takes all day and when evening comes, the disciples want the crowds sent away to buy food for themselves.  This is in stunning contrast with the Lord’s attitude but it is also the first mention of food.  Jesus notes that the crowds do not have to go away.  In fact he puts it on the disciples to give them something to eat!  They report that they have nothing but five loaves of bread and two fish!

Stepping into their inadequacies, Jesus orders the loaves and fish to be brought to him (note this is a command!).  He also orders the crowds to sit down on the grass.  Our Lord  takes the loaves and the fish.  He looks to his Father, blesses and breaks them.  He then gives the loaves (and the fish) to the disciples so they, in turn, can give the food to the crowds (these actions definitively recall the actions of his Supper in the Church’s Liturgy!).

Matthew reports that the crowds are filled (their hunger is satisfied) and that the broken pieces fill twelve baskets.  This is a vivid reminder of Israel’s twelve tribes who were fed by the LORD God during their forty-year journey through wilderness!  Matthew also comments that those eating this food are more than five thousand people, including the men, women and children!

This passage deepens our understanding of the Life given us by the LORD God!  When people find themselves in lonely and ripped places, there can be the growing realization that the world’s life, ultimately, cannot provide for them.  There is also the saving realization, though, that the Son, the Father and the Spirit are entering such places, strongly providing for them!

It is difficult to live in the world as the Lord’s people.  Today’s Gospel, however, sketches out a biblical pattern which frames and sustains our lives in the middle of all the difficulties which press in on us every day.  From the days of our Baptisms we have been learning how the LORD God draws us into his presence through his holy Writings, his Forgiveness and his Eucharist.

Being drawn into his presence establishes a breaking and restoring pattern for all the baptized and ordained throughout their entire lives!  Born to be caught up with our own lives, we learn (often painfully) that such an exclusive focus leads to people being lost.  Eventually, though, such persons also recognize they are being hammered because of their self-focus and the false gods on which they rely.  From there they can call on the Lord and he rescues them, drawing them more fully into the holy places of his Scriptures and Sacraments.  In those places they thank the Lord for his mercy (his compassion!) and the wonders he does for his people!

This breaking and restoring pattern (often described as Law-Gospel in the Lutheran tradition) holds the Lord’s people together as they are worked over by the world’s gods.

It clarifies and sharpens the proclaiming, serving and teaching of the Lord’s Gospel from his parish communities.

It also reminds us of the natural tendency (driven and maintained by the unholy trio of sin, Satan and death) to pull away from the LORD God when our lives are being swarmed by the world’s gods.  Such a tendency creates parishes who try to make themselves attractive to the desires of people or who continually speak of their successes or who cleverly tap into people’s emotions.

All these tendencies do, however, is blunt and obscure the work given by the Lord to his parishes!  That’s why you can go to a Burial Liturgy which focuses almost exclusively on the person who died or participate in an Eucharist which is sloppily put together or hear a homily which is barely connected to a text undergirding it!

Thankfully, though, there are the Lord’s Scriptures and Sacraments to which we have access and there are the members and friends in our parishes who stream into the Church’s liturgies on a steady basis.  These people push to be in the Lord’s presence even though their lives are burdened with illness or are managing difficult circumstances.  Such individuals are well aware of the world’s lonely, ripped places, but they are more aware of the Lord’s holy places.  That’s why they press in on his.  They recognize that in them they have access to the Lord’s rescuing, sustaining and creating activity!

These baptized and faithful people understand we live in a time when most people are focusing on themselves – their desires, their successes, their emotions.  But the baptized and faithful people also recognize they cannot stop the pursuits they notice or even prevent them.  They let those pursuits go on, knowing that, ultimately, such pursuers will finally be brought to the world’s lonely and ripped places.  And it is there where the LORD God will meet them with his deep compassion, restoring their blasted lives with his own!

Now may the peace of the LORD God, which is beyond all understanding, keep our hearts and minds through Christ + Jesus Our Lord

Pr. Carl A. Voges,
STS, Columbia, SC;
carl.voges4@icloud.com