“By this time it was late in the day, so his disciples came to him. ‘This is a remote place,’ they said, ‘and it’s already very late. Send the people away so they can go to the surrounding countryside and villages and buy themselves something to eat.’ ” (Mark 6:35-36)
I’m writing this on my laptop as the battery quickly drains. I had a good plan to be productive today. Then the power went out. All the electronics beeped and buzzed and flickered and went dead. Now I have this sense that I’m using up the very last bit of electrical energy before I can’t go on any more.
The disciples felt that way, too. Remember the reason earlier in this day for the Plan A to get away with Jesus to a solitary place? Everyone was too busy to eat! Then the plan changed, Jesus went back to teaching, hours went by, and the disciples were likely still hungry – along with more than 5,000 people – far from the nearest drive-thru.
So the disciples came up with a Plan B, a very reasonable idea to send everyone hiking to the closest food they could find before their collective blood sugar dropped to critical levels. It sounds like a fine plan – and we’ll see tomorrow that Jesus immediately nixed it.
Sometimes every plan falls through and all you’re left with is trusting God to take care of the problem, to include you in his plan, to make sure you get fed and have the power to go on.
Think: How do you respond when every plan you make seems to fall apart and the problem doesn’t seem to be getting fixed? Is it harder for you to trust God when you’re really hungry? Have you found a way to let go of your broken plans and trust God to provide what you need?
Pray: Ask God to help you to keep trusting him even when all your plans keep getting changed.
Do: Notice this week how much impact feeling hungry has on your attitude and your courage to trust God in the moment.
P.S. The lights just came back on! (Now I need something to eat.)