(Here is a guest post by my friend Bill Belew, who’s daughter Mia Mei has a blog of her own!)
My daddy has a t-shirt that he wears sometimes when he speaks. He will wear it in front of crowds of business people in suits and ties or at the university in front of his students or at a Meetup when people gather to learn from him.
I like when people come to my daddy to learn.
On his t-shirt he has 5 loaves and 2 fish. That’s it. No words. Just the images.
Sometimes people will give him a thumbs up. Sometimes a big smile. It’s because they know the story behind the 5 loaves and 2 fish. They also know where my daddy’s heart is.
There’s a little boy behind the story. It appears that he was the only child out of a very large group of people – 5000 men plus women and children – whose mommy remembered to pack his lunch before he went down to the sea to hear what the famous preacher was going to talk about that day. Or maybe see a miracle of some sort.
Indeed the preacher did a lot of talking. But he also worked a very cool miracle. And he needed or maybe just wanted the little boy’s lunch to start with. The preacher, no doubt, could have made do without the lunch but he didn’t.
After the preacher’s students (my daddy has students, too!) looked around to see what food there was available to feed everyone, the only food the students could come up with was the lunch of the little boy.
It was enough.
The preacher took the 2 fish and 5 loaves of bread and gave thanks. This word – give thanks – daddy told me is really cool. It is eulogy. Eulogy is when you say nice things about a dead guy. The preacher said some nice things about the fish. Then he began to break off pieces and give it away to his students, who gave it away to all the people.
Everybody got filled up with just the food that this little boy brought with him. Isn’t that amazing?
If you give this preacher just a little, he could do a LOT with it.
This preacher, his name was Jesus, could work with just what a little boy had to offer and make it more than enough. There was so much left over, his students had to empty out their travel baskets and fill them up with the left overs. What a funny picture! All the leftover food in the baskets under one arm and all their belongings, iPads and electric shavers and underwear under the other arm.
They had nothing to start with and more than they could handle at the end. All because a little boy gave the preacher everything he had.
Give the preacher a little and he can do a lot. He can do anything.
I am little. And I want to give all I have to this preacher. Because I am curious to see what he can do with me, too.
Mia Mei is a 5-year old blogger who thinks that in time she will change the world. With the preacher’s help, no doubt she will. In the meantime she writes about growing as a Chinese-American.
The Key of David, by Diana Symons
A story that’s been told for thousands of years…
The Bible’s Book 1 Samuel tells the story of David’s life – from an obscure family to an unlikely king, from shepherd to warrior, from champion to king-maker. What does it mean for a man to love God and be loved by Him? This book explores what it means to be human in the light of the Kingdom.
