July 28: The Prophet's Profit

Seventeenth Sunday in Ordinary Time

It’s no coincidence that the first reading shows the prophet Elisha feeding a crowd of people like Jesus in the gospel. If you want to compare miracles, Elisha did his first, but Jesus did it better. Elisha had a hundred people to feed with twenty barley loaves and a handful of fresh grain. Jesus had five thousand people and only five loaves and a couple fish. So was Jesus trying to show up Elisha?

Neither Jesus nor Elisha ever did a miracle for their own benefit. The very next story in 2 Kings about Elisha is the one where he cured Naaman, the king’s servant, of leprosy. (2 Kgs 5:1:19) When Naaman realized he was cured, he came back to Elisha and offered him a gift in thanksgiving. Elisha refused the gift, because it would imply that Elisha did the miracle, while the prophet knew that God had cured him. Jesus also refused to benefit from feeding the crowds. They came to take him away and make him king, but he went up to his place of prayer on the mountain.

Jesus’ miracle of feeding the five thousand was not done just for the crowd. He was using it to teach the disciples something important. He knew there would be times when they felt they were not holy enough or good enough preachers, to spread the gospel over the world. So he showed them what God can do with our meager abilities.

There are millions of people hungry for the good news that Jesus brings to the world. Remember the miracle of the loaves when you only have a few dollars to give to the missions, when you’re not sure you know enough to teach someone about Jesus, when you don’t know how to invite someone to come back to church. And remember that you do those things, not to make you look holy, but to let God show his loving power.

Tom Schmidt