2 Kings 4:42-44 (NRSV)
Read 2 Kings 4:42-44 on biblegateway.com
Verse 42A man came from Baal-shalishah, bringing food from the first fruits to the man of God: twenty loaves of barley and fresh ears of grain in his sack. Elisha said, "Give it to the people and let them eat." Verse 43But his servant said, "How can I set this before a hundred people?" So he repeated, "Give it to the people and let them eat, for thus says the Lord, 'They shall eat and have some left.'" Verse 44He set it before them, they ate, and had some left, according to the word of the Lord.
Devotion
T. S. Eliot wrote, "I have measured out my life with coffee spoons." There are people like that. They are the caretakers of orderly accounting, measurers of income and outgo and assuring that everything balances out. The less drama the better. The disorienting thing is that God is not so careful. Twenty loaves of barley and fresh ears of grain are not enough to satisfy one hundred famished people. But they do. And then some.
And to drive home the nature of this extravagant God, Jesus tells stories of a farmer who indiscriminately sows seed, a shepherd who leaves ninety-nine sheep to find a lost one and a woman who throws a lavish party upon finding a meager coin. But perhaps the greatest affront to measuring out life with coffee spoons is when the Son of God dies for the sake of the people who would nail him to a cross, and then forgives every last one of us for doing it.
Prayer
Extravagant God, fill your people with hope, passion and self-giving that we might partake in the abundance of blessings that you wish to dispense through us, for the sake of advancing your Kingdom in the world. In Jesus' name. Amen.