The miracle of your care

This year the Lutheran church celebrates 70 years of reaching out in love to people in need through ALWS. I was privileged to witness some of the fruit of this work last year at Kakuma Refugee Camp in Kenya. I was immensely proud of the way we had helped make such a difference to people’s lives.

I was also overwhelmed at the enormity of the task. I worried how much more our church could do and for how long. And then I thought of that well-known miracle where Jesus fed the crowd of thousands in Matthew 14. What strikes me about this miracle is that it wasn’t strictly necessary. Yes, it was late in the day and the people were probably getting hungry. But they only needed to go to nearby villages to get a feed. No-one needed this miracle and no-one actually asked for it!

But Jesus said to his disciples: ‘They don’t need to go away. Give them something to eat’ (v16). The disciples only had five small loaves and two fish – for a crowd of 5000 men plus women and children. It wasn’t possible – until Jesus did his thing and everyone had enough!

Jesus is still doing his thing. He has done it in me, pouring out his grace and making me his child. I have eternal life and an unshakeable hope. I want others to know the love of Jesus and for those who are hungry and hurting to know he cares. They don’t need to go away. We can give them something to eat – and we can show them the love of Jesus as we do that.

• Visit www.lca.org.au/spread-the-word to find promotional materials (bulletin inserts, A5 flyers, PowerPoint slides and social media posts) to help you spread the word about our Story of the Week.
• Read the full Story of the Week and other stories like it in The Lutheran. 11 editions/year. Only $45 (Aust), $47 (NZ). Gift subscriptions available. To subscribe: online www.thelutheran.com.au email lutheran.subs@lca.org.au phone 08 8360 7270