Openest Our Hands, O Lorde!
The eyes of all wait upon thee, O
Lorde, / and thou givest them their meat in due season;
Thou openest
thine hand, / and fillest all things living with plenteousnesse.
Glory to the
Father and to the Son, / and to the Holy Spirit,
As it was in the beginning, / is now and forever. / Amen.
Chanting this was how we began each meal in the General Theological Seminary refectory. We sang it from this earlier Coverdale translation that graced earlier editions of The Episcopal Church Book of Common Prayer. This prayer from Psalm 145 [i] means to remind us that we are only here because of God’s grace and sustaining mercy; that our God is a God of open hands, not hands that hold onto things and hoard things, but give it all away; that our God means to fill all living things with ‘plenteousness’ to satisfy the needs of every living creature.
Chanting this daily at meals helps to multiply God’s mercy so that, as we pray, “we may pass through things temporal and not lose those things that are eternal.” As the anonymous author of Ephesians tells us, that which is eternal is that which strengthens our “inner being with power through his Spirit, and that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith, as you are being rooted and grounded in love. I pray that you may have the power to comprehend, with all the saints, what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, so that you may be filled with all the fullness of God.” [ii]
As the successor to the prophet Elijah, Elisha served the
third through eighth kings of Israel from 892-832 BCE. He lived among the
company of prophets, a guild of poet-advisors and interpreters of God’s love
and mercy. When a widow of one of these prophets was in insurmountable debt,
Elisha helped her to multiply a small amount of oil to be sold, which resulted
in retiring her debt with plenty of money left over to raise her family as a
now single mother. When her son died, Elisha went up into the boy’s room and
revived him.
Elisha orders the loaves to be given away as well. His servant, Gehazi, says, “How can I set this before a hundred people?” Elisha repeats, “Give it to the people and let them eat, for thus says the Lord, ‘They shall eat and have some left.’” Gehazi set the barley loaves before the people, they ate, and there were leftovers for others who may pass through Gilgal. [iii]
Some eight hundred years later, people are flocking from all over the region around the Sea of Galilee, also called the Sea of Tiberias, to be with Jesus. The Passover Festival of the Jews was at hand. When Jesus sees the large crowd coming toward him, he turns to Philip and asks, “Where can we buy some bread for all these people?” (He said this to test Philip for he knew what he would do.) Philip says, “Six months wages would not buy enough to feed so many!” Wrong answer. Just then, Andrew said, “Here’s a boy with five barley loaves and two fish. But what are they among so many?” Jesus orders the disciples to have the people sit down. The young boy, becomes an icon of the image of God, as he “openeth his hands” and gives away all he has. After blessing the poor, rough barley loaves, and the fish, Jesus himself distributes the loaves and fish to everyone, as much as each wanted. Then he tells the disciples to gather up the leftovers. They fill twelves baskets, one for each disciple, one for each of the twelve tribes of Israel. It was Gilgal all over again. It was like the manna in the wilderness, where every day each family could gather enough for the one day, no one got too much, and if you gathered too much, it would rot and be no good. Jesus would later teach us to pray for bread that is given daily.
The people want to take him right there and make him their king. Jesus withdraws to a mountain top. No doubt he remembers when in the time of the boy prophet Samuel the people wanted a king, and God had cautioned that would not be good. The king, Samuel warned, would make servants of their women, and send their boys off to war. Jesus would have none of that, being grounded and filled with the unlimited love of God. [iv]
The disciples take off in a boat and immediately run into wind and rough water. They see Jesus, walking toward them on the water. They are terrified. He says, “It is I; do not be afraid.” Then they want to take him into the boat. But before he could get in, suddenly the boat reaches the land toward which they were going. For some strange reason, here endeth the reading! Tune in next Sunday as the story continues, as the crowd of 5,000 hustle around the Sea of Galilee, also called Tiberias, to join him, so amazed were they by the five barley loaves and two fish!
It's about open hands that give away all that we have. It’s about tithing the first fruits of all harvests. It’s about God’s desire to fill all things living with plenteousness; to satisfy the needs of all people and all creatures. It’s about deciding just what role we are meant to play in seeing that all living creatures are filled with plenteousness; that all of us are filled with Christ’s love and faith. A faith that trusts in the abundance of all good gifts around us. A faith that gives away rather than hoards. A faith that says it’s not just about us. It’s about hundreds and thousands of others. A faith that understands that all these stories spanning hundreds of years, and all of the Old and New Testaments are one story for all of us for all of time. These are the things eternal.
The miracle is that the Elisha took the risk of giving all
twenty barley loaves away. The miracle is not that Jesus distributes the bread
and fish, but that the boy gives all he has away! The miracle is that everyone
is satisfied and still there is more. The miracle is that there is faith on
earth.
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