Disciple Is Not An Easy Word: Mark 8:4
Its hard work being a disciple. Growing is tough. Training your brain to think certain ways is hard. Remembering all the good stuff you are taught without forgetting some parts is downright challenging. Lessons aren’t frequently learned the first time through.
Mark 8:4 is not a typical verse to lift out of scripture as a standalone verse for study. It doesn’t have the same intensity as John 3:16, 1 Corinthians 13:13, or Galatians 2:20. Still, for those of us who are growing in Christ, there is a power in this verse that is tremendously easy to overlook.
We the reader know what’s coming. A crowd is present. They’ve been without food for a while. They need access to food but they’re not in a place where food is readily found. It is obvious that Jesus is getting ready to do another feeding miracle.
Before pressing in here, let’s compare the feeding of the four thousand with the feeding of the five thousand. Besides the amount of food at the beginning and the amount of food at the end – which we’ll get to another day – look at the origin of the compassion. In the feeding of the five thousand, the Hebrew people are without food for part of a day and the disciples initiate concern for the people. In the feeding of the four thousand, the Gentile people are without food for a couple days and Jesus initiates concern for the people. These stories get lumped together because of their similarities, but their origination is substantially different.
This is significant to note when we examine this verse. When reading this verse, it is easy to wonder how the disciples could be such blockheads. They already saw Jesus feed five thousand Jews, how could they not possibly connect the dots and anticipate Jesus' next move?
In this story, though, Jesus initiated the compassion. The disciples need time to catch up and get on the same page as Jesus. What appears obvious to Jesus and us as a reader is not obvious to the disciples in the moment. Anyone who has taught or mentored knows this. In fact, this is why teaching and mentoring are so important. Often what experts and mentors consider obvious is in reality a significant leap in conscious understanding.
To give the disciples some credit, putting a dinner together for four thousand people would challenge even the best party planners of the modern age. In the ancient world, this would be a near impossibility. Sometimes catching up to the will of God takes a bit of time. Sometimes it takes more than one experience of the power of God – even a huge experience like feeding a crowd – to have the outcome become part of our working memory. The disciples often get criticized here, but in reality, they deserve a bit of grace. If I were in their shoes, I don’t know that I would’ve been on page with Jesus right away, either. Its hard work being a disciple.
