When the multitudes knew it, they followed Him; and He received them and spoke to them about the kingdom of God, and healed those who had need of healing

 Then He called His twelve disciples together and gave them power and authority over all demons, and to cure diseases.  He sent them to preach the kingdom of God and to heal the sick.  And He said to them, "Take nothing for the journey, neither staffs nor bag nor bread nor money; and do not have two tunics apiece.  Whatever house you enter, stay there, and from there depart.  And whoever will not receive you, when you go out of that city, shake off the very dust from your feet as a testimony against them."  So they departed and went through the towns, preaching the gospel and healing everywhere.

Now Herod the tetrarch heard of all that was done by Him; and he was perplexed, because it was said by some that John had risen from the dead, and by some that Elijah had appeared, and by others that one of the old prophets had risen again.  Herod said, "John I have beheaded, but who is this of whom I hear such things?"  So he sought to see Him. 

And the apostles, when they had returned, told Him all that they had done.  Then He took them and went aside privately into a deserted place belonging to the city called Bethsaida.  But when the multitudes knew it, they followed Him; and He received them and spoke to them about the kingdom of God, and healed those who had need of healing  When the day began to wear away, the twelve came and said to Him, "Send the multitude away, that they may go into the surrounding towns and country, and lodge and get provisions; for we are in a deserted place here."  But He said to them, "You give them something to eat."  And they said, "We have no more than five loaves and two fish, unless we go and buy food for all these people."  For there were about five thousand men.  Then He said to His disciples, "Make them sit down in groups of fifty."  And they did so, and made them all sit down.  Then He took the five loaves and the two fish, and looking up to heaven, He blessed and broke them, and gave them to the disciples to set before the multitude.  So they all ate and were filled, and twelve baskets of the leftover fragments were taken up by them.

- Luke 9:1-17

Yesterday we read that when Jesus returned from the country of the Gadarenes across the Sea of Galilee, the multitude welcomed Him, for they were all waiting for Him.  And behold, there came a man named Jairus, and he was a ruler of the synagogue.  And he fell down at Jesus' feet and begged Him to come to his house, for he had an only daughter about twelve years of age, and she was dying.  But as He went, the multitudes thronged Him.  Now a woman, having a flow of blood for twelve years, who had spent all her livelihood on physicians and could not be healed by any, came from behind and touched the border of His garment.  And immediately her flow of blood stopped.  And Jesus said, "Who touched Me?"  When all denied it, Peter and those with him said, "Master, the multitudes throng and press You, and You say, 'Who touched Me?'"  But Jesus said, "Somebody touched Me, for I perceived power going out from Me."  Now when the woman saw that she was not hidden, she came trembling; and falling down before Him, she declared to Him in the presence of all the people the reason she had touched Him and how she was healed immediately.  And He said to her, "Daughter, be of good cheer; your faith has made you well.  Go in peace."  While He was still speaking, someone came from the ruler of the synagogue's house, saying to him, "Your daughter is dead.  Do not trouble the Teacher."  But when Jesus heard it, He answered him, saying, "Do not be afraid; only believe, and she will be made well."  When He came into the house, He permitted no one to go in except Peter, James, and John, and the father and mother of the girl.  Now all wept and mourned for her; but He said, "Do not weep; she is not dead, but sleeping."  And they ridiculed Him, knowing that she was dead.  But He put them all outside, took her by the hand and called, saying, "Little girl, arise."  Then her spirit returned, and she arose immediately.  And He commanded that she be given something to eat.  And her parents were astonished, but He charged them to tell no one what had happened.

Then He called His twelve disciples together and gave them power and authority over all demons, and to cure diseases.  He sent them to preach the kingdom of God and to heal the sick.  And He said to them, "Take nothing for the journey, neither staffs nor bag nor bread nor money; and do not have two tunics apiece.  Whatever house you enter, stay there, and from there depart.  And whoever will not receive you, when you go out of that city, shake off the very dust from your feet as a testimony against them."  So they departed and went through the towns, preaching the gospel and healing everywhere.  The chosen twelve (6:12-16) are sent out on their first mission.  Note that Jesus sends them out by giving them power and authority over all demons, and to cure diseases; also to preach the kingdom of God and to heal the sick.  We note the great emphasis on healing.  Jesus does not send them out empty-handed, but invested with His own power to do these things.  His instructions further enforce their dependence upon the power which He has given to them.  They are to take nothing with them, nor extra clothing; their demeanor is to be humble and grateful for whatever is offered to them first (not to "trade up" for better lodgings after they are known).  Their power is also in testimony -- those who will not receive them receive testimony against them.

Now Herod the tetrarch heard of all that was done by Him; and he was perplexed, because it was said by some that John had risen from the dead, and by some that Elijah had appeared, and by others that one of the old prophets had risen again.  Herod said, "John I have beheaded, but who is this of whom I hear such things?"  So he sought to see Him.  Herod the tetrarch is also known as Herod Antipas; also known as a "king," he was the tetrarch or ruler of Galilee, who ruled for Rome.  During Jesus' time of trial, He will be sent by Pilate to Herod the tetrarch (23:7).  This Herod is the son of the Herod who slew the innocent children in Bethlehem (Matthew 2:16).  The story of the beheading of St. John the Baptist can be read at Mark 6:14-28.  The curiosity of Herod Antipas at this stage is one more indication that Jesus is coming to the notice of ruling authorities; the conflict with the kingdom of God becomes inevitable.

And the apostles, when they had returned, told Him all that they had done.  Then He took them and went aside privately into a deserted place belonging to the city called Bethsaida.  But when the multitudes knew it, they followed Him; and He received them and spoke to them about the kingdom of God, and healed those who had need of healing.  Jesus tries to go away privately with the apostles, those twelve who have been sent out on their first mission.  But the crowds and their constant need, and demand for healing, makes this impossible.  Note that Jesus spoke to them about the kingdom of God; His mission is to spread this word, not simply to respond to demands.

When the day began to wear away, the twelve came and said to Him, "Send the multitude away, that they may go into the surrounding towns and country, and lodge and get provisions; for we are in a deserted place here."  But He said to them, "You give them something to eat."  And they said, "We have no more than five loaves and two fish, unless we go and buy food for all these people."  For there were about five thousand men.  Then He said to His disciples, "Make them sit down in groups of fifty."  And they did so, and made them all sit down.  Then He took the five loaves and the two fish, and looking up to heaven, He blessed and broke them, and gave them to the disciples to set before the multitude.  So they all ate and were filled, and twelve baskets of the leftover fragments were taken up by them.  My study bible cites the commentary of Theophylact, who sees a liturgical parallel with the feeding of the five thousand.  First Christ healed and spoke about the gospel, then fed the multitude with the miraculous bread by the hands of His disciples.  In the Church, it says, a person is first healed through baptism; then at the Liturgy, the gospel is preached and the bread of life and the cup are received from the hands of ordained clergy.  "You give them something to eat" is a command -- a kind of commission that is a preparation for the apostolic ministry to come after the Resurrection.  My study bible says that they will feed the world with the word of God and with the Eucharist.  On the five loaves and two fish, St. John Chrysostom comments that Christ is the same Creator "of both the earth and the sea, who in the beginning brought fruit from the earth and life out of the water."   St. Chrysostom further comments on the image we're given of Christ looking up to heaven, suggesting that He does so "not as receiving power from elsewhere, but as honoring the Father who begot Him."  Moreover, he adds, that Christ blessed and broke the bread teaches us "not to touch any meal until we have given thanks to Him who gives us food." 

My study bible has an additional comment on the feeding of the five thousand, which adds that Jesus' blessing of the bread with which the crowds were fed gives us a clear eucharistic image, and therefore directs us to pursue spiritual food greater than that which is earthly (see also John 26-27).  In our modern age, which has made and continues to make tremendous progress in the realm of the material (such as scientific and technological progress and new advances of all kinds), we tend to think in material terms.  That is, we think that addressing the problems of the world can be done through material gain.  If only we had enough money for research into this or that problem -- for medical research, or research into the production of more food for more people, or for investigation into the abolition of disease, pollution, natural disaster, etc., we could truly solve all the problems of the world.  But the problems of the world do not rest simply in the material.  Christ comes into the world with the fullness of compassion for all of our problems:  our illnesses, our needs and wants, our desire to be fed.  But never in the Gospels is compassion simply a matter of material understanding of material problems.  Compassion is, in the first place, a product of a spiritual life and spiritual understanding.  Grace comes from God -- and through our understanding of a gracious Creator, we may in turn share a communal concern and right-relatedness with others.  In other words, the material doesn't simply come first, but rather the material is fulfilled through the direction and guidance of the spiritual.  As creatures, we are both material and spiritual beings.  We have a body and also possess a soul.  As such, in the cosmology of the Church, human beings occupy a special role in the fullness of Creation, we straddle both the visible and invisible worlds.  But with so much emphasis on the material, right down to the images purveyed through the mass penetration of social media into more and more of our lives, we forget about our own spiritual side.  We tend to discount that it means anything, because we don't see overtly evidence of its impact or a lack of spiritual attention in our lives.  We may simply come to know and understand, after the fact, an emptiness in our lives, a lack of good direction, the overt callousness of the selfishness and self-centeredness propounded through such total emphasis on image.  But still, our own awareness of ourselves as spiritual beings competes with the ever-driving demand for more:   a better house, more money, to look like a social media star or to be one, to have a child as a kind of commodity that makes us okay or part of a group, to have the right amount of friends and do the right things.  All of these, in a self-centered world, focus on one thing:  what is my image in the eyes of others that will feed me what (I think) I need for myself?  The chaos that emerges from the lives of those driven to be stars in such a cosmos tells us something about the social breakdown that occurs in hidden ways within ourselves when we forget that we, too, are made of spirit, and that our lives need spiritual values to be meaningful and fulfilling, and even challenging in the right ways.  That chaos includes the hidden anger and resentment, the constant challenges of competition for its own sake, and the rivalry for things and even for image that go on all the time under the surface of what we consume -- especially and even through a social media-driven world.  Without a real spiritual basis for community, we find easy scapegoats, terrifying punishments for those who fail, obscurity and rejection of images that don't fit the latest thing, whatever that might be today or this moment.  We find inconvenient facts something to ignore; a threat to the illusion that we are swimming in a stream of progress becomes a threat to our own sense of well-being.  But let us note this little verse in the reading today, that when the apostles come back from their mission, Jesus' first desire is to draw them away from the crowds, to come away for a time to rest and also to discuss with Him all the issues of this mission.  And we must take our cue from Jesus:  we need time alone with Creator; away from image, from the thoughts and popular opinions of others, from the desire merely to please the demands of the crowds.  Jesus always takes time for the spiritual, for the word of the gospel.  Healing doesn't come without it, and we can't heal without a perspective that will give us an independent and especially a detached point of view of all the fuss, demands, and chaos that surrounds us -- and especially the impulse that drives a feeling that all there is is the material and nothing more.  To escape alone by ourselves, to retreat into faith and worship, to set aside every worldly care in order to worship in true freedom (as the Cherubic Hymn of the St. Chrysostom liturgy declares in all languages in which it may be heard -- here is a famous version by Tchaikovsky), is to find ourselves in communion with our Source, with the One who loves us better than anything or anyone else, and who can teach us what it truly means to heal.  Let us consider what we lose in a world caught up with its own fantasies about itself, separate from Creator.  And let us return to what has given us so much, and continues to love and to bestow grace, to await our love and hearing in return for what it offers.   We continue to dwell in a Kingdom that lives midst our own world, no matter what the state of our world may be, and for all times and places.   The twelve baskets left over to the twelve apostles for the whole of the world are still left to feed us all with the spiritual food we need.