The Rev. Thomas Bandy tells about a meeting his wife Lynne, also a pastor, once attended. The meeting was sponsored by a group in their denomination. To begin this meeting, they had a customary sharing time. Each person answered the question: “How did you experience God this summer?”
“Several people in the room told how they had experienced God in nature. At the cottage, in the woods, or on the lake, they saw a sunset, heard a loon’s cry, or felt a summer’s breeze.” And as they listened, participants thought of their own experiences with God and nodded in agreement, “Yes, God was there.”
“Several other people in the room told how they had experienced God in children. Since most of the people in the . . . meeting were over 55, they really meant grandchildren . . . They reflected on the innocent smile, the childlike laughter, the spontaneity of youth.” And as they listened, participants thought of their own children and grandchildren and nodded in agreement, “Yes, God was there.”
“A few people in the room told how they had experienced God in music. They had attended a concert, or purchased a new CD, and heard Tchaikovsky as they had never heard him before.” And as they listened, participants thought of their own experiences with great music and nodded in agreement, “Yes, God was there.”
“Finally, it came the turn of a woman who was a newcomer to the group. She was a lay person . . . about 35 years old. She looked very uncomfortable. She said hesitantly: ‘One morning this summer I awakened with an incredible compulsion to go see my ex-husband. Normally I am not very spontaneous. In fact, I don’t really like my ex-husband. We haven’t spoken in over a year. But I was filled with such a compulsion to see him, that I literally could not resist it. So I gathered up my children, dressed hurriedly, and we drove to his house. We found him collapsed on the floor, having experienced a massive heart attack. We called 911 and saved his life.’ The listeners were stunned. Some stirred uncomfortably in their chairs. This was an unexpected story. Finally, one whispered tensely: ‘Holy smokes!’” (1)
This experience was a little different than seeing a sunset or an innocent child or listening to a grand piece of music. This particular experience reeked of a direct revelation of God. A woman feels a compulsion to see her ex-husband, a compulsion that is too strong to ignore, and she and the children go to his home and find him in the midst of a heart attack and save his life? How else do you explain it? Holy smokes! God was there!
Have you ever had what you felt in your heart of hearts was an experience of God? They happen far more often than we might want to admit.
Imagine you are a Jew in Palestine a little more than 2,000 years ago. You hear about a man named Jesus who is teaching and healing in a region around the Sea of Galilee and you decide you want to hear him. Is he really a man sent from God? You don’t know. You only know him by reputation. You want to find out for yourself.
You’re self-employed as a farmer or a fisherman or a shopkeeper. It would be no big deal if you closed down the shop or left the boat or the farm for the day and went to where Jesus is teaching. It might be an inspiring way to spend some time.
But the meeting lasts longer than you expected. Jesus obviously doesn’t realize it is written in stone that worship services should always conclude sharply at noon. He keeps teaching and healing people long into the afternoon. People are sitting there with their mouths open in awe at his wisdom and his acts of healing. It is a wonderful event. It’s all you had hoped it would be and more. However, your stomach is beginning to growl. You had come expecting that the event would last an hour or so; you hadn’t even thought to pack a lunch. Not a brilliant move. Is there a village nearby where you can grab a sandwich?
Then you begin to notice that you are not by yourself. There are at least 5,000 hungry men there and a scattered number of women and children as well, and you are not the only one who failed to pack a lunch. Even if there are a dozen fast-food shops on the road going into town, they will have difficulty feeding that many tired and hungry souls. You think to yourself, “What a frustrating ending to an otherwise wonderful day.”
Then you notice the Teacher talking to one of his associates. You step a little closer so you can hear. The Teacher asks, “Where shall we buy bread for these people to eat?” Good question. At least the Teacher is aware of your situation. Little good that will do, however. About all he can do under these circumstances is to pronounce the benediction and tell everybody to go home.
One of the Teacher’s associates, a man named Philip, can see how hopeless the situation is. “It would take more than half a year’s wages to buy enough bread for each one to have a bite!” he says. You’re thinking, “Look around guy, we’re not near a supermarket. We’re on top of a mountain. How are you going to get the food up here even if you had the funds to buy it? Be realistic. Say a benediction and get us out of here.”
But then another of the Teacher’s associates, a man named Andrew, speaks up. You see him nudging a small boy to the front of the crowd where the Teacher could see him. “Here is a boy with five small barley loaves and two small fish,” he says, “but how far will they go among so many?”
Andrew is probably trying to make the boy feel important. Andrew was like that. Children are important to the teacher. Give the boy some attention and some praise. Besides, it’s good that he came prepared. You wish you had done the same. But deep in your heart you’re praying, “Let’s wrap things up. I’m starving.”
The Teacher’s not ready to go home yet, though. “Have the people sit down,” he says. “Oh, no,” you think to yourself, “He’s going to keep us longer. My blood sugar is starting to drop. I’m going to faint if he doesn’t let us go before long.”
But everyone starts sitting down. Then the Teacher does something unbelievable no, unbelievable doesn’t even begin to describe what you are witnessing. The Teacher takes the five small barley loaves that the boy had with him, says a prayer over them, and then starts passing the bread among the crowd. Is he crazy? Five thousand men, and no telling how many women and children? Five tiny barley loaves? Who’s he kidding? Then he does the same with the small fish. “Hey,” you want to shout, “pass it to me. I could consume that amount of food all by myself.”
But something miraculous is happening. Something that cannot be explained. The more bread that is eaten, the more bread there seems to be. The same thing is happening with the fish. Five barley loaves and two small fish and thousands of people are being fed. “That’s impossible,” you think as you reach out hungrily for your share. “It’s impossible. Fish and bread don’t multiply. What’s happening here?” Then the thought grabs your mind: “Holy smokes. Holy smokes. God is here. This is holy ground. I am standing in the presence of God.” It is a day that will stay with you as long as you live.
When everyone has eaten their fill, they gather up what is left over, as the Teacher instructs, and they fill twelve baskets with the pieces of the five barley loaves which are not needed. And you and at least 5,000 other people sit there in stunned silence. Then somebody whispers, “Holy smokes. Surely this is the Prophet who is to come into the world.” Someone else murmurs, “This is our long awaited king.” And you begin to sense that the crowd is turning into a mob. Not a mob bent on destruction, but a mob intent on making Jesus their king. And you’re one of them. But then you look around and the Teacher is gone. Just when you were going to volunteer to help lead the insurrection, he’s gone. And you pause for a moment and think to yourself a little more soberly, “God was here. I have experienced the presence of God.”
This is the impact Jesus had on people. They came to see a simple carpenter who built cabinets and kitchen tables and instead they found themselves in the presence of the one who created the universe. Make no mistake about it. Jesus was more than a wise teacher. We have always had wise teachers. Every faith has laid claim to wise teachers. And we should listen to them. The Lord knows we need all the wisdom we can gather. But Jesus was more than a great teacher.
He was more than a great physician. We prize people who can heal our bodies. We call them “Dr.” and give them proper deference. But he was more than a physician. Here was a man to whom even the forces of nature were subservient. Not only could he give sight to the blind and hearing to the deaf without the benefit of MRIs and X-Rays, he could still the storm, walk on water, cause ordinary bread to multiply, and even raise the dead. What can we say in his presence, except this, “Holy smokes. Here is God.”
Have you ever experienced God? Many of you tell me that you have. People still experience God today.
Many of you know the story of Captain Eddie Rickenbacker. It is one of the most remarkable wartime stories I know. In October of 1942 our entire nation held its breath when word came that Eddie Rickenbacker’s B-17 Flying Fortress had run out of gas and gone down at sea. For three awful weeks Rickenbacker and his nine-member crew barely survived on three small rafts lost in the far Pacific. They battled storms. They ran out of food. Sharks, some ten feet long, would ram their nine-foot boats. When asked how they were able to endure that experience, Rickenbacker’s answer was quite succinct. He said simply, “We prayed.”
For days they drifted helplessly under the scorching tropic sun. The heat, the hunger, the exhaustion, brought Rickenbacker and his young, inexperienced crew to the breaking point. But Eddie Rickenbacker continued to pray.
Were his prayers answered? You decide. When he and his crew were almost at the end of their rope, a sea gull flew in from out of nowhere and landed right on Eddie Rickenbacker’s head. He caught the sea gull and that day he and his crew had food. Not only did they have food for that day, they cut the intestines of the bird into strips of flesh so that they had bait for several more days for the two fishhooks they had. Then came their first rainstorm, and suddenly they had fresh water. The survivors were sustained and their hopes renewed by that lone sea gull, hundreds of miles from land.
Miraculously, nearly two weeks later they were spotted and rescued. Rickenbacker’s explanation: “We prayed.”
It is a powerful true story. Writer Max Lucado in one of his books adds a footnote to the story. He tells about James Whittaker a member of Rickenbacker’s crew. “James Whittaker,” Lucado reports, “was an unbeliever.” Experiencing a plane crash didn’t change his unbelief. Facing death didn’t cause him to reconsider his destiny. In fact, Mrs. Whittaker, his wife, said her husband grew irritated with John Bartak, a crew member who continually read his Bible. But it was one morning after a Bible reading that the seagull landed on Captain Rickenbacker’s head. And at that moment, his wife reports, Jim Whittaker became a believer. (2)
That makes sense to me. You’re out at sea about to starve, hundreds of miles from shore, and a seagull drops right in your lap. Holy smokes. God was there.
The same God who fed the hungry multitudes with five small barley loaves and two small fish, the same God who plopped a seagull on Eddie Rickenbacker’s head, is still alive in our world, still working miracles, still revealing Himself to people today.
I’m told there is a Methodist minister in Texas. There was a time, he confesses, when he was a confirmed atheist and a hateful, greedy person. But he suffered a massive heart attack in Paris, and died on a stretcher in the hospital. At that point he had what is often referred to as a “near‑death” experience. In this experience he saw his body, knew it had died, and found himself in a dense gray fog‑like state. He didn’t know what to do, but he knew he couldn’t get back to his body.
He heard his name called, and followed the sound of the voice until he was in a dark place, where creatures began to pull at him, prod, and shriek; they became more insistent as he became more resistant; he suddenly knew he was going to hell.
He despaired; but he suddenly remembered a song from his childhood, and in great sadness he began to sing: “Jesus loves me, this I know . . .”
At the name of Jesus, he says, the beings let go of him and screamed for him to stop singing. He repeated, “Jesus loves me . . .” And at every mention of Jesus, the beings moved farther away, until at length, he was alone. In that pitiable state, as he thought of his life, death, and now his future, he came to say a very brief prayer: “Jesus, I’m sorry. Please help me.” And with those words, he saw a pinprick of light a great distance away‑‑and then, just as suddenly as the light appeared, it was with him, and he was filled with warmth, and love and joy‑‑and he knew he was with Jesus.
He wanted nothing more than to stay there, but Jesus told him he must return to earth. When the man said he could not go back and be as he was before, Jesus assured him he would not be. And he has not been. But he has preached and made known the powerful name and most loving person of Jesus ever since. (3)
Now some of you might be listening to this message with some skepticism. Skepticism allows us to keep Jesus at arm’s distance. It keeps us from letting go and giving ourselves unreservedly to him.
Could it have been a coincidence that a woman felt a strong compulsion to visit her ex-husband at just the moment he was about to have a heart attack? It could have been.
Could it have been a coincidence that a seagull got blown off course and ended up hundreds of miles off shore and needed a place to rest its weary wings when it spied Eddie Rickenbacker’s head bobbing around in that raft and decided that would make a good landing place? Anything’s possible.
Are such things as a near-death experience such as this Methodist preacher described just a chemical reaction occurring in the brain as a dying person is about to succumb to death? If you say so.
Can 5,000 hungry men and an unknown number of women and children be fed with five barley loaves and two small fish? You tell me. All I can do is pass on the reports of people who were there. They saw it happen with their own eyes. They tasted it on their own lips. And they wanted to make him king. I hope you want to make him king of your life. I hope you look into the eyes of Jesus today and say something like this, “Holy smokes, God is here. I am experiencing God.”
1. http://www.netresults.org/fileadmin/community/PDF_Files/Hearts%20Afire.pdf.
2. Max Lucado, The Lucado Inspirational Reader: Hope and Encouragement for Your Everyday Life (Nashville: Thomas Nelson, 2011).
3. Janet Fulmer, http://www.redeemermarin.org/Sermons/HolyName.html.