You don’t get it yet?

“‘Do you not understand yet?’ He asked them.”

Mark 8:21 

Jesus had been with the disciples for a while now. They had witnessed so many miraculous miracles, and all their needs had been provided for in a multitude of ways. Jesus had fed 5,000 men, not counting women and children (so it’s a lot more than 5,000), with some bread and fish, then a couple of days later He fed 4,000 men, not counting women and children, in the same way. 

After Jesus feeds the 4,000 with seven pieces of bread and a few fish, the Pharisees come to argue with Him and demand a sign to prove His authority. He had just done all these crazy miracles and declared who He was. And people just didn’t seem to get it. 

He gets into a boat with His disciples to leave the scene and the disciples realize they forgot to bring food. They only have one loaf of bread. They began to argue about only having one loaf. I can see Thomas sucking his teeth at John. I can see Peter yelling at Judas like ‘yo bro you’re in charge of the money! Why didn’t you get more bread?!’ I can see Judas turning like ‘Matthew got money too! Ask him!’

Jesus hears the conglomerate of disciples arguing like a mom hears her kids fighting in the back seat of the car, and He turns to respond...

“Why are you arguing about having no bread? Don’t you know or understand even yet? Are your hearts too hard to take it in? ‘You have eyes—can’t you see? You have ears—can’t you hear?’ Don’t you remember anything at all?  When I fed the 5,000 with five loaves of bread, how many baskets of leftovers did you pick up afterward?” 

“Twelve,” they said. 

“And when I fed the 4,000 with seven loaves, how many large baskets of leftovers did you pick up?”

“Seven,” they said.

 “Don’t you understand yet?”, he asked them (Mark 8:17-21).

My friend Jonas and I love to talk about the science behind superheroes. We love to talk about the scientific implications of powers and one thing we’ve discussed is the fact that there are two common types of reality manipulation in the superhero worlds. One type is where you take the molecules from the things around you and manipulate their chemistry so you can transform them into other forms. The other is even crazier. It’s where you literally break the Law of Conservation of Mass in chemistry and physics that says matter cannot be created or destroyed and just make something entirely new. 

Jesus did that. Casually. 

Jesus had provided with much less and on a much larger scale before.

And the disciples saw it with their own eyes. 

Twice.

Jesus could have easily done it again but the disciples failed to remember and trust the God who came through for them before.

The Pharisees weren’t the only ones who were blinded to what Jesus was doing. The disciples saw Jesus provide abundance with the scraps that they had and still didn’t apply it to their lives and trust Him to come through. 

When playing pickup basketball, a common thing you may hear if someone does something crazy is, “bet you can’t do it again.” I can see someone thinking this was a fluke shot, but Jesus pulled up and did it again. He did this twice. They saw Him do this twice and still didn’t understand. They didn’t remember who they were dealing with! They have a loaf of bread and don’t realize that’s all Jesus needs to provide!

I can imagine Jesus turning to us with our doubts and fears and saying the same thing, “I guess you don’t understand yet.. I guess you don’t remember how I came through before.”

Jesus has done so much in the lives of us personally and others around us but I know I still don’t trust Him when issues arise again. He’s come through time and time again. We’ve seen it. Multiple times even. But do you understand? Do you remember? Do you remember how God has come through for you in the past? Are you taking that information with you into the future?

God hit the shot before. Trust Him to hit it again when the situation presents itself. 

God, I want to trust You to provide and make a way even when it breaks the laws of reality. I want to trust You to make a way when I can’t see a way. Help me to see You move and remember it so I can trust You better the next time. Amen.

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