108 - Breakfast In Galilee

It’s impossible to do what our Lord asks us to do unless He provides for us. His miracle of provision must undergird every form of ministry no matter how large or small. You may have heard the saying, “Where God guides He provides,” but the fact is, where God guides He must provide because if He doesn’t we won’t be able to do what He asks us to do or go where He sends us. When Jesus calls a person to follow Him it is always inconvenient, and it’s always too expensive. We will always need His help to pay the bills. That doesn’t mean we’re all supposed to quit our jobs, do only spiritual ministry, and expect others to support us. But it does mean that if we are genuinely doing His will, He is committed to providing everything we need, one way or another. The right job can be as much a gift from God as an unexpected check in the mail.

If you and I are not confident that God will care for our needs and the needs of our family, fear will inevitably hold us back. We will always be waiting for enough money to come in before we step out. And there is danger in the other direction as well. There are people who presumptuously run up huge bills claiming Jesus told them to step out in faith and do that. And frankly they’re often unable to pay those bills and leave people with a very bad impression about Christians. The question is: Did God really say that? And the proof that He did will be His miraculous provision. Jesus doesn’t promise to pay the bills we generate from our own desires, only those bills that result from doing what He asked us to do.

The resurrected Jesus appeared to His disciples at the Sea of Galilee to teach them this lesson. He had already given them their assignment (Jn 20:21), a promise of empowerment (Jn 20:22), and the spiritual authority to preach a gospel full of forgiveness and warning (Jn 20:23), but they still needed another promise. They needed to hear Him assure them that He would provide for them, and their families, if they became His witnesses in Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, and even the more remote parts of the earth (Ac 1:8). Actually, He had already made that promise years earlier when they first began ministering with Him. But He would soon ascend into heaven, and they would have to walk in a far deeper level of faith in the future. So He performed that miracle again so that when their faith was tested they would remember that breakfast in Galilee.

John included this passage in his gospel so that you and I would hear the same promise. The promise of miracle provision that Jesus made to those seven men was not only for them, it’s a promise He makes to each of us as well. Let’s listen carefully.