Luke 9: You Give Them Something to Eat

Late in the afternoon the Twelve came to him and said, “Send the crowd away so they can go to the surrounding villages and countryside and find food and lodging, because we are in a remote place here.” 
He replied, “You give them something to eat.” They answered, “We have only five loaves of bread and two fish—unless we go and buy food for all this crowd.” - Luke 9: 12-13 NIV

This is such a familiar scene.  We see the needs all around us and don't know what to do.  We know that we don't have the tools, so our response is to look at our limited resources and then try to foist the needs off on someone else.  Meanwhile, God is telling us to do something about the situation.  "We can't do it we cry, we don't have enough to solve their problems.  Our purses are almost empty.  It's all we can do to take care of ourselves."  All the while we proclaim to be following a God of unlimited capabilities.  We may have seen Him calm the waves, but there are some things that are just impossible.  Send the people away, send them into the village, perhaps someone there will have pity on them.  Perhaps they can scrape enough together to take care of themselves. 

Jesus doesn't argue with us.  He just says, 'Have them sit down", and proceeds to show us what can be done with only five loaves and two fishes.  That power could be ours as well, but most of us have not learned how to harness it.  Instead we rely on the obvious to meet peoples needs:  social workers, psychiatrists, doctors, hospitals, food banks, charitable organizations or the government.  What a difference we could make if we truly believed.