God wants to use your life for His glory. As a Spirit-filled believer, you carry the potential to become a vessel for God’s purposes. So what’s the key to being used by God?
To answer that, I want to take a look at the story of Jesus miraculously feeding a multitude.
Jesus soon saw a huge crowd of people coming to look for him. Turning to Philip, he asked, “Where can we buy bread to feed all these people?” He was testing Philip, for he already knew what he was going to do Philip replied, “Even if we worked for months, we wouldn’t have enough money to feed them!” (John 6:5-7)
So there was a need. By all natural standards, the situation seemed impossible to overcome. The crowd was too big, and the supply seemed inadequate. But then something became available.
Then Andrew, Simon Peter’s brother, spoke up. “There’s a young boy here with five barley loaves and two fish. But what good is that with this huge crowd?” “Tell everyone to sit down,” Jesus said. So they all sat down on the grassy slopes. (The men alone numbered about 5,000.) Then Jesus took the loaves, gave thanks to God, and distributed them to the people. Afterward he did the same with the fish. And they all ate as much as they wanted. (John 6:8-11)
A little boy offered to the Lord his food supply - five loaves of bread, two fish. Concerning the boy’s offering, Andrew asked a fair question: “But what good is that with this huge crowd?”
Jesus, seeming to ignore Andrew’s doubt-filled question, answered confidently, “Tell everyone to sit down..” Tell everyone to sit down? Jesus didn’t even address the doubt behind Andrew’s question. He simply responded with action, with demonstration.
Now the Bible tells us that that there were more than 5,000 people present - the men alone numbered 5,000. Let’s be conservative and assign only one child and one woman to each man. So at least 15,000 people were present and in need of food.
A big need; a seemingly small supply. But the need was met, and the crowd was fed.
The boy offered what he had to Jesus - his five loaves of bread and two fish. Here’s what Luke’s gospel records Jesus doing with the bread:
Jesus took the five loaves and two fish, looked up toward heaven, and blessed them. Then, breaking the loaves into pieces, he kept giving the bread and fish to the disciples so they could distribute it to the people. (Luke 9:16)
So what can we learn from this most remarkable story?
The boy’s meal was not enough to meet the need. The boy’s meal needed to be surrendered to Jesus before it could be distributed. Jesus broke the bread before He multiplied it. In the boy’s hands, the food was not enough.
In our hands, our lives are not enough to meet the needs of the world’s masses. But in the hands of Jesus, our nothing becomes everything. Brokenness precedes usefulness; surrender precedes the miraculous.
There is no limit to what God can do with a life surrendered to the Holy Spirit. Put your life in the hands of God. Surrender. Let Him break you, mold you, create anew. Tell Him, “God, if you can use nothing, here I am.”