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By Pastor Glenn Pease
Basil Matthews tells of being in a little Arabian village and seeing a tall Arab boy playing a flute in the dusty streets.
He was surprised and asked the boy if he could examine the instrument.
He discovered it was made out of an old gun barrel.
The boy had found it on a nearby battlefield.
He had filed it down, drilled holes in it, and out of a weapon designed to inflict misery he created a instrument of music.
Creative people are always taking something worthless and turning it into something worthwhile.
Many can take trash and junk and turn it into trinkets and jewelry.
No one can match the creative ingenuity of Jesus, however.
He can even make a mountain out of a molehill.
We are using an old cliche in a positive way when we say this, for we mean that He can take something minor and minute and turn it into something major and magnificent.
Ordinarily this saying is used as a negative remark about those who turn trifles into tragedies, and who exaggerate minor miseries into monstrous malignancies.
Every gas bubble is made into a bleeding ulcer; every minor pain is the onset of cancer; every storm is expected to be a rerun of Noah and the Ark.
The worry wort and the hypochondriac are experts at making mountains out of molehills, but very few can persuade themselves to appreciate this awesome ability because it is all negative.
There is a positive side to this cliche, however.
G. K. Chesterton points out that if you can see the tremendous in trifles, and find wonder in the commonplace, then you are making mountains out of molehills, and he can think of no more productive form of manufacture.
When we look at the life of Jesus we discover He was a Master at making mountains out of molehills.
He was always finding the sublime in that which was simple.
He used the insignificant over and over for the basis of inspiration.
A poet put it-
He saw the world in a grain of sand,
and Heaven in a wild flower,
Held infinity in the palm of His hand
and Eternity in an hour.
You will search the Scripture in vain to find Jesus speaking of the 7 wonders of the world.
The common people heard Him gladly because He spoke of commonplace things.
All of His illustrations were from everyday life that all men were familiar with.
He spoke of the birds of the air; the lilies of the field; the grain white unto harvest; the sheep and the shepherd, the fishermen and his nets, women baking, men plowing, and all the commonplace facts of life.
Ninety nine per cent of all Jesus said was plain bread and butter talk.
When He came to the last night of His life in the flesh He did not change His life style.
In fact, if it is possible, He specialized even more in life's commonplace basics.
He took a towel and a basin of water to wash His disciples feet, and that is about as commonplace and down to earth as you can get.
Now we want to examine His instituting the memorial by which His church will remember Him all through history, and again we see His love for simplicity.
He does not leave to his church some elaborate ceremony with complex ritual that only the well trained could participate in, but instead he takes a cup and he takes bread.
Cup and bread, no big deal.
The lowliest peasant has a cup and some bread.
The condemned prisoner in the dungeon has his cup and bread.
What kind of memorial is this for a king?
Look at the Washington, Jefferson, and Lincoln memorials, and then you will see honor.
For Jesus there should be a crown with glorious jewels, and a long shiny jewel-studded sword, or at least something that is lasting.
Anything but a perishable piece of bread that can be thrown to a dog, or left to mold and decay in a day.
What madness is this?
A king whose hand can grasp the constellations, and he takes a cup.
A Master whose marvels and miracles could astound the world, and he takes a piece of bread as the basis for his memorial.
Where would the Pharaohs be today if they had taken a piece of bread and a cup instead of building the majestic pyramids?
They would have been forgotten completely.
Jesus does not want His disciples to forget Him either, but He does not insure their remembrance with anything elaborate or complex.
If He can build a perpetual memorial to His name out of these commonplace things, then He is making a mountain out of molehill, and turning the trivial into the tremendous.
The fact that we are here today ready to obey His request to do this in remembrance of Him, proves that He was successful in making the simple sublime.
Joy Romans wrote,
Tuck me in a cozy shanty,
In some unique, secluded place.
Wind a lane, all twisty slanty,
Up to her unpainted humble face.
Happiness comes to those it seems,
Who seek out truth, in simple things.
We want to seek out truth in simple things by examining the significance of the bread and cup, these mere molehills which Jesus used to make a mountainous memorial.
I. THE BREAD.
Here is the ultimate in the commonplace.
It is the universal food, and just because of that, it is an excellent symbol of life and what Jesus accomplished for us on the cross.
The cross becomes a source of life for all men who will look to the Christ of the cross who is the bread of life.
In John chapter 6 the word bread is used 16 times.
Jesus makes it clear, as He compares Himself with the manna of the Old Testament, that He is the true bread of God from heaven.
He is the living bread that can nourish, sustain, and give growth and life in the wilderness of this world.
The bread of communion is to be a reminder that Jesus is the Resource for living.
When we pray, "Give us this day our daily bread," it is a request, not just for the physical bread, but for the soul food supplied in Christ.
Jesus was frequently engaged in making a mountain of blessing out of a molehill of bread.
Some of the greatest miracles He performed were miracles with bread.
He fed the 5000, and again the 4000 by the multiplying of bread.
Bread was thereby made to represent His all-sufficiency in supplying our needs.
Jesus was not the cake of life, but the bread of life.
He has such a love for bread, and such a unique method of handling it, and giving thanks for it, that the two He met on the road to Emmaus did not recognize Jesus after His resurrection until He broke the bread.
When they saw Him breaking bread they suddenly were enlightened.
Why should bread and the Lord be linked so closely so that even when we look back to the cross Jesus asks us to use bread as a reminder?
In spite of the fact that bread is very perishable, it is an ideal symbol of the Lord who is the same yesterday, today, and forever.
Times change, and a ceremony with meaning in one age can become completely meaningless in another.
Had Jesus made foot washing the basis for His memorial, for example, the changing times would have made it irrelevant.
It was a custom when sandals were worn by those who walked on dusty roads and needed their feet washed when they entered a home to eat.
This is no longer the case.
Jesus selected the eating of bread because He knew that for as long as history lasted, and however radical the changes of culture, every man on the face of the earth would be an eater of bread.
Jesus selected the commonplace of bread for His memorial because it would be lasting and universal.
When we begin to emphasize the unique and complex, as theologians often do, we tend to make Christ exclusive and available only to the few.
Jesus purposely majored on the commonplace so as to be inclusive, and to make it clear He is available to all men who will receive Him. Jesus and His life giving power are as available as bread.
Someone has said, "Evangelism is one beggar telling another beggar where he can get bread."
The Gospel is really that simple.
When we begin to ignore the insignificant and become careless about the commonplace, we will find ourselves fumbling with the fundamentals.
Everything connected with the Gospel is basic, simple, and appeals to the common man.
A mountain top experience with Christ demands nothing that is not available to every man.
Jesus was a carpenter by trade, for a carpenter deals in wood, and wood is universal.
It is the common material available to most all men.
From the wood of His crib to the wood of His cross Jesus was a specialist in the commonplace.
It was not a bolt of gold,
But only a cross of wood,
Yet the bliss can never be told,
When its meaning is understood.
The poet is saying in another way, Jesus made a mountain out of a molehill by using the commonplace to accomplish the plan of redemption.
Wood, water, bread, and the cup are His tools.
Where in all the Gospels is there anything of importance that is not common and available to all men.
Failure to see this has often led Christians in a vain search for the spectacular.
They begin to dream that deep Christian experiences can be found in the unique.
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