Matthew 14:13-16 -- On Solutions and Support

"When Jesus heard of it, he departed thence by ship into a desert place apart: and when the people had heard thereof, they followed him on foot out of the cities.
And Jesus went forth, and saw a great multitude, and was moved with compassion toward them, and he healed their sick.
And when it was evening, his disciples came to him, saying, This is a desert place, and the time is now past; send the multitude away, that they may go into the villages, and buy themselves victuals.
But Jesus said unto them, They need not depart; give ye them to eat."
Matthew 14:13-16


Reading this today it reminded me of the Brother of Jared going to God with a problem. There was no light or way to refresh the air in the barges (Ether 2:19). He expected instructions, and he did get some... a way to solve the air problem. But for the light problem, the Lord turned the problem back over to the Brother of Jared. He asked "What will ye that I should do that ye may have light in your vessels?" and helped him by telling him a couple of things that would not work... no windows, no fire (Ether 2:23). God was helping him to think outside the box, to exercise his faith and come up with whatever solution he could imagine. And the solution that the Brother of Jared came up with was sixteen clear stones. And although it was inadequate without God's intervention, God made it work. Here, similarly, Jesus turns a problem back to the disciples. The conventional solution of making the multitude all go buy something wasn't going to work, so that solution was out. What else could they think of? And they tried what they could think of as well, coming up with the sum total of five loaves and two fishes. And God, again, made it work.

Today, as we are endeavoring to do God's will, and we encounter a problem that doesn't have a simple solution, let's turn to the Lord, and remember that sometimes God is going to turn it back to us to think about. He isn't always going to give us the answer, but as we consider the resources that we do have, in conjunction with the miraculous power of God, he will help us with the solution, as we keep working on it to find a way.