I am working my way through a book proposal template for my manuscript these days, and let me tell you, for a beginning writer it can be pretty discouraging. When it starts asking you to list previous publications, speaking engagements, radio appearances, podcast interviews, social media followers, the number of people on your email list, it’s tempting to feel a bit like the Apostle Peter when he looked out over the crowd of thousands of hungry people and said to Jesus, “There’s a young boy here with five barley loaves and two fish. But what good is that with this huge crowd (John 6:9 NLT)?”

What good indeed? I know the feeling, Peter! But Dwell’s devotional for today reminded me of something very important. Jesus performed that miracle of feeding the five thousand with what little the disciples had! He didn’t wave a magic wand and fabricate something out of nothing. He multiplied what they already had — what they were convinced wasn’t much good. I love that! 

When you take a moment to consider those five little barley loaves, are they not a miracle themselves? When you trace that bread to the seed it came from, the precipitation that made it grow, even one loaf, one slice, one crumb is a miracle.

“As the rain and the snow come down from heaven, and do not return to it without watering the earth and making it bud and flourish, so that it yields seed for the sower and bread for the eater, so is my word that goes out from my mouth: It will not return to me empty, but will accomplish what I desire and achieve the purpose for which I sent it.”

Isaiah 55:10-11 NIV

Today, I am encouraged afresh to plough ahead with these words God has given me. I am determined not to despise what little I have, but to give it to Jesus and stay focussed on building His kingdom, not my platform! It’s all His. It’s all for Him. He can do what He likes with it. And I know that what His hands fashion is always good. Very good!