A brother raised an interesting question when he asked, "Have you ever heard the Lord speaking to you?" Yes, the Lord does speak to His own and often for the purpose of strengthening their faith. We believe the precedent for this is found in chapter 6 of John's gospel.
In this chapter, "When Jesus then lifted up His eyes, and saw a great company come unto Him, He saith unto Philip, Whence shall we buy bread, that these may eat? And this He said to prove him: for He Himself knew what He would do." vv. 5, 6. Philip was being tested in one of the ordinary matters of life— providing food for the hungry. How would he respond? How do we respond, when questions arise in our lives? Do we rely on human logic or do we sense that the Lord is proving us? His desire is that we involve His infinite wisdom and resources in our responses. Philip failed his test. Yes, Philip the rational, keen-minded apostle failed a simple test.
We first learn about Philip in John chapter one. We read in verse 45: "Philip findeth Nathanael, and saith unto him, We have found Him, of whom Moses in the law, and the prophets, did write, Jesus of Nazareth, the son of Joseph." Here was quite a detailed answer and we judge Philip to be, as we said, a man with a well-ordered mind; perhaps he was orderly in his habits; knew the shortest distance to go to the marketplace, knew precisely how long the trip would take and was quite organized in all of his ways. He didn't just say, "We have found the Messiah." No, it was detailed, "We have found Him of whom Moses instructed us in the law," etc.
Suddenly Philip is faced with a question that demands an answer, and as we say, he failed the test. Why? Because Philip used only his own reasoning powers. He sizes up that crowd, which we learn elsewhere numbered five thousand men besides women and children. He estimates how many loaves each person might reasonably eat and multiplies by the total number of people in the company, and obtains the total number of loaves required. Then knowing the unit cost of each loaf, he has his answer for the total cost for feeding that multitude. Philip announces his answer to the Lord: "Two hundred pennyworth of bread is not sufficient for them, that every one of them may take a little." John 6:77Philip answered him, Two hundred pennyworth of bread is not sufficient for them, that every one of them may take a little. (John 6:7). In other words, it can't be done. The logic was sound, the mathematics were precise, but the answer was wrong.
Andrew in the meantime finds the right answer. We meet Andrew on two or three occasions and what is characteristic of Andrew is that he was one who was always bringing someone to Jesus. The first one he brought was his brother Peter. I sometimes think this, perhaps, was the only chance that Andrew had to outshine his illustrious brother Peter. We know that Peter became the prince of apostles. He was the one that walked on the water; he was the one that was first here, first there. But it was Andrew that brought Peter to Jesus. Peter might be the one who could preach to five thousand and many souls were saved, but who brought him to Jesus? It was Andrew, his brother, and in this, Andrew comes to the fore.
While Philip is calculating in his mind how this is going to work out, what is Andrew doing? He is looking the crowd over, and he brings before the Lord a lad which had five loaves and two small fishes, and the Lord through them is able to bring a blessing. Out of those five loaves and two small fishes, the crowd of five thousand was fed. The reasoning ability, but because someone trusted in Jesus. Someone brought his lowly means to Jesus and left the outcome to Him.
We might just look in the 12th chapter of John to see one more case where Philip and Andrew came together. "There were certain Greeks among them that came up to worship at the feast: the same came therefore to Philip, which was of Bethsaida of Galilee, and desired him, saying, Sir, we would see Jesus." vv. 20, 21. Now here is a question: Is Philip's logical mind going to find an answer in this case? Perhaps he has learned his lesson, because look at what it says: "Philip cometh and telleth Andrew." Andrew surely will have the answer for this, and so he comes and tells Andrew. These were Gentiles waiting to come to Jesus. Can Gentiles possibly come to Jesus and receive a blessing? How can we answer this? Andrew doesn't know, perhaps, but he does know that if he brings the question to Jesus, it will be answered. And so it says, "Again Andrew and Philip tell Jesus." They bring their question to Jesus and a beautiful answer is given: where the corn of wheat falls into the ground and dies, much blessing is the result, blessing to be enjoyed by Jew and Gentile alike. Well, Andrew is one who answers every question and problem by bringing them to Jesus.
How much we need to do this, don't we? If we can bring the question to Jesus, it will be answered, not from our logical mind bearing on the facts and what we might think of them, but by bringing the problem to Jesus. I'm not much for bumper stickers, but once in a while you see one that has some truth to it. The one that comes to mind is one that says, "I don't know the question, but the answer is love." There is a little truth to this, isn't there? I think Andrew had this in mind: "I don't know what the question will be, but the answer is going to be found with Jesus." R. Erisman