There is no body I'd rather be than me

1. The Savior provided two similar miracles. As a summary of what took place, complete the following chart:

	Matthew 14:14-21	Matthew 15:32-38
How many people were present?	5000 men + Women and Children	4000 men + women and children
What did they need?	Food and the Word of God	Food, healing, and the word of God
What were they able to offer in an effort to meet that need?	A tiny portion of food and the willingness to tarry with the Lord.	Seven loaves and a few little fishes
What words or phrases describe the Savior’s feeling toward the multitudes in their time of need?	He had compassion on them and wanted their physical and spiritual needs to be met.	He had compassion on them because they were willing to stay with him for 3 days
What words or phrases describe what the Savior was able to provide for the multitudes?	They ate and were filled and there were fragments left over.	They ate and had 7 full baskets left over.

2. In each story, the available food was insufficient to feed the multitude, yet with the help of the Lord the insufficiency was overcome. Read Romans 3:23 and explain in writing another way human effort is insufficient in receiving the glory of God. According to Ether 12:27, how does the Lord help us overcome this insufficiency?

All of us have sinned and fall short of the Glory of God.  Just as both groups of people in the stories above we all have little bread and few fish to offer.  It is important to remember that our weaknesses help us reach a depth of humility that can only be achieved by having a lack or deficiency of some sort.  When we recognize our weakness and plead for the Lords help, then we will receive his strength.

Only when we are humble and recognize our weakness will the Lord be able to help us overcome them.  However, recognizing our weakness and being humble is not accomplished by telling ourselves or others how bad, poor, and ugly we are.

Putting oneself down is not humility it is Satan’s way convincing us that humility is weakness.  In reality humility is all the strength, it is when we can say to ourselves, “I am a lot better of a person today than I was yesterday because God helped me do it”.  There can be confidence and optimism in a humble individual.  Let us remember not to confuse humility with self-destruction or poor self-image.