Dr. Green preached this sermon on Sunday, July 19, 2009.
Matthew 14:13-21, Mark 6:31-44, Luke 9:10-17, John 6:1-15
See Also the Feeding of the Four Thousand in Matthew 15:32-38 and Mark 8:1-9
See Also Jesus’ explanation about the Leaven of the Pharisees in Matthew 16:5-12 and Mark 8:13-21
The Feeding of the Five Thousand is the only miracle excepting the resurrection itself which is recorded by all four gospels, Matthew, Mark, Luke and John. Mark and Luke say that Jesus fed 5,000 men. Matthew adds the detail that in addition to 5,000 men there were also women and children at the meal. John says that there were 5,000 people but that Jesus commanded only the men to sit and then fed only those who sat. Personally, I think Matthew got it right—the compassion of Jesus certainly extended to women and children, and that John allowed his theology to show. John says that this whole affair took place near the time of the Passover. When John was written though women participated in the Passover Meal, they were strangely absent from the Passover ritual itself. This seems hard on women, but it is this same hardness that adds additional weight to John’s witness that the first person to see the Risen Christ is a woman.
In all four gospels Jesus has compassion on the crowd that has come out to hear him, and he orders the disciples to give them something to eat. Mark and John record that the disciples protest that it would take 200 denari to feed the crowd. (Footnote 1) The 4th Gospel, adds the detail that Jesus asked Philip, “How will we buy bread, so that these people may eat?” in order to test him. The text says that Jesus himself already knew what he would do.
Most of the time Matthew, Mark, and Luke tell us what Jesus said of did, and leave it to us to determine the meaning. Most of the time John tells us what Jesus said or did, and also tells us what it means. You have heard of the Amplified Bible. John is the Amplified Gospel.
According to Matthew, Mark and Luke it is the disciples who provide Jesus with 5 loaves of bread, and two fish. According to John, it is a boy who provides the loaves and fishes to the disciples. This is a nice detail, one worthy of an eyewitness.
According to Mark, Jesus then commanded the people to sit down by companies on the green grass. I will not go into it here, but this is another nice detail, and scholars have made much of it.
Mark says that the crowd then sat down in groups of fifties and hundreds. Luke says that Jesus commanded the crowds to sit down in companies of about fifty each. I doubt anyone counted exactly. The point is that they set down in groups numbering from about 50 to about 100, large groups, bigger than single families.
According to Mark, Jesus then broke the loaves, and gave them to the disciples to set before the people. According to Mark, Jesus, himself, then took the two fish, and, “divided them among them all.” Matthew says nothing about the distribution of the fish. Luke includes the distribution of the fish with the distribution of the loaves, as does John. In John it seems that Jesus distributes the loaves and fishes to all. Of course, this may be symbolic, another incident in which Jesus works through his apostles.
According to all four gospels all who ate, ate until they were satisfied. According to all four gospels, following the meal, they gathered up 12 baskets full of scraps. John adds the detail that Jesus ordered his disciples to pick up the scraps so that nothing would be lost. That is a hopeful phrase. We, too, pray that as the Lord watches over our lives, nothing will be lost.
Now some are troubled by the differences in all these passages. 2
I have seen many devout Christians tug and twist on theses stories until they have concluded that Jesus must have feed five thousand two times, or three times, or four times, depending upon how they line up the details.
I think there is a better solution. I think it is better simply to assume that when real people tell real stories the details often differ, but do little harm to the story. For instance, suppose that a man named Bill once met Elvis Presley. Bill speaks to two friends, saying, “I met Elvis Presley in a pink shirt.” One friend repeats the story saying, “Bill met Elvis and Elvis was wearing a pink shirt. “ The other friend repeats the story saying, “Bill was wearing a pink shirt, and he met Elvis Presley.” The pink shirt is an unimportant detail. The important thing is that Bill met Elvis.
It is the same way in the gospels. Even the most conservative scholars recognize that the gospels reflect a period of oral tradition. We know for a fact that the gospels were not written down for at least thirty years following the death and resurrection of Jesus. Why were they not? Because most of those first Christians, including the disciples themselves, were Jews, attracted to Jesus by the resurrection or the preaching of it. Jews never looked for the resurrection of a single individual. They looked for a general resurrection of all God’s people at the end of history. 3 They thought that, in Jesus Christ, this resurrection had begun. They believed that their Risen Lord was the first fruits of those who had fallen asleep, the firstborn from the dead. They thought that, at his return, which was to be soon, all the rest of the dead in Christ would be raised, and they themselves would be changed, and all their bodies would be wonderfully transformed until it was like his glorious resurrection body.
People who were waiting on the Risen Christ to come back for his people did not have time to write books. They were too busy telling their friends and families that he was coming. However, their friends and families, and the others who were joining the church, did want to know about what Jesus was like in the days of his flesh. And the people in Mark’s church who had seen him feed 5,000 told the story one way, and the people in Matthew’s church told it another, and the people in John’s church added the detail about the boy. And what surprises us is not how those stories disagree, but in how much they agree.
That means at least once, and probably more than once, Jesus faced a huge crowd, and they were hungry, and he did not send them away hungry, he fed them. And Jesus may have fed the women and children along with the men, or not. And Jesus may have fed them in companies of fifty or in companies of one hundred. And he may have fed 5,001, or 4,437, and he may have started with five loaves and two fishes he got from his disciples, and he may have gotten that meal from a young boy.
But those details are about as important as a pink shirt.
That said, I would be less than fair if I did not point out that the feeding of the 5,000 has long puzzled students of the New Testament.
Did he multiply the loaves or didn’t he?
Some scholars say that Jesus and his disciples gave out small bits of bread and fish not unlike the small portions of bread we give out at Holy Communion. Then, they say, people in the crowd who had brought a lunch, moved by a spirit of sympathy and generosity for those who had not, shared their meal with the people around them. They say it is unlikely that everyone in a crowd of 5,000 men besides women and children would have started out for a day in the wilderness without some provisions.
I think this scenario assumes too much about the preparedness of the average religious person. People with important things on their minds often launch out without proper provisions. I remember flying around the refugee camps in Honduras way back in 1984 with a MAF pilot; and with Charlie Peterson, who was Mike Johnson’s grandfather; and with Joe and Lahoma Gray, who was Steve and Sandra’s mother and father; and with several key leaders of the Miskito people from Nicaragua who had taken refuge there. It was 100 degrees in the shade by 7:00 a.m. Not one of those ordinarily very practical intelligent people had bothered to carry any water with them. I had a single canteen, which I shared with at least five other people, and it was used up by noon.
At the same time, it should be pointed out that in John, this miracle takes place just before Jesus announces, “I am the bread of life.” And in both Mark and Matthew, Jesus later tells his disciples to remember this incident as a way illustrating to them why they should beware the leaven of the Pharisees. You know how leaven works. You put a little in a big batch of dough, and it all rises.
What do I believe about the feeding of the 5,000? Like the author of the 4th Gospel I have always reckoned that if God can create a Universe from scratch and raise Jesus from the dead, it is no real trick for the Son of God feed 5,000. Like the man who calls himself “the beloved disciple,” I consider the Feeding of the Five Thousand one of the Signs that accompanied the ministry of Jesus in order that his disciples might believe that he was indeed, “the prophet who was to come,” “the Messiah,”" the Son of God,” the incarnate “Word.” None of the gospels say that Jesus “multiplied the Loaves,” they imply it, and that is good enough for me.
That said, I have friends, Christians all, who believe different ways about this passage, and I would never make anyone’s interpretation of this passage a litmus test of faith. Ultimately, we don’t really decided anything. God decided this event long ago. It is a point of question. There are thousands. But there is only one point of decision, Jesus Christ himself. When I decide about the loaves and fishes, I don’t decide anything, but when I decide about him who fed the 5,000, I decide something that is real, and of eternal significance.
Indeed, I would even caution against the tendency among some Christians to prefer dramatic miracles over more subtle miracles. From my point of view, one is as desirable as another. It is the end result that counts.
Surely you have heard the story of the man caught in the flood who prayed for God to save him. He was on the roof of his house and the water was still rising. A boat came, and offered him aid. He said, “No thanks, I am waiting on God.” The water kept rising. A second boat came, and offered him aid. Same response. The water was to the peak of his house. Then a helicopter came, and he refused that, too. When he got to heaven, he walked up to St. Peter and said, “St. Peter, don’t get me wrong. I am glad to be here; but I am curious as to why God did not rescue me off the roof of my house.” And St. Peter replied, “Well, God sent two boats and a helicopter, but you refused them all.”
You may say, “That is a joke. It did not happen.” You are right it did not. But in countless floods and other disasters people have prayed, and rescue has come in the form of boats and helicopters. And you cannot tell them that God did not send the boats and helicopters. And many people have prayed for healing, and the healing has come, thanks in part to the work of doctors, and nurses, and hospitals. And these patients are grateful for their doctors, but they still give God the ultimate credit.
God moves in mysterious ways His wonders to perform;
He plants his footsteps on the sea; and rides upon the storm.Deep in unfathomable mines of never ending skill;
He treasures up his bright designs, and works his sovereign will.
And sometimes God works with a flourish, but most often not.
It is the end result that counts; and not how that result is attained.
This passage tells us that Jesus can do some amazing things, and I believe that. This passage also tells us that Jesus wants us to participate in the doing of those amazing things, and I believe that.
Jesus want us to use what we have. He did not create a meal for five thousand from thin air. He asked the disciples what they had to eat, and they offered up a meager ration of five loaves and two fishes, and Jesus took them and did some amazing things with them.
Over and over again the gospel tells the story of a man or a woman, a boy or a girl, who gives up a little in order that God might produce a lot.
Another prominent example is the woman at the temple. Mark 12:41-44 records how Jesus spent an afternoon watching people put their gifts into the temple treasury. First, he saw what was good. He saw the rich putting their gifts into the treasury. That is certainly good. Giving is always good. Then Jesus saw what was better than good, he saw a poor widow put in two copper coins that make a penny, her whole living. And immediately he called her deed to the attention of his disciples saying, “This woman has given more than all of them; for they gave from their abundance and plenty, and she gave from her poverty.”
At one time I thought that Jesus was talking about proportional giving. A rich man had ten dollars. He put in a dollar and kept nine dollars. That means he gave 10 percent. A poor widow had two copper coins worth a penny, and she put them both into the pot, and kept nothing for herself, so she gave 100 percent. She gave a higher portion of her income. Then it occurred to me that Jesus did not say, “Listen, on a percentage basis, this woman put in more than anyone.” He said simply, “She put in more than all of them.”
The truth is, she did. Over the centuries this woman’s gift has been multiplied 1,000 fold. Her story has been told for 2,000 years and it has inspired many to give. I know this for a fact.
The first time I told her story, at the Little Church on the Lane, a man invited me to his home and gave the church $1,000 dollars. He was a visitor, but we took his money and thanked him nicely. The second time I told the story, a woman at Fries Memoria,l who was herself a poor widow, gave $600.00 for a new pulpit Bible. The third time I told this story was here at New Philadelphia. A visitor heard it, gave us a new bicycle she had won to pass along to some child in need. The fourth time I told this story, also here at New Philadelphia, a young couple passed up on a new car, bought an old one, and started tithing on the difference.
I have told the story several times besides and I don’t know exactly what it has produced since, nor what it might produce here, today. I do know that I am just one voice in a sea of voices telling this woman’s story, that it always has, and always will produce a bountiful harvest.
And Mark, Matthew, Luke and John, say that someone else gave five loaves and two fishes into the hands of the Master, and he used five loaves and two fishes to feed as many as 5,000 people.
When we engage in an act of kindness, when we use what we have by putting it into the hands of God, there is no way of telling how it will be multiplied and used. It is easier to count the apples on an apple tree than it is to count the apple trees in a single seed, and every time someone acts in faith and obedience that action is multiplied many times over.
What is my point? Simply that when we put something into the hands of Jesus Christ, and make what is ours available to him, he can often do amazing things with it. He can take five loaves and two fishes and feed a multitude.
Notes
1 A denari was a day’s wage for a single worker.
2 Mark and Matthew also include the story of Jesus feeding 4,000. In both gospels, the feeding of the four thousand follows the feeding of the five thousand. In both cases Jesus has compassion on the crowd because they have been following him for three days and have had nothing to eat. In both cases Jesus divides seven loaves of bread and a few small fish among the crowd. In both cases they take up seven baskets full of the broken pieces.
3 Some looked for a resurrection of the Just and the Unjust. The Just were to be raised to life, and the Unjust to judgment.