The people saw
them going, and many recognized them and ran there together on foot from all
the cities, and got there ahead of them. When Jesus went ashore, He saw a large
crowd, and He felt compassion for them because they were like sheep without a
shepherd; and He began to teach them many things. When it was already quite
late, His disciples came to Him and said, "This place is desolate and it
is already quite late; send them away so that they may go into the surrounding
countryside and villages and buy themselves something to eat." But He
answered them, "You give them something to eat!" And they said to
Him, "Shall we go and spend two hundred denarii on bread and give them
something to eat?" And He said to them, "How many loaves do you have?
Go look!" And when they found out, they said, "Five, and two
fish." And He commanded them all to sit down by groups on the green grass.
They sat down in groups of hundreds and of fifties. And He took the five loaves
and the two fish, and looking up toward heaven, He blessed the food and broke
the loaves and He kept giving them to the disciples to set before them; and He
divided up the two fish among them all. They all ate and were satisfied, and
they picked up twelve full baskets of the broken pieces, and also of the fish.
There were five thousand men who ate the loaves.
Although the best intentions were there to get the
apostles some rest, the reality was that it was not possible. The people who desired healing and teaching
from God were so desperate that they walked around a huge lake and arrived on
the shore before the boat did. Jesus saw
that they were like “sheep without a shepherd.”
The term “shepherd” is used frequently in the OT to describe kings or
elders, who provides guidance for the people (II Samuel 5:2; Ezekiel 34:2;
Zechariah 11:15-17). The term “sheep
without a shepherd” is used frequently to describe a situation in Israel where
they have no human leadership, or when the leadership is evil and ignores the
needs of the people (Numbers 27:17; I Kings 22:17; Isaiah 44:28;Ezekiel 34:5;
Zechariah 10:2). Because the times the
gospels use this term only when Jesus was looking at a crowd in Galilee, it isn’t
certain whether the leaderless people were only in Galilee or meaning all the
followers of Yahweh around the world. It might make sense that it is in reference specifically to those in Galilee, after seeing Herod's weak leadership in the last chapter. Jesus’ response to their lack of leadership is to teach them God’s word,
so they could understand what God really desired of them.
After a while, the people needed to eat, so the
disciples told Jesus to send them away.
Jesus, sensing a teachable moment, gave them an impossible task—to feed
a multitude. They saw the task as
ridiculous, and told him so. When he
sent them out to find food, they brought back a scanty amount, as if to say,
“There is no point talking about this—just send them away like we
suggested!” Jesus, though, took the
scanty amount of food they had brought to him and gave it to all the
people. Not only did everyone eat their
fill, but there were twelve baskets of leftovers—one for each apostle who
denied that it could be done. The
disciples saw the situation like a math problem—5000 men does not equal five
loaves of bread. Jesus saw the situation
differently—he saw the multitudes of the Children of Israel, hungry in the
wilderness, listening to the command of God, just like in Exodus 16-20. In that situation, everyone was hungry and
they could see no human way to provide food.
But God provided bread from heaven, and everyone was filled. Jesus wasn’t giving a new miracle, he was
only providing an opportunity for God to do what he had done before.
Faith isn't like jumping off a cliff. It's like jumping off a cliff with a bungee cord strapped to your back after your friend already did it and came back fine.
It's still crazy. It's still extreme. It still requires a lot of cojones. But we know that acts of faith aren't technically crazy because others have had the same experience and came out okay.
Jesus could tell the disciples to feed the multitudes because the multitudes in the wilderness of Exodus were fed. That was enough for him. It wasn't enough for the disciples. They were from Missouri. They had to see it or they wouldn't believe it.
Okay, so Jesus showed them. Now they were ready to do it themselves. Or so it would seem
Frankly, faith asks us to do things that just don't make sense, and no matter how many people we see doing it, it still doesn't make any sense (for some). Forgiving someone who did you wrong is just too much for some people. Selling your possessions and giving too the poor just seems to radical a step. Loving your enemies is seen as insane by most people. We can see people doing this. Jesus did. So did the Amish. So did the saints. So did many people. But we say "They're special. They can get away with it. I'm not the same as them."
The Bible makes it clear. A saint is just a normal person plus faith to do what Jesus did. To be successful like Jesus just requires faith.
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