The section of Scripture that we will study in for this study in the Gospel of Luke is one of 4 accounts that we have concerning what happens here. In fact we know that all 4 Gospels have this event recorded for us with very little differences in them. This is the only miracle outside of the resurrection of our Lord that is recorded in all 4 Gospels. This does not make it more important than other miracles but it solidifies the truth of this event. None of the writers of the 4 Gospels were getting their information based off of the others writings. Matthew would have been the first to write somewhere between 10 to 15 years before Luke. Matthew of course would have been a first hand eye witness to this event and places this in his gospel writing. Luke may have accumulated data from Matthew’s Gospel because it would have been circulating by the time he wrote the Gospel of Luke but more than likely he gathered information from Matthew personally or the other disciples that he would have came in contact with as he traveled with Paul.
We know that Mark got a lot of his information from Peter who would have been a first hand eye witness to this event as well. Some skeptics suggest that they all copied each other but that was not some easy task for 1st century people. Unless there was a reason for you to have a copy of one of these writings then most likely they did not have these to copy from. John of course would be the last of the 4 Gospels but again he too was a first hand eye witness to this miraculous event. What we will see in this study will show not a copy of these events but a consistency in the story along with details in some that others do not have. Let’s look at this as we look at our first point.
1.The LOCATION of the feeding of the 5000.
Look with me at Luke 9:12 Now the day was ending, and the twelve came and said to Him, “Send the crowd away, that they may go into the surrounding villages and countryside and obtain lodging and find provisions, for here we are in a desolate place.”
Now we do not have much information from this verse alone but if we look back at Luke 9:10b we see that He slipped away by Himself to a city called Bethsaida.
I want to look at the purpose of why He goes to Bethsaida because I believe it is important in looking at where Jesus is and why He is there. To do this we need to look at Matthew 14:13a that says Now when Jesus heard about John, He withdrew from there in a boat to a desolate place by Himself.
In our last study we had determined that John the Baptist had been beheaded somewhere around the time of what we studied at the beginning of Luke 9. I believe that Matthew definitely gives to us a detailed timeline of these events. Because of the news of things not spreading as fast as it does in our time, the execution of John could have still been days or even weeks earlier. In Matthew we see that he says Jesus went to a desolate place by Himself but Mark and Luke specifically say that the disciples were with Him. I think we can conclude that the disciples went with Jesus across the Sea of Galilee but then Jesus went alone originally to a desolate place as He often did.
During this time of His departure the crowds had traveled to meet Him on the shore. The crowds went ahead of Him walking along the shore to meet Him when He stepped off of the boat. The crowds intentions were not always pure or correct concerning their desire to be near Jesus. In fact John 6:2 says Now a large crowd was following Him, because they were seeing the signs which He was doing on those who were sick.
They were following Jesus superficially and this would be exposed very soon in the Gospel of John. Here though I believe we see the crowd meet Him as He gets off of the boat, Jesus teaches the crowd(Mark 6:34), Jesus heals the sick (Matthew 14:14), Jesus then slips away into a desolate place alone, then later the disciples join Him on the mountain(John 6:3).
Of course the crowd is on the trail to find Jesus and to get more from Him. I want to point out that Jesus does not turn these people away. He sets off to go away alone because of hearing the news of John’s death to only find these people waiting for Him in the place He was going. Both Matthew and Mark point out Jesus’ compassion for the people as He teaches the people that are like sheep without a shepherd(Mark 6:34) and also because of the people that were sick in the crowd(Matthew 14:14).
Jesus is motivated to do the work that He came to do by first doing God’s will but also because of the compassion that He has for people. Jesus’ deity is seen in His power to heal and to teach but His humanity shows up in His compassion for the people that He is around. So we conclude that Jesus and His disciples have gone into a desolate place in or around Bethsaida. The crowds spot them and start to move towards them as we see John 6:4-5 that gives us even more detail of the timing of this event, it says Now the Passover, the feast of the Jews, was near. 5 Therefore Jesus, lifting up His eyes and seeing that a large crowd was coming to Him, *said to Philip, “Where should we buy bread, so that these people may eat?”
The Passover is sometime in the spring and will give us the timeframe that this a year away from Jesus’ death on the cross. Jesus is approaching the time when He will go towards Jerusalem to die and that gives us an idea of the timing and the location of this event. This now moves us to look at this miraculous event in our next point.
2.The MIRACLE of the feeding of the 5000.
Look with me at Luke 9:13-17 But He said to them, “You give them something to eat!” And they said, “We have no more than five loaves and two fish, unless perhaps we go and buy food for all these people.” 14 (For there were about five thousand men.) And He said to His disciples, “Have them sit down in groups of about fifty each.” 15 And they did so, and had them all sit down. 16 Then He took the five loaves and the two fish, and looking up to heaven, He blessed them. And He broke them and kept giving them to the disciples to set before the crowd. 17 And they all ate and were satisfied; and the broken pieces which they had left over were picked up, twelve baskets full.
There is simply no explanation for what happens in the feeding of the 5000 other than a creative miracle by our Lord. In no way do we see that everyone got full off of just two fish and five loaves of bread. Could have Jesus supernaturally made everyone feel full off of some little amount or nothing at all? Of course but never do we see that in this story. What do we see? We see that Jesus does this to teach the disciples something here. John 6:5-6 says Therefore Jesus, lifting up His eyes and seeing that a large crowd was coming to Him, *said to Philip, “Where should we buy bread, so that these people may eat?” 6 And this He was saying to test him, for He Himself knew what He was going to do.
As the crowd approaches Jesus and His disciples, He asks Philip a question of what would it take to feed such a large crowd? Philip does answer Him but we also see back in Luke 9:12 that the disciples were saying to Jesus, “Send the crowd away, that they may go into the surrounding villages and countryside and obtain lodging and find provisions, for here we are in a desolate place.”
So it appears that Jesus asks this question and the others were telling Jesus just to send the crowd away. The test seems to be directly toward Philip but I believe that we see this being a lesson for them all as we will see. I believe as the crowd is approaching them, Jesus questions how they could feed this crowd which prompts them to stress how Jesus just needs to send them away. We then see this in Luke 9:13 But He said to them, “You give them something to eat!” And they said, “We have no more than five loaves and two fish, unless perhaps we go and buy food for all these people.”
At this point I believe Jesus turns to Philip that may have been the person that would be good at calculating things like this and asks how much it would cost to feed this crowd? Philip responds by saying in John 6:7 “Two hundred denarii worth of bread is not sufficient for them, for everyone to receive a little.”
What we notice is that they did not have this type of money to feed this crowd and this brought on a dilemma. They did not have the money to feed the crowd but Jesus has told them to feed them. They were stuck in what to do. In John 6:8-9 we see One of His disciples, Andrew, Simon Peter’s brother, *said to Him, 9 “There is a boy here who has five barley loaves and two fish, but what are these for so many people?”
Now we know that this amount of food is nowhere near enough for such a big crowd. In fact Luke 9:14a says (For there were about five thousand men.). This clearly shows us that there could have been easily 10,000 plus people in this location so these two fish and 5 loaves that a boy had is nothing to feed such a large crowd. Jesus is about to take those 5 loaves and 2 fish as an example of the substance that they will eat but then create enough food for this huge crowd to eat.
The crowd sits down in groups of fifty and hundred, Jesus blesses the food and breaks the food to give to the disciples to distribute to the crowd. Luke 9:16b says And He broke them and kept giving them to the disciples to set before the crowd.
Look at what John’s account says in John 6:11Jesus then took the loaves, and having given thanks, He distributed them to those who were seated; likewise also of the fish, as much as they wanted.
The people ate as much as they wanted. It was not that Jesus supernaturally filled them up but that He created food enough to provide for the crowd to eat as much as they wanted. This was the ultimate buffet that was not prepared beforehand but was provided divinely by our Lord. This reminds me of the story we find in 1 Kings 17:1-16 where God provides for the widow of Zarephath when she listened to Elijah’s words from God. 1 Kings 17:14 says For thus says Yahweh, the God of Israel, ‘The bowl of flour shall not be exhausted, nor shall the jar of oil be empty, until the day that Yahweh sends rain on the face of the earth.’”
Then the fulfillment of this comes along in 1 Kings 17:15-16 that says So she went and did according to the word of Elijah, and she and he and her household ate for many days. 16 The bowl of flour was not exhausted nor did the jar of oil become empty, according to the word of Yahweh which He spoke by the hand of Elijah.
The connection I am trying to make is that God provides even at times when we do not have the resources to provide for ourselves. This does not mean we become poor stewards of our resources or money thinking God will provide but rather that we can trust God in spite of whatever circumstances we find ourselves in. This was the lesson for the disciples that even though they had no solution or provision for what was happening, that God would provide. This brings to them more proof of Jesus being the incarnate Son of God.
In our last verse we see that even those that were only there for superficial reasons would also be provided for. God sovereignly provides what we call common grace to all people both Christian and non-Christian alike. Luke 9:17 says And they all ate and were satisfied; and the broken pieces which they had left over were picked up, twelve baskets full.
There was enough to fill all the people and leftovers. These twelve baskets would show the twelve disciples that He will provide for them even when the impossible was before them. This is not to show some type of prosperity type of Gospel but to show God’s creative power through our Lord Jesus and to show His provision to sustain us even when we can not see the solution ourselves. We need to trust Him in the good times and in the bad times. God will provide and God will sustain us to the end.
Disciple's Direction 