Jesus Feeds the 5000

There’s a song we sing from time to time on Sunday mornings called “I Asked the Lord that I Might Grow.” It’s one of the longer songs we sing, and, I admit, it’s probably one that stands out as so utterly different from the modern songs being sung in churches today. It’s strange, not merely in the fact that there’s a line that speaks about “blasting my gourds” - but because the whole song is about how God brings us low, humbles us, makes us feel miserable, makes us experience sorrow, brings us to the end of ourselves - all so that we might truly know his grace.

In other words, it’s a song that helps us remember that God answers our prayers for spiritual growth by humbling us. And he humbles us by helping us see our sins and weaknesses. He answers our prayers in surprising ways. God meets our needs in unexpected ways.

You ask for wisdom, and he puts you through a miscarriage. You ask for patience, and he puts you in an impossible situation at work. You ask to be more holy, and you make a fool of yourself. Things like this happen all the time.

In our text, we see Jesus inviting Jesus into rest, but then that rest gets interrupted by a massive crowd demanding their attention. And what we see is that they don’t get the rest they expected, but they actually get something profoundly greater - that will enable them to enjoy a deeper, fuller, richer rest later on.

Read text. We’ll separate our text into four headings: 1) Jesus gets interrupted, 2) Jesus has compassion, 3) Jesus invites them into the miracle, 4) Jesus demonstrates power.

Let’s start with the interruption: Jesus gets interupted. We looked last week at how Jesus invited his disciples to come away for a while to rest. They had been incredibly busy, were facing exhaustion, and Jesus knows this and wants to give them rest. So they jump on the boat they’ve been using and head out onto the Sea of Galilee.

Verse 33: “Now many saw them going and recognized them, and they ran there on foot from all the towns ang got there ahead of him.” Remember it’s not only Jesus who’s popular; the apostles are becoming well known. And what happened here was that they saw them all get into the boat, and rather than go across the lake, they essentially stay somewhat close to the shore and head north a bit to the region near Bethsaida, but they were close enough to the shore and they had created such a hype that the crowds see them and are following them, on foot. So every town they pass, more people come out. The boat is like a magnet, and the people from the towns are like iron, and as they pass by different crowds, more people are being drawn out. They’re watching from the shoreline while the disciples are in the boat.

Now, at this point we have to answer the age old question: how many people were really there? We say “Jesus Feeds the 5,000” because in vs 44 it says there were 5,000 men. But there are two reasons why the whole crowd isn’t merely 5,000. First, the Greek word there is specifically referring to males. The Greek work isn’t anthropoi, which could refer to a gathering of men and women. It’s the Greek word andros, which is specifically male. The second reason is the clincher: Matthew’s account explicitly says there were 5,000 “besides women and children.” So as they’re going by these towns, thousands of people are coming out. When they finally count, they only count the men (perhaps they’re counting head of households) and they leave out women and children. So if we assume there are also 5,000 women, and for every man and woman a child, we’re getting close to 15,000 people.

And the disciples are out on the lake, they’re getting a bit a rest. The cool breeze and the rock of the waves. And I imagine they look over at Jesus who can’t take his eyes off this massive, bustling, disorganized mass of lost humanity. And the disciples are thinking, “Welp, looks like our retreat is getting cancelled.”

And of course, vs 34, when they port they’re surrounded by people, and Jesus has compassion on them and begins to teach them.

This is why we always do sequential exposition: because the texts always balance each other out. Last week, we looked at how Jesus invites his disciples to rest. We considered why we should rest, and how we should rest, and the nature of true rest. We thought about some applications about what it might mean for us to avoid burnout and develop biblical patterns of hard work and genuine rest.

And isn’t this just like life, that the very text that shows us the need for rest, also shows us that sometimes rest is taken from us? Here we are shown that it is right to plan to rest, while at the same time being prepared for days, weeks, or even seasons, where extended rest is not an option. If you love people, if you commit to care for people - whether it’s a spouse, whether it’s a child, or whether it’s a member of your church - if you choose to love and commit to them, sometimes you will give up rest for the sake of love.

Mother’s know this better than anyone. Last week we had two babies born in our church. Those mothers are going to be exhausted. They need rest. But I also know this, they are not going to say to their crying infant, “Sorry kiddo, I’m on a retreat.”

Love is costly; it interrupts. So here, we balance out last week’s sermon by considering this: valuing biblical rest does not mean we aren’t busy and we never sacrifice. The godliest people I know are busy people; starting with Jesus. Day and night and hardly any relief from the mob. Groups of people trying to get him into trouble. And take Paul, planting churches, writing letters, dogged by false teachers, and when he’s in his jail cell writing 2 Timothy, he’s still asking for books to read so he can keep being productive.

In 36 years of ministry, Martin Luther preached approximately 3,000 sermons; that’s almost 85 a year, about double what I preached in 2020. He had six children. During a year between two of his daughters being born, he preached 200 times (more than every other day). If you think that he neglected his children, consider that on “Sunday afternoons, often after preaching twice, Luther led household devotions, which were virtually another worship service for an hour, including the guests as well as the children. He was engaged in just about every controversy of the day, and one biographer says of him, “All flocked to him, besieging his door hourly, trooped citizens, doctors, princes. Diplomatic enigmas were to be solved, knotty theological points were to be settled, the ethics of social life were to be laid down.”

Now I’m not saying we must all be like Luther. Every person has a different size engine and a different size fuel tank. The Lord doesn’t ask that you drive at Luther’s speed; but that you go along, busy in the Lord’s work, even when it makes you a bit tired. “The world is run by tired men.” I can’t determine what the right ratio for you is. All I can say is this: work really, really hard for the Lord and his people. Use your days well. Use your mornings wisely. Maximize your evenings. And make sure you don’t kill yourself - rest regularly, body and soul, in the Lord.

This is where we see Jesus’ has compassion. There are some celebrities who can hardly walk outside without crowds of cameras following them. Many celebrities loathe the intrusion of the paparazzi into their privacy - and so there are pictures of one sticking their tongue at the camera, another hiding under an umbrella, another celebrities pouring her soda on them.

Look at Jesus' response: He sees this massive crowd following him, they’ve scrambled on foot to follow him, leaving their homes, chasing him into this remote place - this great crowd bustling and clambering for his attention. Jesus doesn’t stick his tongue out. He doesn’t try to hide in the bottom of the boat. And he doesn’t take his wine skin of wine and douse them with it. He sees them and he feels compassion.

The word “compassion” here is used only to describe the heart of Jesus Christ. The word is

“splagchnizomai” which is from the root “splagchnon,” which literally refers to someone’s guts. When Acts describes Judas’ suicide, and says his “bowels gushed out” the word is “splagchnon.” This word “compassion” is referring to that gut-wrenching, deep-in-your-bones emotion felt when you see someone you love in pain. The response of Jesus upon seeing the crowd is not irritation, but the most genuine, pure compassion.

Friends, remember, real quick, that Jesus is the image of the invisible God, the exact representation of his nature. When we see Jesus compassionate, we learn that God is compassionate. A.W. Tozer says, “Mercy is an attribute of God, an infinite and inexhaustible energy within the divine nature which disposes God to be actively compassionate.” Isn’t that incredible news? This is the reason why he always invites sinners to come to him: he is, by nature, bent toward helping the helpless, lifting up the humble, blessing the poor. This is why you, if you’re the chief of sinners, are invited to come to God through Christ. He is merciful, he shows compassion.

Why does he have compassion? He sees this desperate mass of people and thinks: that reminds me of something. These people are like “sheep without a shepherd.” This phrase was used over and over again to refer to the people of Israel when their kings were wicked. They were like sheep without a shepherd. That is, they were lost, they didn’t know right from wrong. They didn’t know up from down. They have no idea why they exist, what they’re doing in the world, how they’re supposed to live.

There is so much comfort here. Some of us feel confused and perplexed and stupid and sinful, and we feel that Jesus must be standing back watching us thinking, “What in the world are you doing? What’s wrong with you? Come on, get with the program?” But here, we see him seeing these people and he’s compassionate. Church, he is compassionate to you.

In fact, there are three ways this compassion is displayed in this event. Matthew describes Jesus as “welcoming the crowds.” So he gets out of the boat and he welcomes them. They come, and he doesn’t push them away, he welcomes them. Luke includes that he’s healing them. The sick and diseased come to him, and Jesus freely heals them.

But third, and this is what is highlighted in our text: end of verse 34 “And he began to teach them many things.” Teaching is an act of compassion. Some people tend to disdain preaching because they feel it doesn’t demonstrate compassion.

So Jesus, in this amazing compassion, begins teaching this massive crowd. Luke mentions he teaches about the kingdom of God. It could be here that he does some variation of the Sermon on the Mount: “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven; blessed are those who mourn for they shall be comforted, blessed are the meek for they shall inherit the earth, blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied.” He’s certainly telling them that God does not accept people on the basis of their own works, but on the basis of his grace. Therefore, to receive grace, humble yourself, confess your sin, repent, and come to God for mercy.

You might be like a sheep without a shepherd. Confused and perplexed by this world. A spiritual wanderer with no home. And you need to hear about what’s true about the world: that there is a God who is compassionate. That he shows mercy to the spiritually lost. That he welcomes all who come to him in repentant, humble faith.

So Jesus is interrupted because his own heart bursts with compassion. He is drawn to these people because they’re so helpless. And he begins to teach them.

Verse 35 “And when it grew late, his disciples came to him and said, ‘This is a desolate place, and the hour is now late. Send them away to go into the surrounding countryside and villages and buy themselves something to eat.”

Now, there’s no evidence they’re upset. In fact, it seems like they’re on board with helping, and perhaps they’re thinking about what’s in the crowd’s best interest. “If you keep teaching them, it’ll start getting dark and they won’t have any food - maybe we break the teaching now, they can go to the nearby villages and get food, maybe they can come back later?”

Here’s our third section: Jesus invites them into the miracle. But Jesus surprises them: “You give them something to eat.” The “you” here is emphatic: “You do it.” I bet there were a lot of confused faces and some incredulity here. The response (John tells us it’s Philip) says, “Shall we go buy two hundred denarii [that’s like a year’s salary] worth of bread and give it to them to eat?” We don’t have the money!

Think about Jesus’ directions for a second. Jesus is telling his disciples to do something they simply do not have the capacity to do. Think of it: “You give them something to eat.” I mean, if you’re them, you’re thinking...Uh, you want me to chop some grass and make them eat it like a cow? You want me to start fishing on our boat? We got nothing, Jesus.”

So he replies, “How many loaves do you have? Go and see.” And they discover they’ve got five loaves and two fish. The loaves weren’t like what you and I call a loaf; these would have been small, flat wafers, like a Ritz cracker.

And then he commands them to sit down in groups on the green grass. The word “commanded” is a strong word, and it’d have to be. One man commanded a crowd of several thousand people to get orderly and organized into groups of hundreds and fifties. At this point the disciples don’t know what’s coming, and I imagine they’re wondering what in the world is he going to do.

Pause and reflect on the fact that Jesus invites his disciples into his miracles. He has just sent them out to preach, cast out demons, and heal - Jesus doing miracles through them. Now, he’s planning on feeding this crowd - but he’s going to use the disciples.

This is exactly what he does in the church. Jesus gives the Holy Spirit who indwells us, and he does his spiritual work through us. Let this be a reminder for us all that the life that Jesus has called us to live and the ministry Jesus has called us into is beyond our natural abilities. We must rely upon supernatural strength for this.

Col 1:29 “For this I toil, struggling with all his energy that he powerfully works within me”

Now: Jesus demonstrates his power. He takes the five loaves and two fish, he looks up to heaven and prays - parallel passages says “having given thanks” - and he broke the loaves and gave them to the disciples to give to the people. And he starts doing the same for the fish.

In the 1800s a school of biblical scholarship arose that essentially tried to read the Bible but denied the supernatural. The kinds of things they came up with to explain away Christ’s miracles are downright silly. They had a particular difficulty with this passage. One scholar said that Jesus had secretly prepared a nearby cave, stuffing it with all the food necessary to feed the crowds, and then, because of his flowy robe, he and his disciples were able to trick the crowd into believing that Jesus was magically producing food.

Another, perhaps more common view, was that some people in the crowd brought food, some didn’t, and after Jesus taught them, they all shared, and the miracle was that everyone became generous with their neighbor. Both of these ideas are utterly foreign to the text.

This was a miracle. Let this sink in: Here, Jesus is demonstrating that he is the Creator. He is creating bread, he is creating fish. Jesus is feeding hungry people by creating food.

There are only two miracles that are recording in all four gospels. This is one of them. The other is the resurrection. That shows you how incredible this was. Perhaps 15,000 hungry mouths, helpless and lost, like sheep without a shepherd, and Jesus, exercising his power as the creator of the universe, feeds them all. Every stomach gets satisfied, with leftovers.

This must have been one of the most amazing things the disciples witnessed. Clearly, it stuck with them - all four gospels record it. Clearly, God wants us to see something about his son, Jesus Christ. God wants us to worship him, trust him, and rest in him. God reveals this not so that we might be merely informed, but transformed.

Let’s go back to where we started. 12 exhausted disciples being invited by Jesus to get away for a rest. And they get a little rest on the boat, but it’s interrupted, mainly because of Jesus’ compassion. Instead of getting a little retreat, they got a massive revelation: And it’s as if God is saying to us, “Do you realize how compassion, how powerful, how generous I am?”

They could have gotten the little retreat, but Jesus gave them something that could fundamentally transform for a lifetime.

Rest is good. Comfort is a joy. Convenience is a blessing. We want quick fixes, immediate results, right-now solutions, problems removed. Jesus is interested in something much more profound. Deep transformation. New ways of thinking. New ways of viewing the world. But in order to bring us into a deeper rest, in order to teach us where true comfort lies, he sometimes limits our experience of it. And he invites us to look to him and find a greater rest and a greater comfort. And he interrupted their rest to show them his compassion, his power, and his generosity, which is a greater foundation for a more permanent comfort.

How will you act today, having seen how compassionate, powerful, and generous our Lord is? At the very least, praise him with all your heart. And then resolve, every day, to devote time and attention to him.