John 6:1-21

Feeding the 5000/Walking on Water

John 6 combined with John 5 are probably the greatest teaching on Who Jesus Christ is and why Peter made the confession that he made. Peter makes that confession here in chapter 6. I consider John 6 one of the greatest chapters in the whole Word of God. Chapter 5 and now chapter 6 are the epitome of John 20:31 as is the whole book of John...... “But these are written, that ye might believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God; and that believing ye might have life through His Name.”

This miracle is the only one accounted for by all four Gospels. It was the most extensive miracle He ever did. I will expound on that in a few......

“After these things....” we have moved now either 6 months or 1 year from chapter 5. John 5:1 “After these things there was a feast of the Jews; and Jesus went up to Jerusalem.”

Most assume that the feast in chapter 5 was the passover, if so John 6:4 tells us that the passover was approaching. “And the passover, a feast of the Jews, was at nigh.”

That being the case it would be a full year from John 5, however if the feast in John 5 was the feast of tabernacles (booths) it could of been 6 months.

No one is sure but it is interesting, we will discuss the feast of the tabernacles in chapter 7, it is very interesting.

Sea of Galilee (sea of Tiberius).....John wrote this in AD 90, at that time the sea was widely known as the sea of Tiberius.

It was named such because of a city west of the sea of Galilee that was named after the 2nd emperor of Rome, Tiberius Caesar.

“Great multitude followed Jesus.....” not because of their belief in Him, but they were curious and possibly desired more....

People with earthly interest, temporal interest, personal well-being, national well-being. They want what unregenerate people all want. And Jesus is riding this tsunami of popularity and they’re all there.

However, despite their reasons for following Him, Jesus still had compassion on them.

Jesus sat down on the mountain with His disciples.....now this was not a mountain like we would think, more like a big hill.

Note, as I said in verse 4 the Passover feast was approaching.

Verse 5-6 is very interesting, Jesus asks Philip “where can we buy bread....?” He asked Philip that to test him.

This is the introduction of Jesus articulating an impossible situation.  He wants to verbalize an impossible situation.  He wants to make it clear for this narrative for all time that this was an impossible situation.  There were no resources.  This is a desolate place, there’s nowhere to go to buy bread for this many people. That’s absolutely not possible.

Also, it was test for the disciples.......he would have passed the test if he had put his trust in the power which he had seen displayed day after day, after day, after day, after day.  He could have said, “Surely, You can do all these other things, You can make lunch or dinner for everybody.”

True to our form, the weakness of man shows up. Jesus knew exactly what He was going to do, He wanted to see if the disciples trusted in Who He said He was.

They were not going to get food from anywhere, it was impossible and Jesus desiring to feed them would of been a sign that He was going to take care of it.

Philip’s answer was almost sarcastic.......200 pennyworth or denarii, that was on the average 8 months wages. That was a lot of money and even if they had that money it would be enough to feed all of these folks.

There are some that say the Philip was talking about what they had in the treasury, not sure, regardless it wasn’t enough to feed this multitude.

Andrew found a boy and he had 5 barley loaves....some say this would be like a cracker, not sure, but this kind of loaf was common amongst the poorer families.

The boy also had 2 fish, which was probably pickled. That would be a typical lunch for a travel or work day.

This lunch, obviously wasn’t enough for the multitude.

So, Jesus starts at doing what He was going to do all along. Make the men sit down.....they sat down in what could only be described as in a grassy meadow or valley, such as the picture you saw.

Beautiful scene!

According to the Mark and Luke, Jesus wanted them to sit down in companies, according to rank.

Basically, Jesus told them to sit that way so there would be aisles in between them.

There were some probably there that were more noble than some (mayors, city councils) and they sat down in an orderly fashion.

5000 men........Matthew 14:21 “And they that did eat were about five thousand men, not including women and children.”

There are different estimates of the crowd, some say 15,000, some say 25,000. Either way, a lot of folks to feed.

Jesus blessed the 5 loaves and 2 fish and began to distribute that to the disciples and they served the people..........at the last of the verse it says “as much as they would” meaning “as much as they wanted”.

Some say the normal serving size in those days was about a half a pound, so somewhere along there. that is a lot of food.

Jesus was just creating the fish and loaves! Other than raising someone from the dead, to feed this many people by creating fish and loaves of bread, would have been the most powerful miracle ever done by Jesus and He did it twice. Matthew 15 Jesus feeds 4000.

There was no fanfare, no lightning, nor thunder, no words but a word of thanks to the Father!

It was a complete full meal, also it was a precise meal. They had how many baskets left over?

Enough for the disciples and the boys lunch was preserved.

How in the world could they ever exhibit a lack of faith!!!

What happens next? The multitude, those men from what they had just experienced they call Jesus the “Prophet”

Deuteronomy 18:15-19........This is what they were referring to.....this was a prophecy by Moses of Jesus the Messiah, but it was a wrong view of the Messiah.

Notice in verse 15, they wanted to take Jesus by force to be their king, but Jesus left them and went into a mountain by Himself.

One writer wrote that they wanted to make Jesus King because under His rule (according to the miracles) would be the ultimate “welfare state”.

Jesus isn’t willing to be a temporal provider.  He’s not willing to do that.  It’s astonishing to think about it, if He wanted to be Messiah, this would have been His moment if He was just a man with ambition.  But He would not allow them to push Him to become the kind of King that they wanted. And that’s the way it is today.  The Jesus of the prosperity preachers is the false Jesus because the true Jesus isn’t there.  He’s left.  He’s left.  He will not be treated in that way.  He withdrew into a mountain alone.

This was a staggering opportunity for them to affirm that He is the Son of God, that He is the prophet.  And for them to say, “Teach us, teach us, what is the truth from God.”  And He will do that.  He will do that later in the chapter, He will give that great discourse on Himself as the bread of life, drawing off that experience in the meal.  He will talk about eternal riches, heaven, salvation, and they will reject it.  They will reject it.

Jesus does not acquiesce to whims and fancies.  He comes to no man on that man’s terms.  People can’t manipulate Him for their own selfish ends, He doesn’t promise unregenerate people what unregenerate people want.  Jesus will not be a quick fix for felt needs.  He will not be the one who just gives you temporal satisfaction. And if you market Him that way, you’re on your own because He’s not there.

Check out what I read about a study that was done from a scientist in this preacher’s church:

“I want to thank Kevin Stolp(?) who is science engineering and who got together with a professor of engineering, Ph.D. at Dort(?) College and came up with a very interesting insight to this.

How much power would it take to create that kind of food?  Let’s assume a half a pound for everybody because they ate as much as they wanted and it was the best thing they had ever eaten, so they probably ate a half a pound. That’s pretty reasonable.  So if you were going to create a half a pound of food for twenty to twenty-five thousand people, how much energy would it take to turn that into mass, right?  E=MC squared, energy is mass times the speed of light square.  That’s Einstein’s famous equation.  So how much would it take?

So they did a scientific study. The formula E=MC squared, energy equals mass times the speed of light squared, you’re turning energy into  mass, how much energy would it take to create this much mass?  The formula works out this way, all the electrical power on earth running at a hundred percent output, a hundred percent of the time for four years.  That’s how much energy it would take to create that meal.

You think that’s a lot of energy?  That’s a lot of energy.  Listen to this, this is nothing for Jesus.  Try this, the sun and He created the sun, without Him was not anything made that was made, right?  The sun consumes approximately six hundred million tons of matter per second, generating enough energy in one second to supply all the U.S. current energy needs for thirteen billion years in one second.  That’s some power.

I mean, they didn’t know the science of that and you probably didn’t know it either, but this is beyond comprehension compared to what He has the power to do in just one star, the sun…staggering.”