Five Loaves And Two Fishes, Feeding 5000, Why?

Five small barley loaves and two small fish, and 5000 plus hungry mouths to feed! This is nothing for our God who is without limits!

Our text today gives a picture of a man that performs a miracle that is impossible in human eyes, that is until you factor in the man and His Father, in whom nothing is impossible.

In this miracle performed on a grassy mountain slope overlooking The Sea Of Galilee, we see an opportunity to display His awesome power to overcome any and all situations, with no exceptions.

In our scripture today John singles out this particular time and place to present a spiritual truth about Jesus.

Jesus, in the multiplication of the 5 small barley loaves, presents Himself to the people and to the world as The Bread Of Life. So that we know that when we are hungry for life He is the all sustaining bread.

A few weeks ago we read John chapter 4 wherein Jesus also presented Himself as ‘Living water’ to whom we turn when we thirst for life.

If we believe these two simple statements, that in turn are loaded with significance, then our lives change and our expectations of life change also.

This morning I want to focus, not on the miracle of the loaves and fishes itself but on the question that Jesus asks the disciple Philip in verse 5.

‘Where shall we buy bread for these people to eat?’

That’s a reasonable question, or is it? Why does Jesus assume it is His, and the disciples, responsibility to feed 5000 plus men, women and children, who have chosen to follow Him of their own accord?

Surely it is the responsibility of the people in the crowd?

The disciple Philip who has been with Jesus since the beginning, he was the third disciple to be called by Jesus, the day after Andrew and Peter were called, is asked the question and gives, what we would consider to be a perfectly reasonable answer, ‘It would take more than half a year’s wages to buy enough bread for each one to have a bite!’

Some bible translations actually give us a figure for an average half a years wage which is 200 denari or £260 pounds sterling.

Remember that Jesus and His followers live from hand to mouth with just whatever donations they receive and food that people give them.

Remember also that 200 denari would only be sufficient for the crowd to have one bite of food for each person, at least according to Philip’s guesstimation!

But Philips answer is the earthly answer, not the godly answer. There is no spirit in the earthly answer and without The Holy Spirit there is no power.

Philip forgets that he is in the presence of a man who has, by now, worked many miracles, and who has proven Himself to be Godly.

Perhaps Philip hasn’t worked out who Jesus is yet.

Perhaps, when Jesus told the woman at the well that He was The Messiah, Philip was away or wasn’t listening.

Maybe Philip didn’t understand the conversations Jesus had in Jerusalem with the Jewish Leaders back in John 5:18-23, or maybe he wasn’t listening then either.

John 6:6 tells us why Jesus asked Philip the question, ‘He asked this only to test him, for he already had in mind what he was going to do.’

And there it is, Jesus already had in mind what He was going to do!

This is all planned in advance by God The Father, the right people at the right time in the right place, with the author of Johns Gospel on hand to make a written record for posterity, all as part of Gods Divine, amazing masters master plan.

But! There is always a ‘but’ in my sermons, but something doesn’t add up here. 5 Loaves and 2 fishes are not the bread of life that Jesus is referring to later in John 6:35 when He declared, ‘I am the bread of life. Whoever comes to me will never go hungry, and whoever believes in me will never be thirsty’, which is spiritual food and drink rather than physical food and drink.

So, the right people at the right time in the right place, with the author of Johns Gospel on hand to make a written record for posterity, being all as part of Gods Divine, amazing masters master plan, can be changed to the right person, at the right time, in the right place being part of God’s amazing masters master plan, and that right person in the right place at the right time is Philip. It’s Philip!

In my mind the whole point of this amazing miracle of feeding 5000 plus men women and children on a grassy mountainside, that day, above the sea of Galilee, was for Philip.