Matthew 14:13-21
Feeding the Five Thousand
13 Now when Jesus heard this, he withdrew from there in a boat to a deserted place by himself. But when the crowds heard it, they followed him on foot from the towns. 14 When he went ashore, he saw a great crowd; and he had compassion for them and cured their sick. 15 When it was evening, the disciples came to him and said, “This is a deserted place, and the hour is now late; send the crowds away so that they may go into the villages and buy food for themselves.” 16 Jesus said to them, “They need not go away; you give them something to eat.” 17 They replied, “We have nothing here but five loaves and two fish.” 18 And he said, “Bring them here to me.” 19 Then he ordered the crowds to sit down on the grass. Taking the five loaves and the two fish, he looked up to heaven, and blessed and broke the loaves, and gave them to the disciples, and the disciples gave them to the crowds. 20 And all ate and were filled; and they took up what was left over of the broken pieces, twelve baskets full. 21 And those who ate were about five thousand men, besides women and children.
Meditation
With Thanksgiving upon us, I’m busy planning the menu for my family’s feast. I tend to over-do it. I mean, really, who needs to cook a 10-pound turkey for 4 people? I have learned, over the years, to scale it down to two Cornish hens. We all know planning a dinner party or catering a special event, large or small, that the size of the crowd is crucial for preparing the right amount of food. And it is always better to have left-overs than to not have enough. Interestingly, in Matthew’s account of Jesus feeding the five thousand, the number of guests is not indicated until after everyone is fed. It is pretty clear there were a lot of people because the disciples wanted to send the crowd away so they could make it to a Shoney’s or a Cracker Barrel before closing.
“Nope,” Jesus says, “prepare a feast.” The dumbfounded the disciples take stock of their supplies and find only five loaves of bread and two fish. Surely, they believed, this would not be enough for the crowd. With gratitude and a blessing, Jesus makes those slim provisions stretch to not only feed the crowd but also to render left-overs.
So, how did Jesus know that five loaves and two fish would actually be enough? Perhaps Jesus understood that gratitude and blessing produce an attitude of abundance that is more powerful than the human anxiety of scarcity. The crowd witnessed this shift both in his teachings and his hospitality and responded in kind. I think that when we all agree that five loaves and two fish will feed everybody, then enough will be enough. And there will be plenty of left-overs.