Jesus starts this passage with a move that is very familiar to parents of toddlers. A lot has happened, and he really wants a moment to himself. The first verse emphasizes it three separate ways. Jesus withdrew. to a deserted place. By himself. (repeat) Jesus withdrew. to a deserted place. By himself. He is really looking for some alone time. He has been teaching and healing, and he is going through a lot. He had just found out that John the Baptist was killed, and he is grieving.
So Jesus is hiding out just like a toddler parent who needs a breather. Sneaking away hoping for a moment of quiet. He isn’t hiding in a bathroom, though, he went all out. He took a boat.
And when a parent of a toddler has tiptoed to another room hoping for a moment alone, what happens next? Who immediately finds them? The toddler. It is like clockwork. The parent slips away for a moment, the toddler finds them, and needs something. Immediately.
Jesus, even though he took a whole boat to get away by himself, was in the same situation. The crowds heard that he had left and went on foot to follow him. So that when the boat came ashore, the crowds were waiting.
But in all seriousness, even though Jesus really wanted that moment alone to grieve, when he looks out at the crowd, he has compassion for them. He sees that they are grieving too. He doesn’t turn the boat away. This is what makes God the perfect parent. He may not have had as much alone time as he was hoping—just the time it took for his boat to travel—but when he sees his children, when he sees the crowd, he has compassion. He cures their sick. He serves them, cares for them, loves them. He is with them in their grief even as he is grieving himself. Jesus hears our cries, and he does not turn away.
And Jesus stays with them, for a whole day into the evening.
At this point, one of the disciples was very practical. I love the disciples for this. It was dinner time, they remind Jesus, “so we should wrap and let folks go to the villages to buy food and eat.” This is very considerate-they are trying to take care of the crowds by letting them disperse. Let’s take a dinner break and resume tomorrow.
But Jesus had an even better way to provide. Rather than leaving them to scatter and scrounge for food, Jesus wanted to feed them himself. So he tells the disciples to give them something to eat. They look at what they have, and it is just five loaves and two fish. For context, this is likely not even enough for Jesus and the 12 disciples to have eaten a full meal. How can it possibly feed this huge crowd?
And this crowd is massive. 5,000 men plus unnumbered women and children. This is nearly double the size of the surrounding villages in the Galilean countryside. Scholars estimate that the cost for a basic meal for that many people would be the equivalent of more than 200 days of work. So the scale of the problem is vast and the resources are few. So few in fact, that it is laughable.
How often does it feel like the problem is vast but the resources are few? I have worked in nonprofits my whole career, and that is the constant state of being of the nonprofit field. Trying to solve big problems like poverty, disease, or injustice, on shoestring budgets.
Or in your personal life, troubles and challenges can pile up before us, and there may be times that you feel like the resources you have to meet the challenge are few. Too little money. Too little time.
But God can make a little into a lot and a lot into a little.
When you give what you have and offer it to God and to others, it is more than enough. As I was reflecting on the passage, I was struck by the fact that Jesus took the disciples dinner at all. After all, God could have provided the whole feast out of the sky, just like God provided the Israelites with manna in the wilderness. But Jesus starts the miracle with the gift the disciples gave from their own provisions. With their willingness to share what they have.
Because part of the lesson here is that when we are open in sharing what we have, God multiplies the gift. When we offer what we have, it’s like a matching gift in donation campaigns. You know what I’m talking about--If you give today, your gift will be matched dollar for dollar. So a gift of $10 ends up yielding $20 for the cause. Except that God’s matching gift is exponential. When we open what we have to God and to others instead of clinging on to it, God turns scarcity into abundance.
Don’t miss the matching gift opportunity that God offers to us every day. Give from what you have. Be generous with your neighbors and those who are in need. Even when it seems like it couldn’t possibly make a difference, God multiplies the impact of whatever we can give.
So the disciples hand over their meager dinner and Jesus tells the crowd to sit, using the word for reclining at a banquet table. He asks the crowd to sit as if awaiting a feast in this empty field in a deserted place.
Jesus blesses the bread and breaks it, and gives it to the disciples, who then distribute it to the crowds. The crowds came hungry, tired and grieving. They heard of John the Baptist’s death and immediately got up and walked to find comfort, to find hope, to find Jesus. They didn’t have time or presence of mind to pack provisions. But Jesus provides. He heals them. Jesus is present with them in their grief, and feeds them body and soul.
If you are in a place like the people in the crowds—depleted and weary—Jesus sees you, hears you, and has compassion on you. Jesus will provide for you even if it seems impossible. Even if the resources are few and the obstacles are many. God is a God who cannot be constrained. Who can make a way out of no way, and will go to the ends of the earth, even to the cross for you.
Jesus invites you to take a seat and lounge as if you are at a banquet, even if all you see when you look around is a desolate place and empty plates. Jesus will provide the feast.
The miracle of abundance continues and after all of the crowd has eaten their fill, the disciples come back together, and the leftovers fill 12 baskets. They end up with more food than they started with, even though 5,000 people were fed in between. That’s what I call God math. It isn’t 2+2=4, it’s 5 loaves plus God feeds thousands with more leftover than what we had when we started. It doesn’t add up when you look at it only from the earthly perspective. When you see only the 5 loaves and the 5000 hungry people. That math ain’t mathin. But the equation works because God is infinite. God is all powerful, and all loving. God is the infinite multiplier in the equation.
“God math” is when God promises one elderly, childless couple, that they will have descendants will be as numerous as the stars in the night sky. (Genesis 15)
“God math” is when an army of 3,000 chariots is assembled against your meager 600 foot soldiers, but God is on your side and brings you to victory. (1 Samuel 13)
“God math” is when Elisha visits the widow who has nothing left to her name except a small jar of olive oil, and Elisha keeps pouring those drops of olive oil to fill every jar in the neighborhood, and it never run out. (2 Kings 4)
“God math” is when Jesus sacrifices himself on the cross, one sacrifice to redeem all of us, one full, perfect, sufficient sacrifice for the sins of the whole world.
That’s what this story is really about. The reason it resonates with us millennia later. It isn’t just that a group of people ate dinner when it didn’t look like there would be enough fish. It was that Jesus can take a little and make a lot. Jesus took his body and broke it, and even though it seems impossible, it was enough. More than enough, to feed all of us with more leftover.
Let us pray:
Heavenly Father, Thank you that you see us when we are weary, hungry, and grieving, and you have compassion on us. May we be like the disciples in offering up what we have even when it seems like it couldn’t possibly be enough. Thank you that your math is one of abundance and not of scarcity. And may we always remember that Jesus’ sacrifice once and for all was enough to cover all of our sins and bring us to everlasting life with him. Amen.