Thoughts for the Day

In those days when there was again a great crowd without anything to eat, Jesus called his disciples and said to them, ‘I have compassion for the crowd, because they have been with me now for three days and have nothing to eat. If I send them away hungry to their homes, they will faint on the way—and some of them have come from a great distance.’ His disciples replied, ‘How can one feed these people with bread here in the desert?’ He asked them, ‘How many loaves do you have?’ They said, ‘Seven.’ Then he ordered the crowd to sit down on the ground; and he took the seven loaves, and after giving thanks he broke them and gave them to his disciples to distribute; and they distributed them to the crowd. They had also a few small fish; and after blessing them, he ordered that these too should be distributed. They ate and were filled; and they took up the broken pieces left over, seven baskets full. Now there were about four thousand people. And he sent them away.

(Lectionary, New Revised Standard Version

Thoughts

Mark's Gospel records two different accounts of feeding a large number of people, the first of 5,000 people (Mark 6.34-44) and the second 4,000 people, as in fact does Matthew's Gospel. They are not just duplicates of each other, and we might wonder why both record two accounts. The answer to this is where the event is held. The feeding of the 5,000 takes place near Bethsaida, north-east of the Sea of Galilee. The feeding of the 4,000 though is in the Gentile country of the Decapolis and because of this is important, as we saw yesterday with the healing of the deaf man.

In both miracles, numbers are symbolically important:

Feeding of the 5,000 - 12 baskets of food left over = stand for 12 tribes of Israel, and 12 disciples.
Feeding of the 4,000 - 7 baskets of food left over = 7 is number of completeness for Jews and Gentiles, and of the days of Creation.

Both miracles show God's love for His people, both Jew and Gentile, and will lead on to Jesus' words "I am the Bread of Life" (John 6.35).

Lord Jesus Christ,
As you taught the people
by the sea of Galilee,
both Jew and Gentile,
may we continue to learn more
about You and the Father,
so that we grow in faith,
and help to nurture others.
We ask this through
the power of the Spirit,
Amen.