About the feeding of the 5000 in MARK 6:
Verses 30-34 (The disciples have just reunited with Jesus after their first ministry tour without Him. They’ve also just shared the news of John the Baptists death with Jesus. They’re sad, tired, hungry and full of stories.)
Q: At what point did Jesus (w/ the disciples) draw the line between doing ministry and needing rest?
Q: How did the disciples feel about taking a detour from their ‘Retreat’ to do more ministry? (keep in mind they had just returned from doing an entire ministry tour apart from Jesus)
Verses 35-38 (The disciples appear so ‘done’ with the crowd at this point and they’re ready to get back to their retreat. To think they only came up with 5 loaves & 2 fish in a crowd of 5000 people makes me wonder how hard they really looked. They must’ve thought, ‘If we don’t find enough food for the whole crowd, maybe Jesus will just tell them to go home.’)
Q: What made feeding the bellies of 5000 people more important to Jesus than spending much needed time with His disciples?
Q: Why do you think Jesus picked this time of all times (when the disciples were tired from ministry) to teach the disciples a lesson?
Q: If it was a creative miracle, couldn’t Jesus have just created bread from thin air? Why did Jesus tell the disciples to go look for bread?
Q: Why did Jesus have the disciples separate the crowd into groups?
Q: Would’nt it have saved time if Jesus, after blessing and breaking the bread, had just made it appear in the hands of the crowd? Why did He have the disciples hand it to the people?
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August 21, 2009 at 6:45 pm
Sally Miller
Vs 30-34
Looks like Jesus & the disciples agreed that they were tired from ministry & needed to get away from the many people who were wanting & needing their attention. They did go away by themselves in a boat, but the people found them & were waiting for them when they got to their destination for rest. The turning point was when “Jesus saw the huge crowd as he stepped from the boat, and he had compassion on them because they were like sheep without a shepherd.” At that point, his nature of compassion became greater than his need to rest, and he began to teach them many things. The word compassion means “a feeling of deep sympathy and sorrow for another who is stricken by misfortune, accompanied by a strong desire to alleviate the suffering.” So it’s based in emotion, but is a catalyst for action to do something about it. There’s the difference between pity and compassion.
Vs 35-38
Jesus, as the teacher, knew that there’s no better way to learn how to do something new than to do it in a real situation. He may have talked to them about meeting this kind of need for people before, but they were given the opportunity to demonstrate that they had learned the thing he had taught them, like in a lab. If he had done the multiplication himself, they would have become dependent on him to do the miracle while they watched & marveled at it. By telling them to do it, they had to put their hands to it and see the miracle happen through them. Oh, my! What a lesson! It’s like the teaching/learning process for children of any age (even adults). The teacher teaches it while doing it while the student watches. Then he lets the student do it while the teacher watches. Then the student does it himself, and he’s learned it. Great model.
Vs 39-44
The obvious reason for dividing them into groups must be that it was easier & more orderly for the disciples to manage that way. Each disciple would have been responsible for several groups, but each would have had to take responsibility for their assignment & not be haphazard in the throng, or wait for somebody else to go first. It would have made it easier to make sure that everybody in the crowd got some food.
August 22, 2009 at 3:21 am
Matthew
Sally, you rock!
September 4, 2009 at 3:47 am
Lisa
Okay here goes nothing. After a comment like that this better be good.
Because of the compassion Jesus had for the people and the knowlege of his fate by doing this one more little thing was his way to teach the deciples how to be good shepards.
That really was my answer to the first question before I read Sally’s comment. And it was the only one I am willing to comment on at this point.