Miracles of Nature — Five Thousand Fed
Matthew 14:13-21; Mark 6:30-44; Luke 9:10-17; John 6:1-14
1. Do you prefer to socialize at large parties, have a dinner for four, or spend a quiet evening with a friend? Why?
2. If you fed 5,000 people at a picnic, what would you serve?
3. What miracle is recorded in all 4 gospels?
4. Remember how the disciples were sort of on “vacation” at this point.
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Jesus Feeds Five Thousand
Mark 6 30 The apostles returned to Jesus from their ministry tour and told him all they had done and taught. 31 Then Jesus said, “Let’s go off by ourselves to a quiet place and rest awhile.” He said this because there were so many people coming and going that Jesus and his apostles didn’t even have time to eat.
32 So they left by boat for a quiet place, where they could be alone. 33 But many people recognized them and saw them leaving, and people from many towns ran ahead along the shore and got there ahead of them. 34 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. So he began teaching them many things.
35 Late in the afternoon his disciples came to him and said, “This is a remote place, and it’s already getting late. 36 Send the crowds away so they can go to the nearby farms and villages and buy something to eat.”
37 But Jesus said, “You feed them.”
“With what?” they asked. “We’d have to work for months to earn enough money[g] to buy food for all these people!”
38 “How much bread do you have?” he asked. “Go and find out.”
They came back and reported, “We have five loaves of bread and two fish.”
39 Then Jesus told the disciples to have the people sit down in groups on the green grass. 40 So they sat down in groups of fifty or a hundred.
41 Jesus took the five loaves and two fish, looked up toward heaven, and blessed them. Then, breaking the loaves into pieces, he kept giving the bread to the disciples so they could distribute it to the people. He also divided the fish for everyone to share. 42 They all ate as much as they wanted, 43 and afterward, the disciples picked up twelve baskets of leftover bread and fish. 44 A total of 5,000 men and their families were fed from those loaves!
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After the people saw the miraculous sign that Jesus did, they began to say, “Surely this is the Prophet who is to come into the world.”
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Question of Discovery, Seeking God’s Message Then and Now
1. Why did Jesus withdraw and take the disciples away?
2. Where did Jesus take his disciples? (Mark 6:32)
3. This was near what city? (Luke 9:10)
4. Describe how the disciples might have felt?
5. What did the people do? (Mark 6:33)
6. Why did the multitudes follow? (John 6:2)
7. Jesus compared the people who followed him to what? (Mark 6:34)
8. When evening came, the disciples wanted Jesus to do what? (Mark 6:35-36)
9. How did the disciples and Jesus differ in the way they viewed the problem?
10. What did Jesus say to Philip and why? (John 6:5-6)
11. What was Philip's answer? (John 6:7)
12. What did Andrew tell Jesus? (John 6:8-9)
13. What did Jesus command the disciples? (Mark 6:39-40)
14. What did Jesus do before He gave the food to the disciples to distribute to the people? (Mark 6:41)
15. How man baskets of fragments did the disciples gather when the people were filled? (Mark 6:42-43)
16. What would you feel as a disciple when you gathered the leftovers? What was the lesson to be learned?
17. What new power do the disciples discover in Jesus?
18. How man people were there? (Matthew 14:21)
19. What did those who saw the miracle say? (John 6:14)
20. What is the lesson here?
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Questions for Personal Reflection
1. If you went to a solitary place with Jesus, what would you talk about?
2. From what do you need a rest: Work hassles? Family? Church activities? Community activities? School deadlines?
3. How has Jesus fed you when you've been spiritually hungry lately?
4. How would you cope if God gave you a new challenge instead?
5. When has God stretched your limited resources (physically or emotionally) far beyond what you could have imagined?
6. In what way do you need to trust him to do so now?
7. When you sense that hunger, do you come searching for him, or do you usually try to fill up on something else first?
8. How are you like Philip and Andrew -- failing to remember something about Jesus when you face a difficult situation?
9. What insights about Jesus will you remember from the story?
10. How have you seen Jesus stretch your resources beyond what you could imagine?
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