After this Jesus went away to the other side of the Sea of Galilee, which is the Sea of Tiberias. And a large crowd was following him, because they saw the signs that he was doing on the sick. Jesus went up on the mountain, and there he sat down with his disciples. Now the Passover, the feast of the Jews, was at hand. Lifting up his eyes, then, and seeing that a large crowd was coming toward him, Jesus said to Philip, “Where are we to buy bread, so that these people may eat?” He said this to test him, for he himself knew what he would do. Philip answered him, “Two hundred denarii would not buy enough bread for each of them to get a little.” One of his disciples, Andrew, Simon Peter’s brother, said to him, “There is a boy here who has five barley loaves and two fish, but what are they for so many?” Jesus said, “Have the people sit down.” Now there was much grass in the place. So the men sat down, about five thousand in number. Jesus then took the loaves, and when he had given thanks, he distributed them to those who were seated. So also the fish, as much as they wanted. And when they had eaten their fill, he told his disciples, “Gather up the leftover fragments, that nothing may be lost.” So they gathered them up and filled twelve baskets with fragments from the five barley loaves left by those who had eaten. When the people saw the sign that he had done, they said, “This is indeed the Prophet who is to come into the world!”
Annie Vallotton drawings _Good news bible
I listened to John MacArthur's latest sermon, True and False Disciples, which is an expounding on part of the above verses (and also part this sermon, from Nov 24th).He said that the feeding the multitudes is an incredible, incredible miracle. 5,000 men were there which means women were there and children, heightening the tally to about 20,000 to 2,000 people on the hillside. Jesus brought food out of thin air, created it on the spot. It was not cursed b the ground nor by man. It was heavenly food, literally, which is probably the reason for the little detail they got as much food as they anted. It was probably so good they ate and ate until they were filled to busting.
It was incredible for another reason- every person participated in it. They didn't just see it, or hear about it but took part in the miracle by eating of the food.
Here is a little scientific fact. In the sermon, Dr MacArthur quoted a scientist (sorry, I didn't catch the name even though I listened several times, transcript will be up soon.) The science question is, if 20,000-25,000 people each ate half a pound of food, how much energy would it take to convert that into mass?
It's Einstein's famous equation, E = mc2.
Answer: It'd take all the electrical power on earth working at 100% output, 100% of the time, for 4 years, to create the energy to create that meal.
Jesus did it without breaking a sweat. Do you see why it's such an incredible miracle? Now, get this:
He created the sun by His voice (John 1:3, Genesis 1:14). The sun consumes 600 millions of matter per second, generating enough energy in 1 sec to supply all US energy needs for 13 BILLION years. And God simply said, “Let there be lights in the expanse of the heavens to separate the day from the night." And there was.
