Feeding of the Five Thousand

The event

Jesus withdraws by boat toward a remote area near Bethsaida hoping for rest with his disciples after the death of John the Baptist, but the crowds follow on foot and Jesus, moved with compassion, spends the day teaching and healing. As evening falls in this uninhabited place, the disciples urge him to send the crowd away to find food — a practical, reasonable suggestion Jesus overturns with a simple instruction: "You give them something to eat."

A boy's lunch of five barley loaves and two small fish is all that can be found for a crowd numbering about five thousand men, not counting women and children. Jesus takes the loaves, gives thanks, breaks them, and has the disciples distribute the food — and everyone eats until satisfied, with twelve full baskets of leftovers gathered afterward. It's the one miracle recorded in all four Gospels, and John tells us the response was so charged that the crowd wanted to seize Jesus and make him king by force, prompting him to withdraw alone to a mountain to pray.

Scripture references

• Matthew 14:13-21
• Mark 6:30-44
• Luke 9:10-17
• John 6:1-14