There is a little boy here who has five barley loaves and two small fishes; but this, what is it for so many?
Thousands of people sit on a bare hillside with nothing to eat. The only food anyone can find is a boy's packed lunch. Andrew's report raises the question this miracle answers. Do we measure what we have against the need, or against the Lord?
Barley was the cheapest grain, and the fish were small. What Andrew found was not a hidden store but the poorest meal on the hill.
Barley loaves were the commonest kind of food. There were two small fish, and a lake full of fish lay not far away. How small a supply to share with that huge crowd! Philip's remark and Andrew's question both showed the same thing: only a miracle could provide a meal. Now they would see that the supply the boy had, so small to human thinking, was plenty — if only the Lord chose to use it. The loaves were not multiplied to ten times their number. The fish, small as John tells us they were, stayed just two the whole time. Yet those five loaves and two little fish did more than satisfy five thousand men, besides women and children. They also filled twelve baskets with the leftovers.
Philip had just done the arithmetic on what it would cost. Andrew now does the arithmetic on what is in hand. Both calculations leave out the same factor.
While Philip talks about how much they need, Andrew complains about how little they have. Neither of these disciples think of the Lord and the vast resources in Him that are at the disposal of faith.
They had also forgotten something their own Scriptures record: God had once fed a hundred men from one man's loaves.
Yet did they not know the Scriptures? Had they forgotten what Jehovah had done in the days of Elisha? Back then God multiplied the loaves of a man from Baal-shalisha, and a hundred men ate their fill (2 Kings 4:42-44). And a greater than Elisha was here — Jehovah Himself.
Commentators differ on how to read Andrew. Some hear only unbelief in his closing question. Others notice that he mentioned the loaves at all — which, on the face of it, was ridiculous.
Without faith, to mention so small a supply in the face of such vast need was absurd in the extreme. But Andrew had some knowledge of the Lord's power. Otherwise he would never have mentioned the small supply the boy had. He did spoil it a little by adding, "But what are they for so many?" We know the result. The Lord took that small supply and made it enough for every person in that vast crowd.
The food was small, and the hands holding it were weak. That is the kind of supply the Lord asks for.
They did not even have the small supply themselves. It was little, very little that they had, and it was in the hands of a little boy, one who was weak. How suggestive! It is so with ourselves and the little we have. Blessed are we indeed if we do know how little it is which is in our hands and how much is lacking. But do not let that turn into unbelief, thinking it is such a little bit that He cannot use it. Nothing is too small, nothing too little, if we bring it to Him; yes, He has chosen the weak things.
The boy who supplied the meal gets the least attention of anyone in the story.
Matthew, Mark and Luke do not even mention the boy, yet it was he who had the food that could feed the crowd under the Lord's hand. Let us be content to be thought little of, even perhaps overlooked altogether. But let us place what we have, however small, at the Lord's disposal. It is not the name and renown of the servant that matters — the lad is unnamed. What matters is having what the Lord can use to sustain His own.
Some commentators read the two items as a picture of Christ Himself.
The five barley loaves (no doubt small rolls) speak of Christ as the bread of life, in lowly humiliation and suffering. The two small fish remind us of His passing through the waters of judgment for our sake. The boy was willing to give his lunch for others. Grace is shown here in the way it can use the smallest willing sacrifice of love for Him, and multiply the blessing.
- Little. The only food was barley bread and two small fish. It was the cheapest meal on the hill, and the disciples did not even own it.
- Counted. Philip measured the need by money. Andrew measured it by supply. Neither measured it by the Lord standing in front of them.
- Offered. Nothing is too small for Him to use, if we bring it to Him — He has chosen the weak things.
- Unnamed. Only John mentions the boy, and even he leaves him nameless. What mattered was not his fame but what he handed over.
- Multiplied. God had fed a hundred men in Elisha's day, and a greater than Elisha stood here. The little became enough for every person in that crowd.
[And] Jesus said, Make the men sit down. Now there was much grass in the place the men therefore sat down, in number about five thousand.
A hungry crowd waits, and there are only five barley loaves and two small fish. Jesus gives an order that ignores the shortage: seat the people.
The disciples had just finished counting what they did not have. Then Christ spoke, and the arithmetic stopped.
Five barley loaves, and two small fishes! That was all. Now came the word of command, "Make the men sit down." Nobody protested. No apostle ventured another word. Christ's word was enough. Matthew alone has preserved two sayings of the Lord at this time. One is, "They need not depart." In the other He tells them to bring the loaves and fishes to Him (Matt. 14:16-18). No doubt these encouraged the twelve disciples to expect some miraculous display of power. They made the company sit down on the green grass, for it was springtime, shortly before the Passover.
Sitting down is not a small stage direction. It is the posture of someone who has stopped contributing and is ready to receive.
To receive the blessing all are reduced to a common level and a state of inaction: they sit down, or recline (v. 10). Neither man's outstanding prominence nor his work has any place here. But the Lord Jesus shows His dependence on the Father by giving thanks. From this point on He multiplies the provision abundantly as He hands it out to the crowd (v. 11)... Nor was there any rationing: all could receive as much as they desired. There is no limit: we may have as much of Christ as we want.
Another writer links the command to sit with rest, and with the gospel invitation.
Food and rest must go together, and our Lord will have none take their food like the beasts, standing. His first command to the crowd He was about to feed was that they should sit down. What a foretaste of the gospel itself, which invites all who labour and are weary to come to Christ for rest.
The verse pauses to mention the grass. It is the touch of a Host who thinks about comfort, not only about food.
He is the Master of the feast. He is the Host. With His own particular grace He makes them eat. He puts all His guests at perfect ease. He gave a feast once before, and He seated His guests in rows of fifty on the green grass, so that none might be overlooked (Mark 6:39-40). The record says, "there was much grass in the place" (John 6:10). Christ always meets the soul with perfect tenderness and care. There is nothing lacking in it.
A crowd that size could have turned into a scramble. Instead He arranged the seating Himself.
The Lord would not permit any such confusion. He was preparing a table in the wilderness for these people from Galilee. He arranged the guests by a definite plan. He would have no haste, no disorder. He Himself knew what He would do. He commanded the gathered thousands to sit as at a table — not where they wished, but where and how He wished. He was the Lord of the feast, and He would say to one, Sit here, and to another, Sit there, as it pleased Him.
One word brought five thousand restless people to stillness. One writer reads this as a preview of what Christ will one day do for the whole earth.
The scene that follows is surely a foretaste of the blessing of the coming thousand-year kingdom. It shows the perfect rule of the Lord. It shows the power of One Person to calm the world's unrest and meet its desperate hunger. At His word five thousand men are in a moment set in perfect rest. He speaks the word, and at once we read, "The men sat down". So it will be in the day of the Lord. Then He "will break the bow and the sword and the battle out of the earth, and will make them to lie down safely" (Hosea 2:18).
- Command. He speaks before He supplies. The shortage of loaves did not delay His word to sit down, and no disciple argued back.
- Seated. Sitting levels everyone. Prominence and effort count for nothing, and nothing is rationed — we may have as much of Christ as we want.
- Grass. The grass was green and plentiful, for it was spring, just before the Passover. The Host gives comfort as well as food, tender in every detail.
- Order. He seated them where and how He chose, preparing a table in the wilderness with no haste and no confusion.
- Foretaste. One word set five thousand at rest — a small model of the day when He calms the world's unrest and satisfies its hunger.
And Jesus took the loaves, and having given thanks, distributed [them] to those that were set down; and in like manner of the small fishes as much as they would.
Five loaves. Thousands of hungry people, sitting down and waiting. This verse is the moment the food reaches them. Everything turns on who takes, who thanks, and who gives.
The loaves came from a boy's lunch, and they were nothing measured against the crowd. What changes them is whose hands they enter. One writer sets them beside an older account of God feeding a household from almost nothing.
When Christ's power brings the small resources of earth into contact with heaven's endless supply, very little goes a long way. In the prophet's day, God could use a widow with "a handful of flour in a jar" and "a little oil in a jug" to keep a household alive for a full year (1 Kings 17:15-16). So Christ can use a boy with five loaves and two small fish to feed five thousand men.
He could have multiplied bread without a word. Instead He thanks God first.
Every work of power done by the Son was for the glory of God, and to do His Father's will. Before He fed the crowd with loaves and fish, He gave thanks. That showed He was not acting independently of His Father, even though everything was in His hand.
Notice who He thanks. Later in the chapter, John looks back and names the place by the thanksgiving, not by the miracle.
We can see how important His public thanksgiving was from the way John later refers to the miracle: "the place where they had eaten the bread after the Lord had given thanks" (John 6:23). John stresses not the multiplying of the loaves, which we find so wonderful, but the Lord's giving of thanks at the start of the meal... But note that the Lord never blesses the bread itself (there is no "it" after the verb in the original in Matthew 26:26; compare Mark 14:22). The Lord Jesus, as the obedient man, blessed God the giver, not the lifeless food.
In the other Gospel accounts the disciples carry the food out to the crowd. John leaves that out, and one writer explains why.
He blessed and broke the bread. He put the broken bread first into the hands of the disciples, and once they had received it they gave it to the people. This is the divine order of ministry... (In John's Gospel He feeds the crowds with His own hands. The ministry of the disciples is not mentioned there, because John presents Him as the Divine One.)
The crowd brings nothing to this meal but hunger. They simply sit down, and no one gets a measured portion.
To receive the blessing, everyone is brought down to the same level and to a state of doing nothing: they sit down, or recline (v. 10). A man's standing counts for nothing here, and neither does his work... And there was no rationing: all could take as much as they wanted. There is no limit: we may have as much of Christ as we want.
This meal was also a claim about who He is, and about the kind of ruler He would be.
The Lord Jesus soon showed everyone that He was the God who gave the manna (Ex. 16). He was also the LORD of Psalm 132:15, who said: "I will abundantly bless her provisions; I will satisfy her poor with bread."... But before He did this staggering miracle, He gave public thanks for the food He was about to hand out (Matt. 14:19). What a wonderful combination of human dependence and divine power in one Person!... A ruler who gives would be a real gift to men worn down by taxes.
In John's Gospel a sign is not the end point. The loaves open a door.
John records only a few signs, and each one is a prelude to deep teaching about grace and truth from the Lord's own lips. So the feeding of the crowds with a few loaves and fish opens the way to His great teaching about Himself. He is the Living Bread come down from heaven, given to bring life to the world and to sustain the life of His own people (John 6).
- Taken — in His hands five loaves go further than five loaves ever could. What we bring is never too small.
- Thanked — He blessed God the giver, not the bread. John later names the place by that thanksgiving. The Son never acts apart from His Father.
- Given — John leaves the disciples out of the handing round. Every eye rests on the Divine One who feeds with His own hands.
- Filled — no rationing and no ranking. Everyone sat still and took as much as he wanted. There is no limit to how much of Christ we may have.
- Followed — the sign points past the meal. It points to the King who satisfies His poor with bread, and on to His words about being the Living Bread from heaven.
And when they had been filled, he says to his disciples, Gather together the fragments which are over and above, that nothing may be lost.
The crowd has eaten all it wanted, and then Jesus tells the disciples to collect the scraps. Commentators find in that order both plain thrift and a picture of how God treats what belongs to Him.
Translations render the word for the scraps in two ways.
John 6:12f. — "Fragments." Or "broken pieces," as the Revised Version has it. The command is unique to this Gospel.
All four Gospels mention the leftovers. John alone tells us whose idea it was.
The other fact was the gathering up of the fragments, so that nothing should be lost. From John we learn that this was by the Lord's express direction (6:12). He held almighty power, yet He allowed no waste. Here He sets an example of thrift before His people. The people were satisfied first, as the twelve baskets of fragments prove. In those baskets the disciples gathered enough for their own next meal.
The same voice that fed thousands without measure would not let a crumb lie on the ground. Both belong to the same character.
Of five thousand hungry people He could say, "Give them something to eat." And when they had eaten their fill, He could say, "Gather up the leftover fragments, that nothing may be lost." The generosity and the economy are both perfect, and neither gets in the way of the other... The same hand that opened wide to every form of human need closed against all waste. Nothing stingy and nothing extravagant marked the character of this perfect, heavenly Man.
Common sense might call the collecting pointless.
The foolish here might say, "Why gather up those scattered crumbs? Surely the One who has worked such a miracle can have no need of fragments." Yes, but we are not to waste God's creatures. The use of the loaves and fishes teaches us not to despise anything God has made. The gathering up of the fragments teaches us not to waste it. Let human need be generously met, but let not a single crumb be wasted.
The collecting was possible only because the supply outran the need. What was gathered exceeded what was first handed over.
Here is the miracle. The little was not only enough for all, but more was left over at the end than they had at the beginning. His blessing was not only on the little for all; He blessed it in such a way that from it came an abundant increase. It is no different now in the ministry of spiritual things. The more we give out, having received from Him, the greater the increase and possession for us in the end.
The point is not arithmetic but the limit of our capacity to exhaust Him.
He takes the very things that showed their weakness. He brings earth's weakness into contact with heaven's fullness. The result: the people were not only fed but filled, and twelve baskets full remained. His grace can meet our need, but our need will never exhaust His grace.
Writers read the number twelve in more than one way. One connects the baskets to the work waiting for the disciples.
In Scripture the number twelve often stands for God's rule carried out through people, as with the twelve disciples. We may apply this to what was then close at hand. The disciples were being made ready to go out into the world with a basket each, filled with the good things of God. Here they carried His bounty to the hungry crowd. That service was a fitting introduction to the great work they were called to do after He had gone on high.
Another looks forward to blessing still held in reserve.
When all were filled, there was to be no waste of what remained (v. 12). What we may not take in of Christ, God does value. But is there not also a hint here of blessing still reserved for all twelve tribes of Israel in a future day? The twelve baskets remaining may well speak of this.
The lesson goes beyond that hillside to everything God provides.
That nothing may be lost! The Lord would not have us lose His gifts through waste or neglect, just because we have plenty for the moment... It is not pleasing to God that we should neglect or squander His bounties. To waste is to despise, to lose, His gifts. Economy is not contrary to true generosity but consistent with it.
The same care for losing nothing comes up again later in the chapter — this time about people.
Now He declares the Father's will to be that the Son Himself should not lose one of those whom the Father had given Him. Death itself could not interfere with this, for He is superior to death... He will raise up every believer at the last day (v. 39). In Christ's death and resurrection the believer sees that his own eternal blessing is certain. Nothing can defeat it.
- Command — The order to collect the leftovers comes from Jesus Himself, and only John records it.
- Character — He gave without limit and wasted nothing. He was never stingy and never extravagant.
- Capacity — He fed the crowd full and twelve baskets still remained; our need never exhausts His grace.
- Commission — Writers see in the baskets the disciples made ready to carry His bounty out, and blessing kept back for Israel's twelve tribes.
- Certainty — Losing nothing covers more than bread. Of all the Father gives Him, He loses none, and raises them up at the last day.
They gathered [them] therefore together, and filled twelve hand-baskets full of fragments of the five barley loaves, which were over and above to those that had eaten.
The feeding of the crowd ends with a count, not an empty field. Everyone has eaten, and twelve baskets are still filled with what is left of five barley loaves. Why does John record the leftovers at all, and why did the Lord order them collected?
The baskets measure something the meal itself could not show. Five loaves fed thousands; the surplus proves the supply was never strained.
When Christ gives out the blessing, people receive as much as they want. Even so, when all are filled, there will still be something "over and above". Now the demand is greater than the supply. Then God's grace will fully meet man's need. But man's need will never exhaust God's grace.
The surplus turned the arithmetic around. What the boy handed over was less than what the disciples carried home.
The little was not only enough for all; more was left over at the end than they had at the start. His blessing did not just stretch the little to cover everyone. He blessed it in such a way that it produced a rich increase. It is not different now in the ministry of spiritual things. The more we give out, having received from Him, the greater the increase and possession for us in the end.
The verse names the loaves as barley. That detail matters.
Barley bread is the poorest of all foods — the food of the very poor. So it stood for poverty and weakness — the very lessons stressed all along... The boy had only five barley loaves of bread, yet these were enough in the Lord's hand to feed the crowd. So it is ever. Will we not learn the simple lesson? Weakness, helplessness, nothingness — in Christ's hands will win the day against all the power of the world.
The Lord who would not send the crowd away hungry also would not let one scrap go to waste. Both came from one perfect heart.
About five thousand hungry people He could say, "You give them something to eat." And when they were filled He could say, "Gather up the leftover fragments, that nothing may be lost." The generosity and the thrift are both perfect, and neither gets in the way of the other... The same hand that was wide open to every human need was shut tight against all waste. There was nothing stingy and nothing extravagant in the character of the perfect, the heavenly Man.
The number is not accidental, and commentators draw more than one lesson from it. One reading points to the twelve who carried them.
In Scripture the number twelve often stands for God's rule carried out through people, as with the twelve disciples... The disciples were being made ready to go out into the world, each with a basket filled with the good things of God. Here they carried His gifts to a hungry crowd. That service was a fitting start to the great work they were called to do after He had gone back to heaven.
Another reading looks past the disciples to the nation they came from — Israel's twelve tribes, still waiting on a promise.
When all were filled, nothing that remained was to go to waste (v. 12). What we fail to take in of Christ, God still values. But also, is there not a hint here of blessing still reserved for all twelve tribes of Israel in a future day? The twelve baskets remaining may well speak of this.
The leftovers say something about the host, not just about the meal.
This shows the wealth of the Lord of the feast, as well as His kindness... If we live on someone else's generosity, and have reason to fear that we have eaten what he needed himself, our enjoyment fades. That fear will creep in, and with good reason, and spoil our ease while we sit at his table. But when we know that behind the table set for us there are full stores in the house, such fears have no place. The thought of the wealth of the host, and of his love, sets us all at ease.
- Little — five barley loaves, the bread of the poorest, were nothing in themselves. In His hands they were enough. Weakness put into His hands wins the day.
- Filled — the crowd received as much as they wanted; grace meets need fully, and need never drains the supply.
- Left over — the baskets held more than the boy first gave. The same holds in spiritual things: the more we give out, the greater the increase.
- Gathered — the hand open to every hunger was shut against all waste. Generosity and thrift met in one perfect Man, and neither crowded out the other.
- Twelve — a basket each for the twelve who would later carry His gifts to the world. Some also see a hint of blessing still held in reserve for Israel's twelve tribes.