Amy C Walters

Jesus Feeds the 5,000 | Luke 9:10-17

The disciples seem reluctant to participate in helping to care for the 5,000 men (and more women and children) who have come to a remote place to listen to Jesus. They would rather send everyone packing. Instead, Jesus involves them in his work, passing the multiplied bread and fish through their hands.

The disciples play kind of a strange role in this story. At the beginning of Luke 9, Jesus commissions the disciples to go out into the villages to teach and to heal. And, with the power of God, they are able to do incredible things. So when they return to report to Jesus everything that had happened, I imagine that they’re really excited about it. 

But then we come to this story and the disciples seem to be hanging back. Jesus is the one who welcomes the crowd. He teaches them about the kingdom of God. He heals them. Late in the afternoon, the disciples “came” to Jesus, implying that they weren’t right there with him. And their solution to the crowd’s needs was to send them away. 

So the disciples are hanging back, but Jesus pulls them in. First of all, he tells them, “You give them something to eat.” In one sense, this reminds the disciples of their dependence on him, not their own meager resources or solutions. But Jesus is also giving them a chance to participate in what he’s doing. 

The disciples’ first assignment is to have the people sit down in groups of 50. After they do that, Jesus thanks God for the food he has provided. Then Jesus hands the food to the disciples to distribute to the people. They are the ones carrying it to each group. 

Imagine what that must have felt like for the disciples. You get a basketful of bread and fish from Jesus. You take it to a group and pass it around, seeing the excitement and joy on their faces. Then you go back and get more and more and more, until there are no hungry people left!

How incredible would that be? I’m sure there’s this sense of exhaustion, because that’s a lot of people to feed, and that’s a lot of back and forth work, and yet so fulfilling to get to be a part of it.

Jesus is teaching the disciples how to feed his people. This exercise of Jesus sending the twelve out to go and preach in the towns and heal people, this was practice. This was the beginning. Jesus was going to involve them more and more in what he was doing. He was teaching them how to do it and giving them opportunities to see God at work in them and through them. 

Sometimes the disciples were slow to learn. In this story, they seem to have forgotten the power of God that’s available. They start reverting back to their old way of doing things and the solutions that they’re used to. 

But Jesus is such a patient teacher. Notice he doesn’t criticize them at all. He just gives them simple instructions for what to do next. 

Later on, in Matthew 28:18-20, Jesus gives the Great Commission. After Jesus has died and risen, he meets with his disciples before ascending into heaven. And his instructions to them are to “go and make disciples of all nations.” He has an important job for them, for his disciples to make more disciples. 

And that cycle is meant to continue. The disciples make disciples make disciples. It continues on. And this is work that continues on today. 

Do you know that there are still billions of people in this world who have never heard of Jesus? Most of them don’t know another Christian, have never heard Jesus’ name, don’t have a local church that they could just walk down the street and go into, don’t have radio programs, don’t have Bibles available to them. So many people still need to hear about Jesus’ love. 

And so the responsibility comes to us as Jesus’ disciples today to get his Word to them. Our generation now is responsible to get the gospel to those lost people. We have the privilege of participating in Jesus’ work because, our key truth for today, is that God involves us in his work. 

Jesus has shown us what it looks like. He traveled around and he taught. He got the disciples involved, and He gave them instructions on how to participate. He taught them and empowered them. And he has given us the Holy Spirit to teach us and remind us and empower us so that we too can participate in God’s incredible work. 

Sometimes it can be scary. We don’t want to mess up. We don’t want to make mistakes. And we might even be so afraid that we don’t even get involved to begin with. 

But what do we learn from the disciples? They made mistakes too. They forgot the lessons that they thought they had learned. But Jesus was so patient, and still drew them in, included them and involved them.

Jesus can do that with you too. In spite of your flaws and the hard time learning the lessons that he’s teaching, he still wants to use you. He’s drawing you into the work that he is doing. 

So today as you go, I want you to find someone to share this story with. This is part of the work that God is involving you in. This is your opportunity to share his Word with someone else. Take it seriously. Share this story, because God involves us in his work.