The Life of Christ

The Greek word used for fish refers to a specific small fish, similar to sardines, frequently eaten with bread.

• This was one of the few fish that could be eaten without first having to be cooked.

• After being caught they were often dried and salted.

Mk. 6:39-40 And He commanded them all to recline by groups on the green grass. 40 And they reclined in companies of hundreds and of fifties.

Before performing the miracle, Jesus would first require a certain orderliness be in place to expedite the distribution.

• The miracle was preceded by a demonstration of structure.

• When Israel left Egypt, Ex. 13:18 says they went out in rank.

• In Col 2:5 Paul commended the “good order” seen in the church at Colossae.

This feeding was later to be known as the “feeding of the 5 000.”

• Skeptics could easily ask, “How do we know there were 5000 present?”

• The fact that Jesus required the multitude to sit in groupings of 100s or 50s may have been to make the count easier.

• The total number is quite amazing when we consider that the entire population of the neighboring towns probably equaled about 5,000 men, in addition to women and children.

• It seems that the entire local population celebrated the Passover with Jesus.

This means people were coming from all over Israel to be there, rather than going to the temple, as the Law commanded them in Deut. 16:5-6.

• “You may not sacrifice the Passover within any of your gates which the Lord your God gives you; 6 but at the place where the Lord your God chooses to make His name abide, there you shall sacrifice the Passover at twilight, at the going down of the sun, at the time you came out of Egypt” (Deut. 16:5-6).

• So, did Jesus tempt the people to violate the Law?

• No, technically, they were allowed to do this because Jesus said He was greater than the temple (Mt. 12:6). “ Yet I say to you that in this place there is One greater than the temple ” (Mt. 12:6).

• This was going to be their Passover, and Jesus was going to provide the meal.

Mk. 6:41 And He took the five loaves and the two fish, and looking up toward heaven, He blessed the food and broke the loaves and He kept giving them to the disciples to set before them; and He divided up the two fish among them all.

We can only speculate how this logistically played out.

• In Gen. 1:21 we read: “ So God created great sea creatures and every living thing that moves, with which the waters abounded, according to their kind, and every winged bird according to its kind. And God saw that it was good.”

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