The loaves and the fishes

Now when Jesus heard this, he withdrew from there in a boat to a deserted place by himself. But when the crowds heard it, they followed him on foot from the towns. When he went ashore, he saw a great crowd; and he had compassion for them and cured their sick. When it was evening, the disciples came to him and said, ‘This is a deserted place, and the hour is now late; send the crowds away so that they may go into the villages and buy food for themselves.’ Jesus said to them, ‘They need not go away; you give them something to eat.’ They replied, ‘We have nothing here but five loaves and two fish.’ And he said, ‘Bring them here to me.’ Then he ordered the crowds to sit down on the grass. Taking the five loaves and the two fish, he looked up to heaven, and blessed and broke the loaves, and gave them to the disciples, and the disciples gave them to the crowds. And all ate and were filled; and they took up what was left over of the broken pieces, twelve baskets full. And those who ate were about five thousand men, besides women and children.

- Matthew 14:13-21

The story of the loaves and fishes, and feeding the five thousand, appears in all four gospels. What this tells me is how central it is to the notions expressed in Christian theology and how important it is as an example of who Jesus is, that reveals to us the nature of God.

My study bible, as it so often does, has a helpful note which I will partially quote here: "The miracle of the feeding of the five thousand ... shows Jesus feeding His people as God fed the Israelites in the desert. The Church Fathers see in this an image of the Eucharist, an idea also expressed in John 6, the discourse on the Bread of Life. ... Moved with compassion is used in very similar situations to show the Messiah's power and authority extending to those who suffer."

We can see many elements in this particular passage, the story of the feeding of five thousand with the loaves and the fishes, that characterize for us the nature of Jesus' persona, if you will. There is his great compassion, which, as noted in the study bible above, is quite characteristic of so many of his healings and manifestations of his power. This is the first thing that we must note. And then again we must also take note of the abundance described in the miraculous multiplicity of this food. Once Jesus has blessed what he is to give out to the crowds, it multiplies. It not only becomes many times over the amount he started with, but even the leftovers are there in abundance to be gathered. Surely this is another metaphor for the nature of the kingdom, just like the "faith the size of a mustard seed" that can move mountains, and the parables of the mustard seed and the leaven. The kingdom itself multiplies, its action strangely hidden (as in our parables) but nevertheless we see its effects. As with the allegory of the Spirit to the wind, we witness its growth and know where it has been - but we don't know where it comes from or where it is going. And certainly, there is the important notion of feeding. Not only are we fed with holy food, just as the bread in the wilderness - the manna from heaven - came to the Israelites, but the holy food itself comes in many forms, including scripture and of course the Eucharist. Christ offers us all that he is and we are fed with that food of the kingdom.

The great offering, of course, is Christ himself. In so many ways, he has come into the world to give himself to us. He will die a martyr's death on the cross in his Passion, he will leave us with his Spirit, his teachings and all the many things which we receive because he emptied himself to fill us. And I think this is the most important thing we have to consider. As human beings, we hunger and thirst for so many things we need. We should always remember how much we need valuable and true objects of worship. We all thirst for worship, whether we wish to see this about ourselves or not. I consider it part of the human need, just as we need food and drink. If we do not choose wisely or well those objects of worship, we choose things in the end that do us harm. The greatest gift we could have are those things to worship that make all the difference between life and death, good values and bad. We choose a God of love and compassion, or gods of violence and selfishness. One leads to expansion and great multiplication of values and meanings and choices and builds up our lives. The other nihilistic, divisive, destructive. Jesus was here to feed us with so much spiritual food, so much wealth of values and good things. We have a great treasure of images to draw upon to feed our hearts and minds, from which we draw inspiration for living and building our lives. Not only do we have the scripture of the New Testament, but we have in Jesus an illumination, expansion and fulfillment of the Old for us to draw upon. Our very notions of love and compassion - all over the world, by Christian and non-Christian alike - are greatly informed by his legacy and the story of his life.

I've been reading about stress and the associated health concerns and difficulties that can result. A tremendous therapeutic exercise is apparently to keep a gratitude journal: a place where one systematically writes down each day things for which one is grateful. It seems to me that we have a great deal to count among our blessings that is contained in scripture. In the story of the loaves and the fishes, and the great love and compassion we are taught are the characteristics of God and those who would be like God, we have a wonderful abundance for which to be thankful. What are you grateful for today?