So here's where we are in the story.
After God created the world, and after people messed up the world by sinning,
and after God created a rescue plan for his children, and after He sent His son Jesus
to Earth as a teeny-tiny little baby, Jesus was all grown up.
He wasn't a teeny-tiny little baby anymore.
Not that when He was a baby, he was teeny-tiny. He wasn't like a miniature sized baby or anything,
It was like, babies are already teeny-tiny, He was a regular sized baby, okay?
Anyway, He was all grown up and he was teaching lots and lots of people all over the place.
He was teaching them how to love God, and how to love people, and how to be more like Him.
This is the story of how one day, Jesus was teaching a big crowd of people.
On this particular day, the crowd was about five thousand men.
Back then, they only counted the men for some reason, so really if you counted
the women and the children, the crowd would be like fifteen or twenty thousand.
and really we should count the women and the children, especially the children
because in this story there's even a little boy, and he's a child
so I don't even know why we didn't count him.
Anyway, on this particular day, there were lots and lots of thousands of people.
Oh, and as a side-note you can read about this story in the Bible, in Matthew 14, or
Mark 6, or Luke 9, or John 6. As a side-note to that side-note this is the only miracle
in the Bible recorded in all four gospels.
So that probably means it's super important and we should be able to learn something.
Anyway, Jesus had been talking to this huge crowd of people all day long.
See sometimes when Jesus was speaking, people just lost track of time.
They couldn't stop listening to Jesus.
They wanted to hear everything that He had to say.
But come on, all day is a really long time to just sit and listen, and these people were getting hungry.
So the disciples went to Jesus and said, "It's getting late.
Maybe we should let these people go home so they can get something to eat."
But Jesus said, "They don't need to leave to get something to eat.
"You can give them food to eat!"
What do you think the disciples were thinking just then.
"I- Pardon me but- What food?"
They didn't bring any food with them, and it's not like there were any restaurants or
grocery stores nearby, although that would be pretty neat if there was like a restaurant
right there in the side of the hill right in the middle of all those people.
Anyway, the disciples were looking around for some food.
Remember that boy I told you about?
Turns out, this one boy had some food!
But it wasn't like a food truck or anything, it was just his own little lunch,
five pieces of bread and two small fish.
Definitely not enough to feed a crowd of lots and lots of thousands of people.
But Jesus was about to do something amazing!
He took the bread and the fish and He thanked God for it.
Pretty simple stuff, right?
But then He started to split it up and pass it out to everybody.
Everybody.
Woah, woah, woah!
Time out!
What the actual crazy do you think was happening inside the disciples' heads just then?
What in the world was Jesus even doing?
Did He really think that he was going to be able to feed thousands and thousands of people
with only five pieces of bread and two small fish?
It must have seemed impossible.
But what the disciples didn't know is that when Jesus prayed this prayer of thanks,
He was talking to his dad in Heaven, and his dad in Heaven is God!
The one who created all the fish in all the oceans!
The one who, at the beginning of time, created everything out of nothing!
So making some lunch for some people was no big deal;
actually it was a big deal because
these people would have known the story of the Israelites wandering in the desert really well.
And how God had provided for them for 40 years with manna, which is kind of like bread except
it's really small so it's more like cereal, and it fell from the sky,
and boy that would be super sweet to have like cereal falling from the sky,
but it would also creep me out a little bit,
and there was also quail when the Israelites were wandering in the desert
and quail are like these tiny little birds, actually they're not tiny,
they're like regular birds, and birds are already tiny
so they're still tiny but maybe not as tiny as you would have thought.
Anyway, the food that Jesus prayed over and handed out was being passed around
and people were eating, and eating, and eating, and the craziest thing happened!
Even though they kept handing out bread, they never ran out of bread.
And even though they kept handing out fish, they never ran out of fish!
All these lots and lots of thousands of people ate as much as they wanted
and there was still leftovers! Twelve baskets of leftovers!
What!?
How does that even work when they started with so little?
Not only did Jesus feed these people dinner, He gave them more than they needed.
Leftovers!
When the people saw Jesus do this miracle some of them were convinced,
right then and there, that he was the King and the Rescuer that God had promised so long ago.
And while it was probably pretty wild to see Jesus take these five pieces of bread and
two small fish and feed lots and lots of thousands of people, it wasn't crazy at all for Jesus.
It was...psssh...easy.
He would keep doing greater and greater miracles than that,
including the greatest rescue the world would ever see.
I can't wait for you to hear that story.