Jesus Feeds More than Five Thousand People^(A)

³⁰ The apostles gathered around Jesus and told him everything they had done and taught. ³¹ He told them, “Come away to a deserted place all by yourselves and rest for a while,” because so many people were coming and going^[a] that they didn’t even have time to eat. ³² So they went away in a boat to a deserted place by themselves. ³³ But when many people saw them leave and recognized them, they hurried on foot from all the towns and arrived ahead of them. ³⁴ When he got out of the boat,^[b] he saw a large crowd. He had compassion for them, because they were like sheep without a shepherd, and he began to teach them many things.

³⁵ When it was quite late, his disciples came to him and said, “This is a deserted place, and it’s already late. ³⁶ Send the crowds^[c] away so that they can go to the neighboring farms and villages and buy themselves something to eat.”

³⁷ But he answered them, “You give them something to eat.”

They asked him, “Should we go and buy 200 denarii^[d] worth of bread and give it to them to eat?”

³⁸ He asked them, “How many loaves of bread do you have? Go and see.”

They found out and told him, “Five loaves^[e] and two fish.”

³⁹ Then he ordered them to have all the people sit down in groups on the green grass. ⁴⁰ So they sat down in groups of hundreds and fifties. ⁴¹ Taking the five loaves and the two fish, he looked up to heaven and blessed them. Then he broke the loaves in pieces and kept giving them to his disciples to set before the people.^[f] He also divided the two fish among them all. ⁴² All of them ate and were filled. ⁴³ Then the disciples^[g] picked up twelve baskets full of leftover bread and fish. ⁴⁴ There were 5,000 men who had eaten the loaves.

Jesus Feeds More than Five Thousand People^(A)

¹⁰ The apostles came back and told Jesus^[a] everything they had done. Then he took them away with him privately to a city called Bethsaida. ¹¹ But the crowds found out about this and followed him. He welcomed them and began to speak to them about the kingdom of God and to heal those who needed healing.

¹² As the day was drawing to a close, the Twelve came to him and said, “Send the crowd away to the neighboring villages and farms so they can rest and get some food, because we are here in a deserted place.”

¹³ But he told them, “You give them something to eat.”

They replied, “We have nothing more than five loaves of bread and two fish—unless we go and buy food for all these people.”

¹⁴ Now there were about 5,000 men. So he told his disciples, “Have them sit down in groups of about 50.” ¹⁵ They did this and got all of them seated. ¹⁶ Taking the five loaves and the two fish, he looked up to heaven and blessed them. Then he broke the loaves in pieces and kept giving them to the disciples to pass on to the crowd. ¹⁷ All of them ate and were filled. When they collected the leftover pieces, there were twelve baskets.

Jesus Feeds More than Five Thousand^(A)

6 After this, Jesus went away to the other side of the Sea of Galilee (that is, to Tiberias). ² A large crowd kept following him because they had seen the signs that he was performing by healing the sick. ³ But Jesus went up on a hillside and sat down there with his disciples.

⁴ Now the Passover, the festival of the Jews, was near. ⁵ When Jesus looked up and saw that a large crowd was coming toward him, he asked Philip, “Where can we buy bread for these people to eat?” ⁶ Jesus^[a] said this to test him, because he himself knew what he was going to do.

⁷ Philip answered him, “Two hundred denarii^[b] worth of bread isn’t enough for each of them to have a little.”

⁸ One of his disciples, Andrew, who was Simon Peter’s brother, told him, ⁹ “There’s a little boy here who has five barley loaves and two small fish. But what are these among so many people?”

¹⁰ Jesus said, “Have the people sit down.” Now there was plenty of grass in that area, so they sat down, numbering about 5,000 men.

¹¹ Then Jesus took the loaves, gave thanks, and distributed them to those who were seated. He also distributed^[c] as much fish as they wanted. ¹² When they were completely satisfied, Jesus^[d] told his disciples, “Collect the pieces that are left over so that nothing is wasted.” ¹³ So they collected and filled twelve baskets full of pieces of the five barley loaves left over by those who had eaten.

¹⁴ When the people saw the sign^[e] that he had done, they kept saying, “Truly this is the Prophet who was to come into the world!”