Perspective: The Meaning of a Miracle

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The Meaning of a Miracle

Then Jesus did many other miraculous signs in his disciples' presence, signs that aren't recorded in this scroll.  But these things are written so that you will believe that Jesus is the Christ, God's Son, and that believing, you will have life in his name.

John 20:30-31 (CEB)

I felt it first when I was younger
A strange connection to the light
I tried to satisfy the hunger
I never got it right

From "Your Love" by  Brandon Heath

In the Gospels, we read that one day Jesus and the Disciples head across the Sea of Galilee to a secluded location.  There, they are met by a crowd of nearly five thousand people.  At one point, the question arises of how Jesus and the Disciples can possibly feed so many people.  They know that they cannot afford to buy enough food for everyone, and they have only five loaves of bread and two fish on hand.  Jesus has all of the people sit down on the grass.  He then takes the bread and fish, gives thanks for them, breaks them up, and has the pieces distributed to the crowd.¹

Somehow everybody in the crowd has enough food to eat, and, when the Disciples gather up the leftovers, somehow they fill twelve baskets.²

The story of Jesus' feeding the multitude is one of the few stories that can be found in all four of the Gospels.³  Sometimes, in my personal Bible studies, I like to compare different versions of a single story from the Gospels so that I can see what the different writers want to emphasize.  When I recently encountered the story of Jesus' feeding the multitude as it is told in the Gospel of John, I wanted to compare it to a telling from one of the other Gospels, because John's Gospel is radically different from the other three.  I chose to compare it to the version in the Gospel of Mark, since Mark's Gospel is thought to be the first Gospel written.

In Mark's version of the story, after Jesus has been teaching the crowd all day, the Disciples become concerned that the people are growing hungry.  They urge Jesus to dismiss the crowd so that everyone can go to a nearby village and buy some food.  Jesus then says to the Disciples, "You give them something to eat."⁴  In John's version of the story, when Jesus sees the crowd, He asks the disciple Philip where they will buy food for so many people.  The writer tells us that, when Jesus asks this question, He is already planning to feed the crowd miraculously.⁵

In Mark's version of the story, when the Disciples remark about how expensive it would be to buy food for so many people, Jesus asks them how much bread they have on hand.  They check their provisions and reply that they have five loaves of bread and two fish.⁶  In John's version of the story, when Philip remarks that it would not be feasible to buy food for the crowd, the disciple Andrew reports that a young boy has offered them his five barley loaves and two fish.⁷

In the Gospel of Mark, Jesus' miraculously feeding the multitude seems to happen on the spur of the moment.  The Disciples are concerned that the people in the crowd are growing hungry, so Jesus helps them find a way to feed them.  In the Gospel of John, Jesus' actions are a lot more deliberate.  Jesus brings up the matter of feeding the crowd, because He already has a plan to feed the crowd miraculously.

Something else that differs between the two versions of the story is how the story ends.  In the Gospel of Mark, Jesus tells the Disciples to go ahead of Him back across the Sea of Galilee, and, after He dismisses the crowd, He heads up a mountain to pray for a while.⁸  In the Gospel of John, Jesus can see that the people in the crowd want to revolt against the Roman Empire and make Him their king, so He heads up the mountain to escape from them.  When night falls, the Disciples decide to head back across the sea of Galilee without Jesus.⁹

I think that the key to understanding the differences between the two versions of the story is understanding the significance of a miracle means in the Gospel of John.  In John's Gospel, Jesus' miracles are called "signs."  They are not just good deeds supernaturally done or demonstrations of divine power.  They are meant to point beyond themselves to some truth about who Jesus is.

In John's Gospel, the tension between Jesus and the people who want to make Him their king leads into a greater discussion about who Jesus is and what people want from Him.  When the crowd catches up with Jesus, He points out that the only reason they are looking for Him is that He gave them all the food they wanted.  He notes that the food He gave them won't keep them filled forever and then urges them to seek what can truly satisfy them.¹⁰  Jesus goes on to tell the crowd, "I am the bread of life.  Whoever comes to me will never go hungry, and whoever believes in me will never be thirsty."¹¹

In three of the Gospels, Jesus miraculously feeds a crowd of thousands of people simply because they are hungry.  In the Gospel of John, Jesus miraculously satisfies the physical hunger of thousands of people in order to teach them that they need more than literal bread in this life and that He is the Bread of Life that will satisfy the hunger of their souls.


Notes:

1. Mark 6:32-41, 44; John 6:1-11
2. Mark 6:42-43; John 6:11-13
3. Matthew 14:13–21; Mark 6:30–44; Luke 9:10–17; John 6:1–13
4. Mark 6:34-37 (CEB)
5. John 6:5-6
6. Mark 6:37-38
7. John 6:7-8
8. Mark 6:45-46
9. John 6:14-17
10. John 6:24-27
11. John 6:35 (CEB)

The Miracle of the Loaves and the Fishes was painted by Bartolomé Esteban Murillo in the late 1600s.