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The Feeding of the Five Thousand and the Sufficiency of Christ
By Jake Hanson
This lesson was taught by Jake Hanson on March 15, 2010 at a Community Group at Mountain Brook Community Church in the midst of a series taught by various teachers called “The Road to the Cross: Peaks and Valleys Along the Way.” Below is a reconstruction of that lesson with some additions.
The Feeding of the Five Thousand is a wonderful, true story with which those who have grown up in the church are well familiar. The problem with the familiarity is that our understanding of the miracle is most generally on target, but the miracle has a lot more depth than it is given credit for, especially since most of our thoughts on it are shaped by childhood learning in application of it. These applications are actually very good and helpful to understanding our Lord, His provision and His power. In this lesson, I hope we are able to see some of these applications, but to also take it a step or two further than some of us have gone in understanding this wonderful miracle. I want us to see in the end, that Jesus Christ Himself is completely and totally sufficient for you.
The Feeding of the Five Thousand is the one miracle of Jesus (besides the Resurrection) which is attested to and described by all four Gospel accounts. While each account is important for various purposes, we will be looking at this miracle from the Gospel of John Chapter 6 because it includes small details absent from the other Gospels (though consistent with the others), and includes a lengthy interpretation of the miracle which will be important for our lesson.
Our method will be to examine the text bit by bit with the outline below. This will help us look at the important details of the text and the important applications which we can gain from these. If you are one of those people who needs to know the end of the story before doing so, let me tell you the end of the story: Jesus miraculously feeds a crowd of five thousand.
Part I: The Miracle of the Feeding of the Five Thousand from John 6
I. The Who, Why, When, Where: Introductory Information (vv. 1-4)
- Excursus on the Passover (v. 4)
II. The Problem Described (vv. 5-9)
V. The People's Interpretation of the Sign (vv. 14-15)
Part II: Jesus' Explanation of the Miracle: The Bread of Life
VI. Don't Stop Now! The Bridge to the Teaching (vv. 16-24)
VII. What the People Wanted (vv. 25-27)