Mark 6:39 Commentary and Bible Study

In this miracle we see Christ as Prophet, Priest, and King. He is Prophet, first of all, in that the bread represents the word of God, and it comes from him. But in another sense also – they are on a hillside, thousands of people, and Christ says to the disciples, arrange them; arrange the vast crowd in companies of fifty – hundreds and then fifties. The Greek wording is very interesting. A word is used which describes garden plots: in other words, there is a group of fifty; an aisle; another group of fifty; then an aisle – aisles all over the place, corridors, and neat groups of fifty. That must have taken some time. ‘What’s this all about?’ they would have asked. ‘You are going to be fed’, say the disciples. That is not in the text, but it is fair to imagine it. ‘Fed, here? There is nothing to feed us with.’ ‘Jesus of Nazareth says, you're going to be fed. Sit down in an orderly manner, all of you, and then we will serve you.’ Nowadays, you would look down the hill expecting to see a group of trucks coming up the hill; to feed five to ten thousand people is good to take a lot of food. The supplies by now will be wending their way up the road. In those days you would expect a long line of carts. ‘Where is the food coming from? How is it going to be supplied? We are all sitting here, waiting.’ He is a prophet, you see; it’s just like prophecy. The promise is made; we wait for its fulfilment; there seems to be no sign of the fulfilment. Time goes by, and then the miracle occurs and the promise is fulfilled. We see Christ as a prophet. We see him as a priest also. He takes the five loaves and the two fishes, and Matthew says, he looked up to heaven, somewhat obviously and conspicuously. He looks up to heaven; he blesses, he thanks God for the provision, and he turns to the people. ‘Now feed them.’ He is a priest. He stands between God and man. He represents man to God and he represents God to man. He calls to heaven and then he by his power performs the miracle. ‘Our priests never did anything like this, the people say. Our priests call upon God and give us nothing.’ He is the priest, the great high priest, and he demonstrates it in the miracle. And he is King. His bounty is distributed – the giver-King to all the people. Only Christ held all those offices at once. Visualise these groups of people on the hillside, arranged like garden plots, the food coming from one source, namely Christ. Isn’t it just like church? This teaches us about preaching and order, people listening to God or the word of God, people being taught in an orderly way, just like church.