Matthew 15:36
And he took the seven loaves and the fishes, and gave thanks, and brake them, and gave to his disciples, and the disciples to the multitude. And he took the seven loaves and the fishes, and gave thanks, and brake them, and gave to his disciples, and the disciples to the multitude.
The verse records the feeding of a Gentile and heathen crowd in Decapolis near the Sea of Galilee, after Jesus had healed the lame, blind, dumb and maimed. The crowd had stayed with Him three days, sleeping outdoors at night and pressing by day to hear His words and see His healings, listening with deepest interest to His ministry of truth and the gracious words from His lips until their food was spent and they had nothing to eat. They had forgotten the wants of nature in their eagerness for truth.
After commanding the multitude to sit down on the ground on a grassy spot, He took the seven loaves and the two fishes, described as few little fishes, gave thanks, broke them into small pieces, and gave them through the disciples to the multitude. All had enough, and four thousand men besides women and children were refreshed and sent away with glad and grateful hearts. Seven large baskets of fragments were gathered so nothing was lost.
The disciples revealed unbelief and Jewish prejudice because these were Gentiles and not Jews like those fed at Bethsaida. They failed to bring forward their all in trust in His power to multiply, asking how men could be satisfied with bread in the wilderness, yet in obedience to His word they brought Him what they had. The act shows Christ's tender solicitude as a pitying father mindful of human wants and of those who hear truth. Though often hungry Himself He was awake to the necessities of others and would not send them away hungry or fasting lest they faint in the way. He remembered how He Himself had fainted after His long fast in the wilderness of temptation when angels ministered to Him, and without hesitation He wrought a miracle to feed the thousands who had followed Him.
The miracle shows what Christ can do for His people and calls for more faith in Him. It was done to impart spiritual truths vital to the salvation of souls, not to teach that people should make no effort to provide the necessities of life. Together with the feeding of the five thousand, the feeding of the four thousand gives the Lord's methods for food work: simple, inexpensive preparations made to greater advantage in an economical manner without need for large investment, and carried forward without selfish private interests blocking progress in the right way.
The feeding of the needy multitude together with the healing of the sick shows Christ ministering to the wants of the needy and gives a lesson for God's people today to have a part in that same work by doing the work of healing the sick in connection with health institutions. For as miraculous feeding does not end the need for human provision of food, miraculous healing in answer to prayer does not end the need for institutions for the suffering. God will not always work miracles to keep people alive, and the sick are to be placed where they can have hygienic living and treatment.