After the forerunner of the gospel was martyred, the Slave-Savior said to His disciples, “Come you yourselves privately to a place in the wilderness and rest a while” (v. 31). In order to rest, “they went away in the boat to a place in the wilderness privately.” Nevertheless, a great crowd followed them. On the one hand, in this chapter we have rejection, hatred, and injustice. On the other hand, the crowd was still following the Lord.
Mark 6:34 says, “And coming out from the boat, He saw a great crowd and had compassion on them, because they were as sheep not having a shepherd; and He began to teach them many things.” His expression of compassion exhibited the Slave-Savior’s virtue in His humanity, which was carried out by the power of His deity.
When the disciples suggested to the Lord that He send the crowd away, He answered, “You give them something to eat” (vv. 35-37). The Slave-Savior had compassion on the people and wanted to feed them.
We all know that the Lord used five loaves and two fishes to feed the five thousand (vv. 38-42). John 6:9 tells us that these five loaves were barley loaves. In figure, barley typifies the resurrected Christ (Lev. 23:10). Thus the barley loaves signify Christ in resurrection as food to us. The loaves are of the vegetable life, signifying the generating aspect of Christ’s life, but the fishes are of the animal life, signifying the redeeming aspect of Christ’s life. To satisfy our spiritual hunger, we need Christ’s generating life as well as His redeeming life. Both of these aspects are signified by small items—loaves and fishes.
The five loaves and two fishes also indicate that whatever we have of the Lord we need to bring to Him so that it may become a great blessing to many others. The Lord often uses what we offer to Him to provide for the need of others.
We should not look down on our experience and say, “We don’t have much of the Lord. We have not experienced much of Him.” Look at what the Lord can do with five loaves and two fishes. The Lord does not require more than we have. If we give Him what we have, He will bless it. When we present what we have to Him, He will pour out the blessing, bestowing His unlimited blessing on what we present to Him.
Verse 43 says, “And they took up twelve baskets full of broken pieces and of the fish.” Here we see the result of the Lord’s blessing. This not only displayed the Slave-Savior’s power of deity as the Creator, who calls the things not being as being (Rom. 4:17), but also signified the bountiful and inexhaustible supply of His divine life (Eph. 3:8; Phil. 1:19).
I am burdened that we would be impressed with the pictures in 4:35—5:43 and 6:1-44. We should not be bothered or disappointed by the fact that the number of those in the Lord’s recovery in this country is still rather small. It is our destiny to be despised and rejected. We may even say that God has predestinated us for this. Even the God-man was despised and rejected. If He was rejected, then we should not expect anything different. Furthermore, the Lord’s forerunner, John the Baptist, who was a landmark in history, was imprisoned and martyred. If such a thing could happen to John the Baptist, then we should not expect something better.
We should not be frightened by the fact that it is our destiny to be rejected, hated, imprisoned, and even martyred. Instead of discouraging us from taking the Lord’s way in His recovery, this should encourage us to present what we have to the Lord. We may have only five loaves and two fishes, but we can give this to Him for His blessing. If we give the Lord what we have, He will bestow His blessing on what we offer to Him. The result will be that others will be fed and satisfied, and there will be twelve baskets left over.
No matter how much rejection, hatred, and injustice there may be, we nevertheless have the kingdom life today. In this kingdom life people are healed, nourished, fed, and satisfied, and there is an abundance left over. This is an accurate picture of today’s church life.