My children drew pictures of Jesus feeding the 5,000. The story is found in Matthew 14: 15-21, Mark 6:33-44, Luke 9:12-17, and John 6:1-14. The disciples told Jesus to send the people away because it was getting late. The Bible says this took place “when it was evening.” For some reason I always picture it during the daytime. It might have been early evening, maybe around dusk, while it was still light outside.
Jesus turned to the disciples and said, “You give them something to eat!” The disciples looked at Him like He was insane because it would cost a lot of money to feed 5,000 people!
The disciples found a boy with five loaves of bread and two fish, so they gave those to Jesus. Looking up to heaven, Jesus blessed the food and began breaking it apart and putting it into baskets. The food began multiplying itself. This was not the first time that food had multiplied itself. Elijah and Elisha had caused food to be multiplied many years before (through the power of God in prayer), to take care of widows who were starving during famine.
God is able to multiply food because He is in control of all the atoms in the universe and created everything from nothing anyway (Hebrews 11:3).
The people were told to sit in groups of 50, and the disciples served as the waiters of a huge restaurant on the green grass. After everybody was fully satisfied, the disciples picked up 12 baskets of leftover food. The leftovers were more than what they started with!
Here is a hands-on activity to leach the lesson of Feeding the 5,000. It includes a diorama and some kids placing fish crackers in piles of 50 on a large blanket:
Sign up below for a free Bible crafts e-book!
If you enjoyed this “Feeding the 5,000” children’s drawing activity, you will love the huge Bible section inside the Unit Study Treasure Vault!
Tags: Bible, Bible class, drawing, Jesus, New Testament
