17B21. 2 Kings 4:42-44. “A man came from Baal-shalishah bringing to Elisha, the man of God, twenty barley loaves made from the first fruits and fresh grain in the ear.” When Elisha ordered the offering to be given to the people, his servant objected that it would not be enough for a hundred people. Elisha responded that he is to give it to the people anyhow because the Lord says, “They shall eat and there shall be some left over,” and there was. God provides and will always provide in abundance.
John 6:1-15. Because he was performing many miracles to cure the sick, a large crowd followed Jesus. Philip says that a large sum of money “would not be enough for each of them to have a little.” Andrew said to Jesus, “There is a boy here who has five barley loaves and two fish; but what good are these for so many?” Jesus had the crowd of about five thousand men and those accompanying them recline. After they ate their fill, “twelve wicker baskets with the fragments from the five barley loaves” were collected. “When the people saw the sign that he had done, they said, ‘This is truly the Prophet, the one who is to come into the world.’ Since Jesus realized that they were going to try to make him king, he fled to the mountain alone to escape them. He had come to be the Messiah of a spiritual kingdom and not of an earthly one. The miracle of the multiplying of the earthly food was to proclaim that he would feed all people of all times with a spiritual food that gives life for all eternity.
Ephesians 4:1-6. While in prison, Paul calls upon the Christians of the Church of Ephesus to bear “with one another through love so to be one body that breathes its life through one Spirit in “one Lord, one faith, one baptism,” having one God and Father of all.” He “is over all” and lives “through all and in all.” When we live in Christ, we live in Christ together. We are still each unique, united though different, diverse yet not divided. Our life is God’s love for us; his love is the life that binds us to one another.