How to feed thousands on a budget

After Mark 6:30-44 

How to feed thousands 

on a budget?

First, take an inventory

of what’s on hand.

Five loaves, two fish – check.

(Background noise of thousands

of stomachs, rumbling.)

Second, sit down,

sit down in groups.

They sit, by hundreds.

They sit, by fifties – check.

Third, look to heaven

and pray the blessing – check.

Fourth, break the loaves

and divide the fish – check.

Fifth, give the food to the staff

for distribution – check.

 

They eat.

Thousands eat.

Thousands eat their fill.

Baskets of leftovers

collected total 12 – check.

Check – what?

 

Photograph by Mike Swigunski via Unsplash. Used with permission.

Send them away

After Mark 6:30-44 

Surrounded by thousands,

the thousands who thronged

to see him and to listen,

his people say what

would be expected

in the circumstances:

It is late, there isn’t exactly

a restaurant or a supermarket 

or even a convenience store 

nearby, so send them away

to find something to eat,

we have no way to feed them,

and not even enough to feed

ourselves.

Feed them, he says.

With what, they say, do you

have the small fortune

it will take to feed them?

He smiles.

Feed them, he says.

 

Photograph by Jaanus Jagomagi via Unsplash. Used with permission.

He sees a great crowd

After Mark 6:30-44 

He sees a great crowd

of people come to hear,

to listen, to touch and be

touched, people desperate

to feel the hem of his robe.

His compassion wells up

and overflows upon

these sheep without

a shepherd, gathering

in the roads and hillsides,

waiting. And he does what

he knows to do, what flows

from understanding and 

compassion, and he begins,

he begins,

he begins to teach,

he begins to teach them,

he begins to teach them many things,

there in that wilderness,

that desolate place.

 

Photograph by Derek Story via Unsplash. Used with permission.

No rest for the weary

After Mark 6:30-44 

They return with their stories

of what they have done,

of what they have taught,

and he says it’s time to rest,

retreat for a time

to a desolate place

to rest.

Crowded by needs,

by constant demands

and cries for help,

they need rest. First,

they sail placid waters,

calmer and more isolated

than taking a walk, sail 

to their desolate place,

their place of rest,

where they are met

by the crowds hurrying

to catch them.

No rest for the weary.

 

Photograph by Liamannung via Unsplash. Used with permission.