A man came from Ba’al Shalishah, carrying twenty loaves of barley bread baked from the first ripe corn, along with some ears of new corn. “Give it to the people to eat,” Elisha said. “How can I serve it to one hundred people?” Gehazi asked. But Elisha replied, “Give it to the people to eat. For this is what YHWH said: ‘They will eat and have some left over.’ ” Then the food was set before them, and they ate and had some left over, according to the word of YHWH.

Response: You open Your hand and satisfy the desire of every living thing.

Let all Your works give You thanks, O God, / and let Your faithful ones bless You.
Let them discourse of the glory of Your reign / and speak of Your might.
R: You open Your hand and satisfy the desire of every living thing.

The eyes of all look hopefully to You, / and You give them their food in due season;
You open Your hand / and satisfy the desire of every living thing.
R: You open Your hand and satisfy the desire of every living thing.

Adonai, you are just in all Your ways / and holy in all Your works.
You are near to all who call upon You, / to all who call upon You in truth.
R: You open Your hand and satisfy the desire of every living thing.

I plead with you, then, in the name of our Redeemer, to lead a life worthy of your calling. Treat one another charitably, in complete selflessness, gentleness and patience. Do all you can to preserve the unity of the Spirit through the peace that binds you together. There is one body and one Spirit — just as you were called into one hope when you were called. There is one Savior, one faith, one baptism, one God and Creator of all, who is over all, who works through all and is within all.

Some time later, Jesus crossed over to the other side of the Sea of Galilee — that is, Lake Tiberius — and a large crowd followed him, impressed by the signs he gave by healing sick people. Jesus climbed the hillside and sat down there with the
disciples. It was shortly before the Jewish feast of Passover.

Looking up, Jesus saw the crowd approaching and said to Philip, “Where can we buy some bread for these people to eat?” Jesus knew very well what he was going to do, but asked this to test Philip’s response.

Philip answered, “Not even with two hundred days’ wages could we buy loaves enough to give each of them a mouthful!” One of the disciples, Simon Peter’s brother Andrew, said, “There’s a small boy here with five barley loaves and two dried fish. But what good is that for so many people?”

Jesus said to them, “Make the people sit down.” There was plenty of grass there, and as many as five thousand families sat down. Then Jesus took the loaves, gave thanks, and gave them out to all who were sitting there; he did the same with the fish, giving out as much as they could eat.

When the people had eaten their fill, Jesus said to the disciples, “Gather up the leftover pieces, so that nothing gets wasted.” So they picked them up and filled twelve baskets with scraps left over from the five barley loaves.

The people, seeing this sign that Jesus had performed, said, “Surely this is the Prophet who is to come into the world.” Seeing that they were about to come and carry him off to crown him as ruler, Jesus escaped into the hills alone.