Article August 7, 1954 Issue

"THAT NOTHING BE LOST"

HILDA L. ANDERSON

Many students of the Bible, in considering the proofs of supply related there, find the account of Jesus' feeding of the five thousand with five loaves and two fishes one of the most inspiring. The first three Gospels—Matthew, Mark, Luke—tell us that Jesus took the five loaves and two fishes and blessed them. Then he broke the loaves and gave them to the disciples, and they in turn gave to the multitude. We are also told that when they all had eaten, they took up twelve baskets full of the fragments that remained.

But John, the clear-sighted and much-beloved disciple of Jesus, gives us more to ponder on this subject, for he says (John 6:12), "When they were filled, he said unto his disciples, Gather up the fragments that remain, that nothing be lost." Did not the remaining food, and the directive to gather it up, symbolize something besides the ever-presence of God's providence, for that had already been proved. Certainly it was more than just economy or tidiness on the part of Jesus. Could it not be that this undeniable evidence was retained for the purpose of invalidating any suggestions that the multitude had been mesmerized or hypnotized into just believing that they had been fed?

Undoubtedly there were some in that large gathering who had no faith in the truth, and who would take advantage of any opportunity to discredit any demonstration of God's law. But Jesus' alertness not to lose a fragment of the God-supplied means nullified any effort of evil or material-mindedness to take away the glorious victory that evidenced the infinite supply of Spirit as supreme over the lie of limitation.

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