Little Becomes Much : The Boy Who Shared His Lunch

Do you remember that biiiiig crowd of people that walked around the lake to get to Jesus? One of those people was a little boy who had a lunch packed special for him. One, two little fishes. And 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 little flat bread pancakes. Now we don’t really know what the little boy was thinking or what he said to Jesus that day. But since there’s always “more to the story” than can be written down in books, we imagined what the little boy could have been thinking. And we wrote a story to help you imagine how it could have happened that day. And in this story, be sure to notice how one person’s choices can help waaaaay more people than you might think.

“Look at my special lunch, Jesus. If You want some I will share it with You!”

Jesus winked at the boy with a big smile, “Okay! I have some things I need to take care of first, but I won’t forget! Thanks so much, buddy!”

That made the little boy feel very special!

Sure enough, after all that walking around the lake, the little boy was getting hungry, hungry, hungry! But Jesus didn’t take a break from loving (even though He was probably very hungry too).

The little boy’s tummy ruuuuumbled. He thought to himself, “Maybe I could eat half of my food now and let Jesus eat the other half later? Except I wanted to eat my lunch with Jesus.”

So the little boy stood close and listened, watched, and waited… because he didn’t want to interrupt. But Jesus was talking to so many people… and the crowd got bigger and bigger. Mommies, daddies, babies coming. Brothers, sisters, friends coming.

The little boy’s tummy gruuuuumbled again. He opened his basket. Yup. They were all still there. One, two little fishes. And 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 little bread pancakes. But NOW the boy felt like he could eat it ALL!

“Maybe Jesus isn’t as hungry, hungry, hungry as I am. Mom did pack it for me. Maybe it would be okay to just go ahead and eat it since it belongs to me, anyway?”

Hmmm… maybe. But being selfish, even when it seems like it makes sense, will always mean we will miss out on something special Jesus may do.

Just then, the little boy overheard Jesus and His 12 helpers talking. His helpers wanted to send the crowd away because there was no food to feed all those people. But Jesus said, “No, YOU give them something to eat.”

Jesus’ helpers looked confused. They said, “Us? Buy food?! There are too many people. Someone would have to have bags and bags of money to even give each of these people a teeny, tiny bite of food!”

But Jesus wasn’t meaning for them to buy food when He said, “You give them something to eat.” Jesus looked very disappointed — His helpers were not seeing things the way God sees them.

But when the little boy heard them talking, he opened his basket.

The boy thought, “Hmmmm. I could tell Jesus He could use my lunch. I already told Him I would share it with Him.” But his tummy was grumbling and tumbling and growling loudly now. “How would my little lunch help with such a HUGE crowd?”

The boy decided it didn’t make any sense. BUT, he also decided it didn’t matter if it made sense. He wanted to share his lunch with Jesus, and Jesus could do whatever He wanted with ALL of it, even if the boy would be hungry for the rest of the day and night.

So the boy walked over to one of the disciples and said, “Jesus can use my lunch if He wants!”

The man smiled and took the boy’s hand and walked him close to Jesus. “This boy has two fish and five little bread pancakes. This is all the food we have. But I don’t know how it’s going to help with this HUGE crowd of people.”

Jesus saw the boy with his lunch basket. “There you are!” Jesus said happily. “I didn’t forget the very sweet offer you made Me earlier today! Thank you so much for sharing your lunch. You’re probably super hungry, hungry, hungry, aren’t you?”

The little boy nodded his head fast.

Then Jesus got close to his ear and whispered, “Wanna watch and see what God can do with this little gift you decided to share?”

The boy got super excited and nodded his head even faster!

Jesus held the boy’s little basket up in the air towards Heaven and told God “Thank You” for the food. He asked the men near Him to tell everyone to sit down in the soft green grass. And then, He started reaching into the boy’s basket and handing out fish and bread… but WAIT! The boy started counting the fish Jesus was pulling out of the basket:

1, 2… 3? 4? 5? 6 FISHES?!?!?

And then the bread:

1, 2, 3, 4, 5… 6? 7? 8? 9? 10 little bread pancakes?!?!?

And that wasn’t all. More and more fish, fish, fish and bread, bread, bread just kept coming and coming out of the little basket! The boy had never seen so much food! God had made food for the WHOLE CROWD out of the gift this little boy decided to share! The boy was smiling the biggest smile ever, even forgetting he was hungry!

Jesus reached in and pulled some of the food out and handed it to the boy. “Here! This is for you!”

The boy giggled. “WOW! Thanks so much Jesus! This is way better than keeping any for myself! Look what God DID!” Jesus and the boy laughed together.

The whole, huge crowd ate until their bellies were full, and there were still 12 baskets of leftovers!

Wow!

The little boy learned something very important that day. If we are selfish — even if it kinda makes sense to us — we will always miss out on something special Jesus might do! And if we share and give gifts to Jesus of obeying and loving and caring and telling the truth even when it hurts or doesn’t make sense, Jesus can ALWAYS make something incredible happen!

What will Jesus do with your gifts you decide to give Him today? Let’s find out!