This Bible Story had lots of numbers! 2 fish, 5 loaves, 12 baskets of leftovers and 5,000 people! But we are using it to count to five. The Story is from John 6. It is, of course, ‘The feeding of the 5,000’.The Bible Truth for Toddlers is ‘Jesus is amazing!’. There is also something for the adults to think about at the end of the story.

To tell the story you need – Philip and Andrew, a boy, loaves, fish and some extra people for the crowd. (I’ve used concertina people shapes)

Ask everyone to be ready to rub their tummy every time they hear the word ‘hungry‘

It was getting late. There were so many people in the crowd – lots and lots of people (Take them out of the storybag as you say this) And all the people were hungry.

Jesus was there, he had been talking to the people but now they needed something to eat. ‘I’m so hungry‘, they said to each other.

Jesus spoke to Philip (take him out of the storybag). ‘Go and buy everyone something to eat. They are all very hungry!’ But Philip looked in his pockets and he didn’t have any money. He was never going to have enough money to buy food for all the hungry people.

Andrew (take out of storybag) had found someone who had some food to share. Shall we find out who it is? It was just one small boy (take out of storybag). I wonder what he had? Let’s see (take out of storybag) He had two fish – let’s count them – 1,2 – and five loaves of bread – let’s count them – 1,2,3,4,5.

It’s not enough to feed all the hungry people!

But Jesus is very different to us. Jesus is amazing and can do amazing things. He said ‘thank you’ to God for the small packed lunch and then he began to share it out.

This is yummy! the people said. We’re not hungry anymore!

Jesus isn’t going to give us lots of food – but he can give us life. If you want to know more – come and ask me or take home part of the Bible to read about Jesus for yourself.