NOTES for Joh 6:5-6
The story of the miraculous feeding of a large number of people with a minimal amount of food is repeated in the Gospel more than once. In John's account there is an interesting nuance: when Jesus asks Philip a question, He already knows the answer. He Himself knows what He will do. The question turns out to be rather a kind of test for the disciple: what does he think? One could, of course, interpret this as a kind of test of trust in the Savior Himself. But the issue is not only Philip's trust in Jesus.
The issue first of all is where, in what world Philip lives: in the Kingdom or on the untransformed earth. For this is what determines the possibilities. And one can become a true disciple of the Savior in only one way: by sharing His life. The life of the Kingdom that He brought into the world. When five loaves and two small fish prove enough for several thousand people, it is obvious that the issue can only be the Kingdom: in our untransformed world such a thing is impossible. But this is only an episode, touching both the five thousand who had to be fed and, of course, the apostles themselves. Gospel history is made up of such episodes. But what happens between them?
After all, the apostles spent more than one year with Jesus, and besides those moments when the Kingdom opened to them visibly and tangibly, they also somehow lived, somehow communicated with the Teacher, thought and felt something... Were they in the Kingdom all the rest of the time? Jesus' question to Philip is a test of abiding in the Kingdom. Philip reacts like a normal person living ordinary earthly life: they need to send to the nearest town for food, they need money...
The alternative simply does not occur to him. And therefore, in his life at that specific moment, there is no question of the Kingdom. Probably the same was true in the lives of the other disciples. Of course, very soon they will remember the Kingdom. They will remember it in connection with the next miracle. But one cannot become an inhabitant of the Kingdom if one remembers it only after the next miracle. And Jesus wants to wake Philip, hinting to him at something greater than what he sees in this world. But only a miracle can wake him. Time will pass and everything will be different. Later. After Pentecost. For now, it is as it is.