<p>9:12 <i>And the day began to wear away; and the twelve came and said to him- </i>The implication is that they weren&rsquo;t standing by Him, but rather watching cynically from a distance. Which explains their harsh attitude to the crowds. After all, they too had been followers of John the Baptist, they too wanted to get away on their own to mourn the news of His death. They probably felt the Lord should&rsquo;ve sent away the multitudes from the start. It&rsquo;s not hard to sense that the record paints the disciples negatively at this time. But who wrote this record? The Gospels are transcripts of how the disciples preached the Gospel. Despite the process of inspiration, the disciples in their recounting of the Gospel repeatedly mentioned their own weakness, and thereby would&rsquo;ve come over as all the more credible to their audience. And in this we see a fine pattern for our own witness.</p><p><i>Send the crowd away- </i>Twice they wanted to turn away those who wished to come to Jesus, and whom He wished to accept (Mt. 14:15; 15:23). As with the two miracles of bread, the second incident was giving them the opportunity to learn the lesson from the first incident- and yet they failed. Likewise they &ldquo;forbad&rdquo; John&rsquo;s disciples just as they wrongly &ldquo;forbad&rdquo; the little children to come to Him (Lk. 9:50). They ask the Lord to send the multitude away, whereas He had taught by word and example, that whoever came to Him He would not turn away (Jn. 6:37). Mark and Matthew present themselves, the disciples, as seriously out of step with their Lord at this time. And surely the communities which they were establishing were likewise tempted to &lsquo;send away&rsquo; or deny fellowship to those whom the Lord would have them fellowship.</p><p><i>That they may go into the villages and countryside and lodge and get provisions. For we are here in a deserted place</i>- Seeing most of the people were poor, and were likely subsistence farmers, it is most unlikely they had money to buy food. And 5000 men plus women and children would&rsquo;ve meant a crowd of 10,000 at least- the few shops in those tiny hamlets would&rsquo;ve been totally unable to provide for them. Here again we see the insensitivity of the disciples being related in the narrative which they themselves told after the resurrection. The apparently redundant &ldquo;buy&nbsp;<i>themselves</i>&rdquo; (Mk.) may suggest the disciples&rsquo; bitterness and resentment at the apparent expectation of the crowd that the Lord was to provide food for them. The only other time we meet the phrase is when the wise virgins tell the foolish to go and &lsquo;buy for themselves&rsquo;, and refuse to give their oil to them. Perhaps the Lord built that phrase into the parable because the disciples had earlier used it- and by His provision, He had effectively rebuked them for doing so.&nbsp;</p>