time for me and Gini to get to almost all of the finer points.  Today I want to focus on the transition that occurs between the two narratives: between the bread and the walking on water.  Immediately after Jesus performs the miracle of the loaves and fishes, what happens?  He has to run away because the people want to SIEZE him and make him king.  "This is the prophet we have been waiting for!" they say.  They are ready to seize Jesus, to grasp ahold of him.  The word "seize" is the same as Paul uses in his letter to the Philippians.  He tells us, "Equality with God is not something to be grasped."  Jesus knows this, and avoids the grasping. Jesus' time was full of expectation for a coming messiah.  There were many candidates running around Palestine, and there were militias ready to get behind one of them to try and replace the Roman governor.  You know this if you've read any biblical history, or if you've scene Monty Python's "The Life of Brian."  The time of Jesus was the time of expectation of the coming savior of the Jewish people from the Roman imperial oppression.  So the people hear in Jesus, the see in Jesus, what THEY WANT TO SEE. The expectations are dangerous.  The people here are ready to try an install Jesus as King with armed rebellion, so Jesus takes off.  This story about Jesus seems so long ago, but we know something of the reality