MONDAY November 1, 2021 “Manna” Exodus 16:11-35

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Good morning my “Walking with Jesus” friends and welcome to November!

Do you like the smell and taste of fresh, hot baked bread? Have you ever stood in a commercial bakery surrounded by fresh baking bread or rolls pouring out of those huge ovens by the hundreds? My wife and I once lived near such a bakery and it was a remarkable experience to visit there surrounded by hot, fresh, baked breads and rolls of all kinds, enough to feed the whole town!!

I left you this weekend sitting among 1 million hungry people who have just been told God was going to pour out two great miracles for them in less than 24 hours. First, in the evening would come meat for all these people to eat and then in the morning fresh bread! As you looked over the huge throng of people 1 million people I wonder what picture came into your mind as you imagined how much meat it would take to feed a million people and where it would come from out here in the desert? Well let’s look at the Exodus record in Exodus 16:13. “That evening quail came and covered the camp…” There it is, the best way to bring meat to 1 million people is to fly it in, do you agree?! So how many quail does it take to feed 1 million people? Can you see the children running around trying to catch quail while parents make a plan for how to prepare a meal of quail in the desert?! That night these Hebrew slaves slept with full stomachs.

The record says: “In the morning there was a layer of dew around the camp. When the dew was gone, thin flakes like frost appeared on the desert floor. When the Israelites saw it they exclaimed, ‘what is it?’ for they did not know what it was. Moses said to them, ‘It is the bread the LORD has given you to eat.’ (Ex. 16:13-15) No it wasn’t long French bread loaves, nor was it “Jewish Rye bread”, nor was it Kaiser rolls or whatever your favorite type of bread is. It was more like flour, the ingredient needed to make bread in the desert. Do you see it my friends? God was teaching His people what a partnership in life looks like when a person partners with God!

God provides the needed ingredients and we use our abilities or talents as we follow God’s instructions to accomplish His purpose. The quail needed to be caught, defeathered and cooked before they could be eaten. These flakes, which they called “Manna“, needed to be collected off the desert floor and cooked before it was bread, ready to eat. Have you learned to watch God provide YOU with the resources and necessary ingredients to accomplish His purpose? Ingredients like time and relationships and education and experience and creative ideas and passion and self motivation and planning and physical strength. Then as God leads us we use all these resources to follow His leading in accomplishing those things that make a difference in our world... can you see how that has worked in your life?

Of course this first day everyone had the same questions: What is it? How do we collect it without mixing it with sand? How do we cook it? How much will be required to make a loaf of bread or even a biscuit? What other ingredients will be needed? And God did here, what He often does… God let them figure out what worked best for each family! So let’s walk around the camp and watch. I imagine some are making pancakes and some are making biscuits and some are making rolls and some big loaves of bread. Some are mixing dates they might have brought from those palms back at Elim. And everyone was enjoying fresh bread!

Many of the people did it just as Moses had instructed. They picked up the amount they thought they’d need for that day. But for many others, they weren’t ready to trust God yet. God had promised a DAILY bread delivery, but many collected more than they needed, just in case. Moses had warned the people about this. God wanted them to learn what Jesus taught His disciples to pray many centuries later “…give us this day our daily bread.” (Luke 11:3) So the next morning these people who had collected more manna than what they needed, thinking they’d have a head start on the day, well… those folks woke up to a terrible smell. Rotten manna with maggots crawling all over it, just as Moses had warned them. (Ex. 16:20)

Remarkable… a fresh, daily delivery of manna that would collect like frost on the ground, but be available for the people only until soon after sunrise, when it would disappear in the sunlight! The record says:
“Each morning everyone gathered as much as they needed for that day, and when the sun grew hot, it melted away.” (Ex. 16:21) Once people picked it up and took it home, it only lasted a few hours before it turned rancid. But if prepared in those few hours, it could be eaten anytime that day. Now that really makes the “…daily bread…” phrase in the LORD’s prayer come alive doesn’t it?

But by the end of the week, on the sixth day, Moses instructed the people this time to collect enough for two days, because on the seventh day there would be no manna falling from heaven! Guess what happened? “Nevertheless, some of the people went out on the seventh day to gather it, but they found none.” (Ex. 16:27) That’s our human nature isn’t it my friends? If you had been among this huge throng of people, how long do you suppose it would have taken you to learn exactly how much to collect each day for you and your family, and how to remember to collect twice as much ONLY on the sixth day? How many times do you suppose you’d wake up to that terrible smell and the sight of maggots because you tried to shortcut the process? As God watched this, day after day, He said to Moses: “How long will these people refuse to keep My commandments and My instructions? (Exodus 16:28) This my friends was the main issue for these Hebrew slaves, as it is for us. Over and over God provided specific instructions and warnings about shortcuts or ignoring the instructions, and over and over these people pushed the limits and intentionally tried God’s patience by seeking to do things their own way. Have you learned the pain of that rebellion against God?

Here, only a few weeks out of Egypt, in the hot Sinai desert, God was trying to teach these people the wonderful joy of walking with God in obedience and the painful reality of ignoring God’s instructions. This was about more than manna, this was also about something God called “Sabbath“. God had instructed Moses: “Tomorrow is to be a day of rest, a holy Sabbath to the LORD.” (Ex. 16:23) It’s safe for us to assume these slaves worked like slaves, with very little time to rest. Their lives only had value to their slave owners as they worked. But their value to God, like all human beings God has made, is not in our work productivity alone. Our greater value to God is in our love relationship with Him, our worship of Him, our contentment in His provision and protection, and our learning to be a holy people for His glory and honor!

This new concept of Sabbath was the first major distinctive God put in place for His people. The seventh day of the week, every week, NO manna fell from heaven as a tangible reminder of making this a day of rest and refreshment. Soon, when these people arrived at Mount Sinai, God would teach them about the importance of making Sabbath a holy day for spiritual refreshment as well as a day of rest for physical restoration of their energy. May I ask, what does this concept of “Sabbath” mean to you my friends, no matter where you live in our world? Do you take one day a week for physical refreshment and spiritual renewal? How exactly do you do that? What refreshes you and what renews your spirit?

Finally, let’s look at one more miracle God did with this manna. God had instructed Moses to ‘Take an omer of manna and keep it for the generations to come, so they can see the bread I gave Israel to eat in the desert…’ So Aaron put a jar of manna in front of the Testimony, that it might be kept. The Israelites ate manna for forty years until they came to the land God promised…” (Ex. 16:32-35) Now can you explain that to me, my friends? Normal manna would spoil by morning, but this jar of manna remained as it had fallen from the sky, for forty years as the unchanged evidence of the miraculous provision of God for His people. By the way what Moses referred to as “…the Testimony…” was the scroll of the law God gave them at mount Sinai, as we will see in a few days. (Exodus 20)

Let’s just spend the rest of today sitting with any family there in that desert, eating what we would call Matza bread. That is probably the closest thing we have today, to what they made fresh everyday, from the manna. And as we eat, let’s contemplate this daily miracle of God’s provision for 1 million people in the desert. Let’s praise God for His faithfulness but stand in awe when we look at that jar of manna which remained fresh for 40 years! The power of God is really quite remarkable isn’t it? 10 plagues, each unique from the other and God keeping His Hebrew people safe while Egypt suffered. The Red Sea escape through the ‘water tunnel’ and then watched those walls of water collapse on Pharaoh’s chariot army. Bitter water at Marah turned sweet, and now a daily bread delivery from heaven!

When you contemplate it all, what awakens from deep within that you want to express to God in your admiration and amazement for His majestic power and provision? Let’s take a few moments right now to thank Him, that this same God is providing for you and me in the same way, today! Here’s a song that might help you praise Him. . .

Today’s Scripture is Exodus 16:11-35.

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Bible images provided with attribution to www.LumoProject.com.

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Pastor Doug Anderson 262.441.8785
“Let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us, with our eyes fixed on Jesus…” (Heb. 12:1,2)

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