Manna Was Easily Accessible

Topic: Food
Passage: Exodus 16:14–22

December 21, 2020

Commentary

When the people complained against God and against Moses He could have  said,"I will rain fire and brimstone upon these ungrateful sinners!” Instead, in His mercy and by His grace He supplied them with bread each day. Every morning the desert was covered with thin flakes that looked like frost (vv. 14-15). It has been estimated that an omer is about two quarts. Think of the magnitude of this miracle that took place each morning (except on the Sabbath) for forty years. Someone has calculated that to feed two million people each day it would have required four freight trains of 60 cars each.

Some spiritual principals we can gain from this passage are:

  1. We can not hoard God’s Spiritual food for another day (vv. 16-22) but need to gather fresh food for each day.
  2. The manna disappeared when the sun became hot (v. 21). This suggests that the day of judgment will arrive when it will be too late to turn to Christ.
  3. The gathering of the Manna daily was a test of Israel’s obedience (v. 4). Christians that begin their day with the Bible, gathering spiritual food are the ones God can use.
  4. The manna was easily accessible. They did not have to travel many miles or work hard to get it. We do not have to go to Church to meet the Lord. He is always present.

Application

An example of this is when I read Phil. 4:10, “My God shall supply all your need according to His riches in glory by Christ Jesus. This is true when I really appropriate this to myself and say, “My God shall supply all of Lou Nicholes needs.”

Exodus 16:14– 22 (NET)

14 When the layer of dew had evaporated, there on the surface of the wilderness was a thin flaky substance, thin like frost on the earth. 15 When the Israelites saw it, they said to one another, “What is it?” because they did not know what it was. Moses said to them, “It is the bread that the Lord has given you for food.

16 “This is what the Lord has commanded: ‘Each person is to gather from it what he can eat, an omer per person according to the number of your people; each one will pick it up for whoever lives in his tent.’” 17 The Israelites did so, and they gathered—some more, some less. 18 When they measured with an omer, the one who gathered much had nothing left over, and the one who gathered little lacked nothing; each one had gathered what he could eat.

19 Moses said to them, “No one is to keep any of it until morning.” 20 But they did not listen to Moses; some kept part of it until morning, and it was full of worms and began to stink, and Moses was angry with them. 21 So they gathered it each morning, each person according to what he could eat, and when the sun got hot, it would melt. 22 And on the sixth day they gathered twice as much food, two omers per person; and all the leaders of the community came and told Moses.