Lessons From Manna

Good afternoon, everyone.

Today we’re going to look at an event in the Bible which I consider to be fascinating. The Bible is full of fascinating events, and God has put them in there to have a tremendous impact for anyone who reads it, particularly those who He has called. God uses these fascinating events in a very particular way. One of the things that He wants to achieve, because He is trying to replicate Himself, He’s trying to transform, in his brilliance and wisdom, the people that He has called. He uses these events, these fascinating events, to do just that.

We can learn from these fascinating events, and we can apply what we learned to transform ourselves into the person that God has called us to be. This one that we’re going to look at is no exception. Let’s turn to Exodus sixteen to begin right away. Exodus sixteen. I’m sure you can think of many fascinating events that are detailed in the Scriptures. Which one am I going to pick today to look at, to learn from? Exodus sixteen, and we’re going to jump right into verse thirty-two.

“Moses said, this is the thing which the Lord commands. Fill an omer of it to be kept for your generations, that they may see the bread wherewith I have fed you in the wilderness, when I brought you forth from the land of Egypt. Moses said to Aaron, take a pot and put an omer full of manna therein, and lay it up before the Lord to be kept for your generations. As the Lord commanded Moses, Aaron laid it up before the testimony to be kept.”

Mr. Houk, is this the fascinating biblical event? Really? Yes? Really? No need to raise your hand, but how many find it at least a little bit interesting that God had Aaron fill an omer of manna for generations to look at? Now imagine your parents telling you, “Children, we’re going on a sightseeing trip.” You ask, “Wow, Disney World?” “No, children, I said a sightseeing trip.” “What about, could it be Mount Rushmore?” “No.” “Grand Canyon?” Let’s go to Rome and see one of the seven wonders of the world, the Colosseum.”

“How about the Great Wall of China? Is that where we’re going, Mom and Dad? Taj Mahal? Petra? Petra? Big Ben? Great Barrier Reef? Mount Everest?” You arrive, not much around to see. You walk up, and you gather in a circle, and you appear into about a two-pint-three-liter pot full of small, round pieces of bread. That’s it. “Mom and Dad, this is it? It’s exciting. It’s amazing. Can’t you see it?” I will say that gazing into a pot of manna, brethren, might not be that impressive in and of itself, but the story behind it and the lessons from this bread may actually leave you in awe today, brethren.

In awe of the brilliance and wisdom that God shows as He tries to transform every single one of us. For that, let’s look at what I believe are some of the most important instructions that God ever gave His people. Let’s look at verse one. We just jump up to verse one here. “They took their journey from Elim, and all the congregation of the children of Israel came to the Wilderness of Sin, which is between Elim and Sinai, on the fifteenth day of the second month…” It’s just one month removed, “…after departing out of the land of Egypt.” Just one month in. “The whole congregation of the children of Israel murmured against Moses and Aaron in the wilderness.” Now it’s only been thirty days into their journey, and they’re already complaining.

Now, when I sat back and I thought about this, and I read the entire account, and again, this is part of the fascinating event that we’re looking at, it’s not entirely unreasonable if you think about it. How long do you think the food supply they brought from Egypt would last? It looks like about one month. Maybe they thought God would have given them the land he promised their father Abraham by this point. Because all accounts, it takes about eleven days from where they were in Egypt, journey on foot to the promised land. Now it’s thirty days, and the food supply has run out. Anyone who has traveled with children, small children in particular, immature children, they’re familiar with this. Are we there yet?

I heard it times four, if you will, on our travels. We would take ten-hour trips down to Georgia or go to Florida, and sure enough, it’s the same question. One didn’t learn from the other. When the other one got bored, they didn’t hear our response the first time to the first sibling that asked the question. They went ahead and asked it anyway. How much longer? I would say, because we were driving south, “Just look at the sun to your left. When you see the sun on your right, you’ll know we’ll be close.” I had to use all kinds of answers, but that’s what children do.

Verse three, “The children of Israel said to them, Would to God,” this is an expression if you look at it in English, “O that we would have died by the hand of the Lord in the land of Egypt when we sat by the flesh pots, and when we did eat bread to the full; for you have brought us forth into this wilderness to kill this whole assembly with hunger.” That’s what I would call in the modern-day drama. They’re being dramatic. Now, they did run out of food. Have you ever heard it? “We’re starving.” Son, girls, you don’t know what starving is. You have no idea.

“When are we going to eat?” Now, this wouldn’t quite be the same, but imagine saying to your parents, “Mom, Dad, why didn’t you just kill me at home instead of starving me to death on this trip?” Now, I’m certain that would not have gone well with my parents. God knew, brethren, in all seriousness, he knew the provisions they took from Egypt wouldn’t last long. Now he’s setting them up, I believe, for one of the most powerful instructions that he gave to them.

Continuing here in verse four, “Then said the Lord to Moses, Behold, I will rain bread from heaven for you,” bread from heaven, “and the people shall go out and gather a certain rate,” it’s a specific amount, “every day.” There it is. One of the most powerful instructions that God gave to His newly freed people, that are now journeying in the desert towards a destination that they so much look forward to: the promised land. The first instructions God gave Israel in the wilderness beyond the Red Sea were about collecting bread. What? Collecting bread?

That’s it. How to collect bread, Sunday through Friday, which is the preparation day, and as my daughters like to say, and here we are. Today, brethren, let’s look at God’s instructions about collecting and eating manna and draw some powerful lessons from it. People on the outside looking at us, they might see our lives as ordinary, dull, mundane, whatever adjective you want to come up with. I don’t. I don’t see my life as a Christian following this way of life as ordinary, dull, or mundane.

Our days, however, as Christians, are pretty simple, and quite honestly, they should be. Not every day is a new moon celebration. Not every day as Christians are we having a feast on the Sabbath. It’s not the Feast of Tabernacles or another holy day. Thankfully, our days are not made up of Friday or Saturday nights at bars, or concerts, or sporting events. Think about our lives after baptism. The days, the weeks, the months, maybe forty years beyond the Red Sea, beyond our baptism in our wilderness. Brethren, while our lives over the days, and weeks, months, and years may be routine and simple, they are in no way ordinary, dull, or mundane.

Let’s look at God’s instruction in the first lesson that we can get from it. Let’s just continue reading here, continuing in verse four. “The people shall go out and gather a certain rate every day to prove whether they will walk in my law or not.” A specific amount of what every day? We know what it is. Verse fourteen, “When the dew had gone up, behold, upon the face of the wilderness there lay a small round thing, as small as the hoarfrost on the ground.” When I got up this morning, I looked out, and I thought it was inspiring because it was the first time I saw frost here in the summer.

It was literally frost on the ground. White patches, little by little. I thought that was strange for me because I never see that. Maybe it was the sprinkler system, and the wind blowing, whatever the case might be, but I thought that was inspiring to see that this morning when I got up early. Here’s lesson number one from this little portion of Scripture here. God uses small things every day to teach and test our obedience to prepare for greater ones. Let me repeat that. God uses small things every day to teach and test our obedience to prepare us for greater ones.

If we don’t grasp this, brethren, we are missing God’s brilliance and wisdom, and the way He transforms us into his prized possession. The way He intended to transform Israel into His prized possession. God uses easy-to-follow instructions to sort out those who would walk in his ways from those who would not. Look at what it says here. “The people should go out and gather a certain rate every day to prove whether they will walk in my law or not,” and he hadn’t given it yet. Christ understood this. He taught his disciples this foundational lesson.

Let’s turn to Luke sixteen. Luke chapter sixteen. We’ll just read one verse here. It says here in verse ten, “He that is faithful in that which is least is faithful also in much. He that is unjust in the least is unjust also in much.” Now, what makes this powerful to me is that Christ isn’t supposing or suggesting or saying maybe about this. It is a foregone conclusion whether we’re talking about Israel or us. If Israel didn’t follow simple instructions about collecting and eating manna, there was no way they would obey God’s law.

Remember the famous nine words that we’ve heard recently in the prophecy series? Just three chapters later in Exodus nineteen, “All that the Lord has spoken we will do.” You read the account in manna; they couldn’t even get collecting manna correct. They were disobeying God. All means all, brethren. Not just the big things when we’re scared or worried, but the everyday little things is where God is focusing us, transforming us little by little. The sermonette set this up well. If you want to accomplish something big, you got to start small.

Christ was more direct with the disciples. If we say we will be faithful in all God’s commands, which I don’t think there’s a person in this room that would disagree with that, we better show it in simple everyday things, brethren. Most of our tests when it comes to the things of God are repetitive. They’re small ones, but they’re vital, they’re crucial. God designed small repetitive obedience tests, if you will, to condition and prepare us for the occasional big ones that come along. I think that’s brilliant. I think that’s genius. My dad often would say, “Son, you will play how you practice.”

I’ve said that time and time again. If we practice obedience in the small things, when we reach the playoffs, when we reach the championship game, our minds are already prepared to perform. Think about Christ in the desert. He spent his entire childhood, teen years, young adult life, practicing day by day, obeying God in the little things, at home, in the synagogue, with his dad, before he encountered Satan after forty days in the desert. It was the little things that prepared Christ for the big things, and think about what rode on that. Think about what we can learn from that, brethren.

What small things does God give us specifically to prepare us, to transform us? Before we look at that, before we draw lessons from those things, I want to hammer this point home. I want to drive it home. What could have been even bigger than the Ten Commandments to transform Israel into the prized treasure? Nothing. You think about Christ. Christ said, “I came to fulfill the law,” and he summed it up. The first four commandments, he says, “Love your God with all your might, all your strength, all your heart,” and he summed up the last six commandments by saying, “Love your neighbor as yourself.”

He didn’t diminish the law; he expanded it. He increased it. Nothing could have been bigger. God knew that his commandments, much, much, would be ineffective for those unwilling to be faithful in the least manner. That’s what he said here in Luke chapter ten. They needed to be trained to be obedient in things that are least to prepare them to be obedient in the much. It’s that simple. God knows in the little things whether or not we will be obedient when the rubber hits the road and the big things come along.

It’s no coincidence that God arranged that journey so that the provisions that they took from Egypt depleted thirty days later, because God is going to teach them powerful lessons that we’re going to look at. I think about my calling. I was always the provider, for the most part, for my family. Most of the time, my wife worked because she wanted to work, not because she had to work. She didn’t have to worry about the multiple houses, house payments, or the multiple car payments that we had, or the vacations, or the food that came day in and day out, week by week.

What could be wrong with that? Most people look at that from the world and say, “From their perspective, well done.” I was unteachable. I was in no condition to learn lessons from the little things that God was going to use to teach me. We have to get this, brethren. If God had let me come to the church, I’ve said that with all that I had, I would not have made it. Why? Because I couldn’t be taught in the least, in the little things. I had those covered. My marriage, my children, putting food on the table, a roof over their head.

I would have thought, coming in, that I was ready to take on the big things of living God’s way. That could not be more false. I had to realize that. I’ve told this, and I don’t want to go into the details, but my life inexplicably reached a point where God could begin teaching me with little things again. After baptism, no change. Jesus Christ, the same yesterday, today, and forever. God, the same yesterday, today, and forever. God never changes. He continues teaching and testing me every day in the small things, whether or not I will be obedient.

God instructed Israel to collect a certain amount of bread every day before giving them the Ten Commandments. How much bigger can you get? Before these, God said, “Go out and gather a certain rate of bread each day.” Before God gave them laws about restitution and administering justice, he said, “Go out and gather a specific amount every day.” Before God instructed Israel about holy days, tithes, offerings, clean and unclean meats, hygiene, sexual relations, you know what he said? “Go out every day and collect a specific amount for yourself in your household.”

Before teaching them about blasphemy, punishment, vows, Levitical duties, rule for kings, property boundaries, before laying out the rules about warfare, unsolved murders, inheritances, dealing with rebellious children, before he talked to them and gave them instructions about divorce and marriage, God told them, “Go out daily and gather a certain amount.” None of these or any other elements of the law had been given, and I find that amazing, fascinating. These would have been almost pointless to give them to obey if they were not given repetitive, small things to obey daily.

God was setting them up for success in the big things by telling them, instructing them on the little things. Think about the parable of the talents. Christ told the one who received the five and produced five more, “Well done, you good and faithful servant, you have been faithful over few things. I will make you ruler over many things. Enter you into the joy of the Lord.” Think about what’s riding on the few. Eternal life. The joy of the Lord, eternal joy of the Lord, is eternal life, becoming a God being.

What greater joy can someone experience when they’re transformed in front of God’s eyes, in front of your own eyes, into a God being? It’s all riding on the little as much as it is the big things. God will teach and test our obedience and faithfulness every day. God gave them one thing, not many, to prove their faithfulness. To begin proving that they were going to be faithful. “Collect a certain rate for you and your household,” he said. Maybe your small thing, brethren, is money, because I will tell you, that’s a small thing in God’s eyes.

The money we have is a small thing, regardless of the amount. If you have a little bit or you have a ton, it’s little to God, because that’s what this account is talking about. That’s the lead-up to this account. God will teach and test you daily with money, what we’ll call the least of your concerns, to determine if you qualify to handle true riches, which is much. That’s what it says here. Perhaps it’s not money, but maybe you have talents or skills, as you heard earlier. A few skills or talents, maybe one skill or talent. Doesn’t matter. God gave it to you. We’ll look at that.

He will teach us and test us daily on those things, brethren. Will we qualify for infinite talents to run cities? First Peter chapter four. First Peter chapter four and verse ten. “As every man has received the gift,” every man, “even so minister the same one to another, as good stewards of the manifold grace of God. If any man speak,” could be talking about primarily ministry, but it could be talking about us speaking to one another, “speak as God’s oracles.” If you’re giving a piece of advice to your brethren and you know principles of God, and they need your help, and it isn’t above your pay grade, speak as an oracle of God.

Speak as someone who knows what God’s principles have. If it gets bigger than your pay grade, give it to the minister. Ministers, speak as oracles of God. We’ve all received the gift. If any man speaks, speak as God’s oracles. If any man minister, that means like diakono, to serve the physical needs, do it according to the ability God gives that he in all things may be glorified through Jesus Christ, to whom be praise and dominion forever and ever. Amen. Brethren, God gives at least one gift to every single one of us, and I’m certain he gives more than one gift to all of us, to see if we’ll obey and use the little things to help others.

It says, “In everything glorify God.” Think about this. The Israelites would have glorified God just as much by following simple instructions as obeying his laws and commandments. In all things, they are to glorify God, the little and the big. Romans chapter twelve verse three, “For I say through the grace given unto me, to every man among you, not to think of himself more highly than he ought to think, but to think soberly according as God has dealt,” think about dealing out cards or dealing out gifts,” to every man the measure of faith.”

For as we have many members in one body and all members have not the same office, duties, responsibilities, but we all have responsibilities in the body of Christ, so we, being many, are one in Christ. The context is the whole body, not just a portion of it, not just the ministry, and members one of another. “Having then gifts differing,” verse six, “according to the grace that is given to us,” given to you, this verse should be speaking to each and every one of us, “whether prophecy, let us prophesy according to the proportion of faith; or ministry, let us wait on our ministering; or he that teaches, on teaching; or he that exhorts, on exhortation; he that gives,” you don’t have to be a minister to give.

You don’t have to be a minister to encourage, “or to exhort someone; let him do it with simplicity. He that rules, supervises something with diligence. He that shows mercy, with cheerfulness.” I have repeatedly said, and you’ve heard recently, that God gives instructions on how to do something he commands us to do, not just what to do, but how to do it. Look at that. He does not leave any one of us wondering about the small things. She who cooks for potluck, or for those in need, will she cook with joy, and according to the ability that God gives, not more, not less. Don’t overdo it; everything in moderation.

He who brings something for the potluck, will he bring it cheerfully, and according to the ability God gives him, not more, not less? God’s not asking for more than your ability can withstand, but he’s not asking for less either. Everyone there’s a certain amount, hearkening back to the instructions that he gave about collecting manna every day. He who helps with setup, will he do it with eagerness to serve, according to the ability that God gave him? She who leaves or helps in the kitchen, will she do so diligently, ruling over the group, or supervising the group.

Will she do it diligently with meekness and kindness, according to the ability that God gives her, not more, not less? Will we participate in all Church events, rather than we hit hard being at the activities at the feast? Family day, seniors luncheon, not everyone qualifies for that. The first day, the last day luncheon. Brethren, do we participate in those? Softball, socials, community garden, not to mention Bible studies and new moons. Do we do it diligently, as it says here?

If you’re given something to do at work, do you do it cheerfully with diligence and putting all your might into it, demonstrating and being an example to your co-workers? At home, do you give of yourself with simplicity, letting your life shine? Not just your life, but your life. Let your life shine. All of these everyday things may seem small to the world, but we know, brethren, that all those little things prepare us for something indescribable, greater, bigger. That’s lesson number one. God uses small things every day to teach and test our obedience, to prepare us for greater ones.

Let’s look at the second lesson. Let’s go back to Exodus chapter sixteen. Going back there quite a bit. Exodus sixteen, just read one verse thirty-five. “The children of Israel ate manna for forty years.” They didn’t just collect manna the same way, day in and day out, Sunday through the preparation day. They ate manna for forty years. That’s an important point, brethren. God designed our bodies to be nourished daily. Did you ever think of this? God could have designed our bodies to be nourished once every forty days, or forty weeks, or forty months, or even forty years. God can design anything.

If he designed us for forty days, what would have been the test after coming out of the desert, not eating for forty days, and drinking for forty days and nights? Christ. God designed our bodies to be nourished every single day. Every day, Israel had to eat. They ate the same thing for forty years. Manna. Day in and day out. Morning, noon, and night. Three square meals. Now I get it. You may not think I get it, but I get it. I lived in the Dominican Republic. I know I’ve told this before, but I lived there for eleven years.

I often joked with people, still do, that I had one of the most extraordinarily diverse culinary experiences that you could have as a young twenty-one, twenty-two-year-old. For example, I might have rice, beans, and chicken on what I’ll call a simple Sunday. Magnificent Mondays, now there’s something. I’d dine on beans, chicken, and rice. Then came Terrific Tuesday. What a treat. Smorgasbord of chicken, rice, and beans. Then there was Wild Wednesday, folks. That’s where we got really crazy. Slices of beef, not chicken. On top of what? Rice coupled with beans.

Brethren, think about our brothers and sisters in Christ in Africa, who likely eat their staple diet, the same foods, day in and day out. Maybe that’s all that’s available to them in that region of the world. Maybe that’s all they can afford. What about our brothers and sisters in Asia, French Polynesia, Philippines? They likely eat a limited, small selection of foods every day. Those that live in South America, Peru, Mexico, the Caribbean eat similar foods to what I ate, day in and day out, in the Dominican Republic.

Those brethren in these countries are conscious, maybe more than we are, in these Israelite nations that we live in, many of us, of the second lesson. Lesson number two. God uses small things, seemingly ordinary things, like feeding us daily, to teach us to rely on Him. That our reliance is entirely on God. God wants us to rely on Him in every area of our lives, starting with each time we look down at a plate of food. No matter how many times you look at rice, beans, and chicken, or chicken, beans, and rice, or beans, rice, and chicken.

While others see eating and drinking as routine, we see our daily food and drink as proof that our God cares for us. I did a quick calculation. I’ve calculated that my mother-in-law, over the course of her marriage, has prepared her husband, her children, her grandchildren over twenty thousand plates of rice, beans, and chicken. Let me tell you, she does a great job at it. You wouldn’t expect me to say anything else, because she’s part of the church, and I have to continue eating when I go to visit her. You know what she understands?

She understands that she relies on God, not only for her cooking skills and the ability to cook that rice, beans, and chicken every day, she relies also on her God, on our God, in her marriage, and how she is as a mother to her now-grown children, how she is as a grandmother, and how she is as a sister in Christ to all of you. Just the little things that teach us to rely on God for everything. Matthew chapter six. Again, let’s go back to what Christ said. Matthew six. We often read over these verses and miss powerful lessons we can learn.

Matthew chapter six and verse twenty-six. “Behold the fowls of the air.” Now, why would we do that? Why would I want to see a bird flying over my head, or sitting in a nest, or battling out at our bird feeder? Why? Why do we contemplate birds? Why is Christ telling his disciples? I mean, this is the second member of the God family giving bird-watching advice. That’s a simple thing. Why? “For they sow not, neither do they reap, nor gather into barns; yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much better than they?”

Hopefully, you answered yes quietly to yourself to that rhetorical question. I don’t want to say that we are better than the ancient Israelites, but I certainly will say this, brethren, we are better off than them. We don’t have to eat manna to learn the lessons from it. One way God reveals himself as our Father is that he feeds us. Physically feeds us every day. It’s as simple as that. He gives us instruction about how we should eat. Clean versus unclean. Everything in moderation. We have to be an example of obedience even in the little things that we do, in our dietary intake.

God’s watching it. Brethren, you think it’s a minor point? No, God is watching us in the little things because it is revealing in terms of the big things. Deuteronomy twenty-nine. Here’s the problem. Deuteronomy twenty-nine. The Israelites didn’t have the heart, eyes, or ears to understand what we, brethren, can. Deuteronomy twenty-nine and verse two. “Moses called all Israel,” this is verse two, Deuteronomy twenty-nine, “...and said, you have seen all that the Lord did before your eyes in the land of Egypt unto Pharaoh and all his servants and all his land. The great temptations with your eyes have seen the signs and those great miracles, yet the Lord has not given you a heart to perceive, eyes to see, or ears to hear unto this day. I have led you forty years in the wilderness.”

Here’s what he’s saying. “Look, your clothes have not waxen old upon you, and your shoes have not waxen old upon your feet.” Moses is nearing the end of his journey, gathering Israel, last words of a mighty man of God, and he tells them to look at their bodies and their feet. He gathered Israel to remind them of the miracles and the law, but he also wanted them to take note of the seemingly ordinary things God did to teach them to rely on him every step of the way for forty years. Moses had to point out the obvious to them.

Proof that God was their Lord was literally on their bodies and strapped to their feet. Moses told Israel they didn’t have the heart, eyes, or ears to perceive, see, or hear any of that, much less care or be grateful for it. Let’s go to Deuteronomy eight. Deuteronomy eight and verse two. You shall remember all the way,” all the way, “that the Lord your God led you these forty years in the wilderness, to humble you and to prove you and to know what is in your heart, whether you would keep his commandments,” what a setup, “or not.”

He did just that for forty years. How did he do it? Here are the next words. Verse three. “He humbled you, and suffered you to hunger, and fed you with manna.” That’s how he tested them and prepared them to obey his commandments and laws to prove them. “He humbled you, and suffered you to hunger, and fed you with manna, which you knew not, neither did your fathers know; that he might make you know that man does not live by bread only, but by every word that proceeds out of the mouth of the Lord does man live.”

Sounds familiar, those words, doesn’t it? It’s one of the responses that Christ had against Satan’s temptation to convert stones into bread because you know he was hungry. Verse four, “Your raiment waxed not old upon you, neither did your foot swell, these forty years.” Foot swelling. God even took care of their feet on a day-to-day basis. You know what? Two thousand two hundred. Let me throw that number at you. What do you think that is? Now that’s a conservative estimate, my friends, of the number of miles that they walked over forty years.

Moses, Caleb, Joshua, Aaron. Two thousand two hundred miles. That would be the equivalent of taking forty years, forty years, walking from Wadsworth to San Diego, California. Not a sandal strap broken, and not a piece of clothing worn out, and no swelling feet. It hurts just thinking about that. Let me tell you, it wasn’t always warm in Israel, in the wilderness. It could get cold. They were subjected to extreme temperatures as well. You know what God was teaching them? To rely on Him every single day, every single step.

Every Israelite could literally look down at their untorn sandals and unswollen feet and be reminded that God was present every step of the way. Brethren, how much more can we? It may not be that dramatic, but God has given us His Spirit. He’s given us eyes, and a heart, and ears to perceive, to see, to hear how God wants us to rely on Him every single day. The Apostle Paul understood this powerfully.

Let’s turn to Philippians chapter four. Philippians four. Familiar verse, but you’ll see it maybe a different way, or more deeply, or more broadly. The Apostle Paul understood the power of daily instructions from these ordinary, small things in his life. Let’s read what he says, verse thirteen. “I can do all things through Christ which strengthens me.” How many of us have memorized that verse? Oh, you must be talking about spiritual matters, right? Let’s look at the verse leading up to this. Verse ten, “I rejoiced in the Lord greatly, that now at last your care for me has flourished again.”

That certainly wouldn’t be spiritual, or that would be reverse. The brethren weren’t taking care of him spiritually; he was. They were called to take care of the Apostle and physical needs. He’s obviously talking about physical things, and he’s discussing his daily physical needs, not just once in a while. “Wherein you were also careful, but you lacked opportunity. Not that I speak in respect of want, for I have learned.” Oh, three of the most powerful words that anyone that in God’s way can say. Three of the most powerful words. I have learned.

“In whatsoever state I am, therewith to be content. I know both how to be abased, and I know how to abound.” In other words, I know how to have a little bit of money, and I know how to have a lot of money. “Every where and in all things I am instructed.” There’s another powerful three words: I have learned, and I am instructed. Brethren, that’s what our day-to-day lives should be. It should be a daily instruction for us to learn how to more and more rely on God in every area of our lives.

Food is just the simplest example, but if we don’t even see God and our reliance on God in that, how are we going to see our reliance in the greater things? He goes on to say, “...both to be full and hungry, both to abound and to suffer need.” No one can convince me otherwise. The Apostle Paul didn’t understand parallels between his journey and Israel. You can’t convince me that he didn’t understand it. He didn’t learn the lessons from manna and the experiences and the lessons that God wanted to teach him on that.

Where do we start if we want a mindset, the fortitude that Paul had to do all things? I can do all things through Christ which strengthens me. Matthew chapter six. Matthew six. I’ll often go back here to the model prayer. Verse ten. Powerful words. “Your kingdom come.” We pray it every day. We want it every day. We’re the seventh era. It should be on our minds and the forefront of our minds day in and day out, right? Yes. “Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven.” God’s will. We want to do it, brethren.

Number two. What’s the third thing in the model prayer? “Give us this day our daily bread.” Limiting our request to give us this day our daily bread, think about that, expresses our reliance in God today. For us, a plate of food, even if it’s peas or lima beans, or a lunch container full of vegetables, when you’re at work or at school, brethren, is an answered prayer to our reliance on God. Lesson number two. God uses small things, seemingly ordinary things like feeding us daily, to teach us to rely on Him in every area.

If you learn to rely on God in just these little, small things, you’ll learn as my mother-in-law is learning and will continue to learn to rely on him in their marriage, whether it’s an unconverted spouse or even in the church. Your reliance on God to give you guidance and wisdom as you raise your children, in your relationships, your friendships, at work. Our reliance is entirely on God. Let’s jump down and read a memory verse we know all too well, and I want to examine this verse just after the one that we know to go to lesson number three.

Verse thirty-three. We don’t have to go anywhere else. “Seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things shall be added unto you.” Another memory verse. Powerful. We should have it memorized. Most of us know it by memory. How many see this as a command? “Seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things shall be added unto you.” How many of us are obeying it? You know how to prove to God? You know how to prove it to yourself that you’re obeying this command?

Don’t look anywhere else in the Bible. Do you know what prevents us from seeking God’s kingdom and His righteousness every day? Here’s some advice that Christ gives, verse thirty-four, “Take, therefore, no thought for tomorrow: for the morrow shall take thought for the things of itself. Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof.” Here’s lesson number three that is intrinsically tied to lesson number two about relying on God today. God uses small things to teach us to trust him with tomorrow.

Maybe a subtle difference, but there is a difference between reliance on God and trusting God. I see it this way. You might see it a different way. I rely on God today, just like Paul relied every day on God. He trusted God with tomorrow. What did that allow him to do? Seek first the kingdom of God today and His righteousness today, because he left that in God’s hands tomorrow. We plan constantly, brethren. We plan things days, weeks, months in advance. There’s nothing wrong with planning or looking ahead.

That’s not what I’m talking about. Israel was carnal-minded. They were self-reliant. They were covetous. They were faithless people. They refused to rely on God for their present needs, and they wanted more than they needed and did not trust God for their future. You saw it. When he said, “Don’t go out on the Sabbath and collect manna because there won’t be any,” what did they do? They went out on the Sabbath and tried to find manna, and guess what there was? Nothing. He says, “Don’t leave leftovers.”

Now, I’m not against leftovers, but he said, “Don’t leave leftovers. Trust me for tomorrow that the manna will be there tomorrow,” and what did they do? They left leftovers, and it stank, and it turned into worms. There was worms. They did not trust God. Again, God said, “Don’t store this overnight,” but some stockpiled it. God said they will be fine on the Sabbath and on His holy days, and if you go to the feast, if you obey, just obey me. It doesn’t matter what your boss says, obey me. Trust me for tomorrow.

Now, full disclosure, my wife and I store groceries in our refrigerator, in our freezer, in our pantry, and we keep leftovers. We eat leftovers, but that’s for convenience. If I had to go back to the days when I was living in the Dominican Republic where there was no electricity, and there was nothing to put in the refrigerator, and we had to figure out whether we were going to eat on three dollars a day, day in and day out, I’d go back to doing it, because I survived. People don’t pray, “Give us this day our daily bread,” and God still feeds them. How much more us? God feeds the birds every day. How much more us? We must learn to trust in God for tomorrow, and the day after, and day after. We plan, but we must trust God.

Isaiah twenty-six, and here’s the benefit of it. Isaiah twenty-six verse three, “You will keep him in perfect peace,” think about that, “whose mind stays on you because he trusts you. Trust in the Lord forever.” I don’t have to read a lot of verses for them to speak powerfully, the lessons that hearken us back to manna. Reliance and trust work hand in hand. If you learn to rely on God every day as the Apostle Paul did, whether it’s in times of scarcity or trouble, you will trust God. If you trust God, God will not fail you in terms of you relying on Him today. They work hand in hand with one another.

If you learn to trust God no matter the situation, your reliance on God will not weaken; it will strengthen, and you will have, it says, perfect peace. Not just peace, perfect peace. Now you can see Paul sitting with a ball and chain on his leg, not worrying. It was a test, and he was instructed on it; he learned from it, but it was a test and an instruction for the people who eventually came to his aid and met his physical needs at the right time, given the right opportunity.

Here’s another lesson. Let’s look at three portions of Scripture. Let’s turn to back to Exodus sixteen. See if we go through a few Scriptures here very quickly. Exodus sixteen and verse thirty one. “The house of Israel called the name thereof manna.” They were the ones that called it manna. God called it bread from heaven. “It was like coriander seed, white, and the taste of it was like wafers made with honey.” Wafers made with honey? Think about that. You serve that after potluck, and I’ll jump right to the dessert section in line. Wafers made with honey, made by God. Think about that just for a moment.

Go to Numbers eleven. Let’s just look at the description of manna for a moment here. Numbers chapter eleven and verse seven. “The manna was like coriander seed, and its color was like bdellium,” that’s a pearl. “The people went about, gathered it, and ground it in mills, or beat it in mortar, baked it in pans, and made cakes out of it, and it tasted like fresh oil.” So, depending on how they prepared it, it was like fresh oil. Psalm seventy-eight. Psalm seventy-eight, building to another lesson, in verse twenty-four. They believe not in God, and trusted not in His salvation. Trusting God’s salvation, I’ll just throw this thought in there, is a day-to-day thing. It isn’t this far-off, lofty goal that we have. No, it’s something we need to do every single day. We need to trust in God’s salvation every day. Yes, I trust God will come and will give us ultimate salvation of eternal life, but I want to trust His salvation every day, His deliverance every day, His provision every day. I want to rely and trust on Him today and tomorrow.

“Though He had commanded the clouds from above, and opened the doors of heaven, and had rained down manna upon them to eat, and had given them of the corn of heaven.” Corn of heaven. Oh, I had recently a corn on the cob made with... it was grilled on a grill, and it had a bunch of sauces on it. It was absolutely delicious. Corn is one of my favorite vegetables, fruits, you name it. I like rice with corn. Ask my wife. I want to mix things up a little bit and have a terrific Thursday. Throw some corn in that rice. It’s absolutely delicious. But it goes on to say, “Man did eat angels’ food.”

Now, think about how long the angels were living before us, or existed before us, and they’ve been eating it for a while. And it was angels’ food. Wafers made with honey, fresh oil, corn of heaven. Angels’ food. Powerful descriptions of what must have been delicious. There’s a law in business called the law of diminishing return. The first time you go to a restaurant, it’s the best restaurant I’ve ever been to. Absolutely fabulous. Go the second time, he goes, “Oh, it wasn’t as good as last time, but it was great.” Go a third time, you go, “Eh, yes, that’s kind of good.” Now, on the fourth trip, you’re looking for a different restaurant. It’s called the law of diminishing return.

As you go back, the likeliness of you returning goes down and down and down. It’s a law that all businesses... That’s why they try to keep their menus fresh and try to advertise, because they want you to come back. And although I cannot prove it, let’s be honest, manna was probably the first food on the planet that people ever got tired of. And we’re talking angels’ food. Day after day, the same old, same old. You know the feeling. If you’ve ever eaten chicken several times, night after night, day after day. So let’s imagine a few dishes they may have tried to keep things interesting and enjoyable.

Here’s a list of things: manna stew, manna casserole, roasted manna medallions, mannaroni and cheese, honey-glazed manna bites, manna balls (like meatballs, but not), crispy fried manna, manna pancakes, manna surprise, (The surprise? It’s manna), leftover manna salad, manna on a stick, and if you’re really desperate, raw manna, because you just gave up. I’m going to go back to raw manna. Kids, dinner’s ready. Guess what we’re having? Manna lasagna. If Uber Eats had been around, most of Israel would have signed up for it. Proverbs fifteen. Proverbs fifteen. I digress. We’re still building to a powerful lesson here.

Proverbs fifteen and verse sixteen. “Better is little with the fear of the Lord than great treasure and trouble therewith. Better is a dinner of herbs where love is than a stalled or fat ox...” Big juicy steak. “...and hatred.” Went out for a steak dinner the other day. You know what made it wonderful? The company that was with me. I enjoyed the steak, but I loved the company. Lesson number four. No matter how small or ordinary, God wants us to see the things He gives us every day as gifts to enjoy. Ecclesiastes chapter three. Not to go far at all. There we go. Ecclesiastes chapter three. No matter how small or ordinary, God wants us to see the things He gives us every day as gifts to enjoy.

Ecclesiastes three, verse twelve, starting with the smallest things. “I know that there is no good in them, but for a man to rejoice and to do good in his life.” He knows that. But I also know this, verse thirteen, “That every man should eat and drink and enjoy the good of all his labor.” Why? “It is a gift of God.” If we believe this, then we understand what the Apostle James tells us. Every good gift, which includes food, drink, jobs, parents, children, brethren, friendships, none of them are perfect, because he uses two things here. Good. Every good gift. Not perfect. And that includes food and drink and parents and children, brethren, friendships. None of that is perfect, brethren.

But James, the Apostle James, encouraged us to see it as a good thing, as a gift, a good gift from God. But then he goes on to say, every perfect gift, like Christ, God’s Spirit, His plan, His will for us, James says it all comes down from the Father of Lights. There are good gifts and there are perfect gifts. And if we learn to appreciate and enjoy the gifts that God gives us and the small things, how much greater we’ll appreciate the bigger ones? So we must enjoy even the basic elements of life, the portion God gives us daily, starting with the food we eat and the things we drink, the beverages we drink.

Think about this. I enjoy the same meal. I enjoy one meal over another. If they’re exactly prepared the same, if I know it was prepared by my mother, my wife, or my mother-in-law, versus a chef in a restaurant. Why? Because it came from people who I know deeply care about me. But I enjoy every meal, including from the chef, except maybe those meals early on in our marriage. Wait a second. Those were tough. She was learning, and so was I. But I enjoy just about every meal because I know it all comes from God, and God is paying attention to how we see the small day-to-day things in our lives. How we see our marriages. Good, not perfect.

Children, jobs, classes, daily commutes to work or school, Sabbath services, church events. None of those are perfect. They’re good gifts. Do we enjoy them as we should? Do we find ways of enjoying them? What are we doing in our marriages to make it new and fresh every day? I’ve been waking up to the same woman for thirty-three years, and it doesn’t get old. She might think it’s the same old, same old. I don’t think she does. She’s nodding no. I’m safe. But God has opened our eyes to enjoy marriage more than we ever could have outside of God’s way because of that.

Brethren, think about your lives and the daily ordinary things. God gave them to you to learn to enjoy them as gifts from Him. I can remember back in Christmas and birthday, and sometimes when you open it up, you’re excited, and it’s a pair of socks or another sweater or a shirt or a pair of pants. I didn’t appreciate it back then, those gifts from my parents, but they were giving me what I needed, not what I wanted. And that’s the greatest gift that we can get from God, brethren. What we need. Sure, He’ll give us the desires of our heart, but the greatest gifts are the ones that we need, small and big.

And you know what else I’ve come to realize? The greatest gift that day that I received on Christmas or birthday was right there in front of me. The greatest gifts I ever got in my childhood were my parents. The greatest gift we have, brethren, is God in our lives. Those gifts help us to realize that. Think about it. The Israelites kept the Sabbath as they journeyed. They observed new moons and holy days for forty years, thirty-nine, forty years, and onwards. I don’t read anywhere... I’m not saying that it doesn’t exist, but I don’t read anywhere that they complained about resting on the Sabbath.

I don’t read anywhere that they complained about observing new moons and holy days. They stopped keeping them because they allowed the world to influence them, but while they were keeping them, I don’t read much. I don’t see it. There might be somewhere, but they didn’t complain about that. They complained about manna and having to collect it every day and eat it every day. The Israelites grew weary of living day-to-day the way God wanted them to. That’s the problem. They grew tired of their journey under God and Moses.

Egypt, bondage, life under Pharaoh’s rule, was continuously attractive to them because they didn’t learn to enjoy the little things that they had as gifts from God. They would have happily returned to that routine in their lives. We see it happening in the church today. No different. Despite miracles and God’s one true church, despite the signs and wonders, despite the victories that God gives people, I see it happen to others. Others see it happen to me. Arriving at the land promised or the promised land, a place flowing with milk and honey, the kingdom, was taking too long for them.

It wasn’t a problem of the kingdom coming later than they expected or thought. You know what the core of their discontentment is? Their core discontentment is that they loathed the light bread that they had to eat every day. That’s where it started. That’s where it emanated from. The small daily routine things. They loathed it. Let’s turn to Numbers twenty-one. Numbers twenty-one. I’ll get there in a moment. Verse five. “And the people spoke against God and Moses. Wherefore have you brought us up out of Egypt to die in the wilderness? For there is no bread, neither is there any water, and our soul, our lives, loathes this bread.”

Brethren, it all started with not learning to enjoy the greatest gift God could ever give us. Again, the things we need. You know what we need most? I’ve said it. God. But if we can’t see the gifts from God as something we can enjoy every day, how are we going to feel the same way about God Himself? It all starts with the little things. Israel missed the point. We can all miss the point. They didn’t need manna in their lives as much as they needed God in their lives. Whether they realized it or not, they despised and rejected, not just the manna, but God and His way of living, and they got tired and they wanted to bail, or they wanted to rebel. And that’s the story of Israel.

Brethren, it can’t be so with us. And how do we inoculate ourselves, protect ourselves against getting weary or bored with this way of life? See and enjoy whatever God gives us as a gift from Him, both the good and the perfect ones. Let’s go back to Exodus sixteen for the final, and I think, greatest lesson. There’s plenty of other lessons, brethren. I encourage you. This one chapter, if you just meditate on it, you’re going to say, “Wow, how much we can learn.” Exodus sixteen, in verse eleven, “And the Lord spoke to Moses, saying, I have heard the murmurings of the children of Israel. Speak to them, saying, At even, you shall eat flesh, and in the morning, you shall be filled with bread,” manna, “and you shall know that I am the Lord, your God.”

Greater than obedience, which is a byproduct of what I’m about to say, greater than enjoying the little things, greater than relying and trusting, it all starts here, brethren. The greatest lesson from manna, God often uses seemingly ordinary, everyday things to show us that He is our God. What more powerful lesson can we have? It’s foundational to all the other lessons that we’ve covered today and more that you can learn from it. God often uses seemingly ordinary, everyday things to show us that He is our God. God made Himself known to Israel as their God using manna. God made Himself known to us and continues to make us in similar ways.

Let’s turn to John six. John six, as we begin to come to a close. So, after more than twelve hundred years, what we’re about to read, Israel did not improve. No heart, no eyes, or ears to see God revealing Himself through bread. In verses one through twenty-one, we won’t have time to read that. Christ fed a great multitude with just a small amount of food to begin with. Christ knew that something great was hiding just behind those few loaves and fish. He didn’t despise the little things that God gave Him that day. He was relying on that, and He trusted God for what was about to happen in the very immediate future. Two fish and five barley loaves.

It is the next day, in verse twenty-two, the people search out Jesus and begin an exchange with Him. And let’s pick it up in verse thirty. “They said, therefore, unto Him, What sign show you then that we may see and believe you? What will you do?” And here it is. “Our fathers did eat manna in the desert. As it is written, He gave them bread from heaven.” There it is. “But My Father gives from heaven to eat, verse thirty-two. “Then Jesus said to them, Truly, truly, I say to you, Moses gave you not that bread from heaven, but My Father gives you the true bread from heaven. For the bread of God is He which comes down from heaven and gives life to the world. Then they said to him, Lord, evermore.” Pantoteh, continuously, always. Are you sure? Are you sure you’re ready for every day, day in and day out, the same thing?

Well, here it is. “And Jesus said to them, I Am the Bread of Life. He that comes to Me shall never hunger, and he that believes in Me shall never thirst.” Yes, God sent bread from heaven to reveal Himself to Israel, but He also revealed Himself to us by sending Jesus Christ. And interestingly, I don’t know how many of you know this. We know that Jesus was born in Bethlehem. That word Bethlehem in the Hebrew means house of bread. And how did Jesus reveal Himself? He fed thousands with five loaves of bread and two fish.

That was the run-up to Jesus revealing Himself as the bread of life. Brethren, while we can learn much from manna, the bread from heaven, we must learn everything from the Bread of Life, Jesus Christ. God taught Christ every day, little by little, to obey Him in the small things. Christ learned to rely and trust His Father daily in the seemingly ordinary, routine things, including what He ate, what He drank, His family, His work alongside His dad, His ministry, His calling, His care for His disciples. God taught Christ to enjoy and appreciate even the smallest things, you and me, because they were good, not perfect, gifts from above.

Brethren, we must do the same. If we don’t learn to apply the lessons of manna, the bread from heaven, if we fail in our lives, small, ordinary, routine things, we reject, worse yet, the examples from the Bread of Life, Jesus Christ. Brethren, the forty-year story of manna, the bread from heaven, it’s fascinating. Yes, but not quite as fascinating as the lessons we learn from it. As we have seen, powerful lessons can be learned from small, seemingly ordinary, routine things in our lives, as simple as collecting and eating the portion of manna that God gives to us every day.

Yes, God gave us His commandments, His statutes, and judgments to transform us like He intended to do with Israel. Sure, we have Sabbaths, new moons, holy days, but brethren, God uses seemingly unimportant, daily, routine things with simple instructions for us to follow each day. Are we willing to collect, eat, and learn from God’s daily ration for as long as it takes?