Day 1123: Our daily bread - Exodus 16 vs 19 - 33

19-20 And Moses said to them, “Let no one leave any of it over till the morning.” But they did not listen to Moses. Some left part of it till the morning, and it bred worms and stank. And Moses was angry with them. 21-24 Morning by morning they gathered it, each as much as he could eat; but when the sun grew hot, it melted. On the sixth day they gathered twice as much bread, two omers each. And when all the leaders of the congregation came and told Moses, he said to them, “This is what the Lord has commanded: ‘Tomorrow is a day of solemn rest, a holy Sabbath to the Lord; bake what you will bake and boil what you will boil, and all that is left over lay aside to be kept till the morning.’” So they laid it aside till the morning, as Moses commanded them, and it did not stink, and there were no worms in it. 25-26. Moses said, “Eat it today, for today is a Sabbath to the Lord; today you will not find it in the field. For six days you shall gather it, but on the seventh day, which is a Sabbath, there will be none.”

27 On the seventh day some of the people went out to gather, but they found none. 28-30 And the Lord said to Moses, “How long will you refuse to keep my commandments and my laws? See! The Lord has given you the Sabbath; therefore on the sixth day he gives you bread for two days. Remain each of you in his place; let no one go out of his place on the seventh day.” So the people rested on the seventh day.

31-33 Now the house of Israel called its name manna. It was like coriander seed, white, and the taste of it was like wafers made with honey. Moses said, “This is what the Lord has commanded: ‘Let an omer of it be kept throughout your generations, so that they may see the bread with which I fed you in the wilderness, when I brought you out of the land of Egypt.’” And Moses said to Aaron, “Take a jar, and put an omer of manna in it, and place it before the Lord to be kept throughout your generations.” 34-35 As the Lord commanded Moses, so Aaron placed it before the testimony to be kept. The people of Israel ate the manna for forty years, till they came to a habitable land. They ate the manna till they came to the border of the land of Canaan. (An omer is the tenth part of an ephah.) Exodus 16:21-33 English Standard Version

What the Israelites gathered on six days they were entitled to bake or boil, but they were not to leave anything over till morning. When some did so, they found it was full of worms and stank! But on the sixth day of the week they could gather the manna, and what was left over for the seventh day did not have worms, and nor did it stink. When some of them went out on the seventh day to seek manna, they found none! Over 1400 years later, the Lord Jesus taught His disciples to ask God, and to trust Him, for their daily bread. How good it is to live within our means, and to look to God for our daily needs.

But what was the other main feature being taught here?

It was a truth which God had established from the foundation of the world. Genesis 2:1-3 says: “Thus the heavens and the earth were finished, and all the host of them. And on the seventh day God finished His work that He had done, and He rested on the seventh day from all His work that He had done. So God blessed the seventh day and made it holy, because on it God rested from all His work that He had done in creation.” Before it became one of the Ten Commandments, the principle of resting one day in seven was already established. Not that God needed to rest, but that man would put aside his work to worship the Lord. It also speaks of the eternal rest God has promised. Hebrews 4:9-10 says: ”There remains a Sabbath rest for the people of God; for whoever has entered God's rest has also rested from his works as God did from His.”

Why were the Israelites told to keep some manna in a jar for future generations?

Surely it was because Israel ate the manna till they came to the border of the land of Canaan, and then God's miraculous provision ended. But they were to remember what God had done for forty years. And is this not true of the gospel. Jesus, and the the apostles, worked miracles. But now, like Israel of old, we are to live by faith, and to love God for all He has done for us.