Manna from Heaven

https://odb.org/MY/2022/05/19/food-from-heaven

The manna from heaven that the LORD provided for the Israelites in their 40 years in the wilderness was an active demonstration of the supernatural penetrating into the natural as it would have been impossible for a nation of nearly 2 million people (600,000 men plus women and children) to live in the dessert for such a prolonged period of time that spanned at least one generation. In fact a whole generation of adult Israelites who were divinely brought out of Egypt by God through Moses and entered the desert died there, except Caleb and Joshua. Only the children of the former Egyptian slaves and those born there in the wilderness together with Caleb and Joshua finally entered the Promised Land 40 years later.

Besides the manna being supernatural, God’s presence was with them all the time as He resided in the Tent of Meeting (Tabernacle) and led them by a cloud in the day and by a ball of fire in the night. Wherever they stopped amd camped, they were able to find a water source with the staff of Moses leading the way. Thus their lives and sustenance were fully dependent on the supernatural.

I always believed that God leaves behind a historical narrative or story in His Word as a way to proclaim His goodness and love and also to guide future generations on how to relate to Him by Him showing examples of how He related with His people in the past.

Thus we know that, if necessary, God can and will bring the supernatural into the natural even for long periods of time as evident from this example of 40 years in the desert. In the case of Elijah and the widow at Zarephath, God also provided food for the 3 of them during intense famine in the land from just a little leftover of flour and oil that the widow was about to prepare for her son and herself to die. Elijah was also fed by ravens before God led him to the widow. All these real life stories of the ancients demonstrated God’s usage of the supernatural into the natural to preserve life.

The lesson this morning I believe is not the repeated theme of bread of life (like yesterday’s) but more of God telling us today at this time and hour and this present age that He is able and will do the necessary for us in order that we may live. He had ensured the survival of a nation in the harsh and unhabitable wilderness for 40 years. He had ensured the survival of Elijah and the widow of Zarephath despite the raging famine. He will thus ensure the survival of each and every one of us notwithstanding the expected recession, rising prices, reduced purchasing power, scarcity of work, slowdown in businesses and the economy in the days to come post Covid, post the Russian-Ukraine war, post US-China trade war. Perhaps it is true that Christ will return this generation and perhaps we believers may be raptured. But until then, the LORD our God, Jesus Christ our Lord and the Holy Spirit will ensure that we get to live to fight another day! Yes, life is fleeting and we can be like the flower that bloom today and is blown away and forgotten the next day. But the picture that came to me is that we as people of the faith will be like the sunflower which grew and stood tall in a lonely forsaken desert highway. We could live and thrive despite the adverse and unfair conditions life brings us. Why? Because if God is with us, who can be against us?