What Is It?

“Then the LORD said to Moses, ‘I will rain down bread from heaven for you.  The people are to go out each day and gather enough for that day'” Exodus 16:4.

We continue to follow the children of God in the wilderness with Moses as their leader.  In reading the passage of the complaining Israelites, I cannot help but to remember family vacations with our 3 children.  We were only going to beach for goodness sakes but you would have thought we were going to Egypt ourselves…the questions…the complaints…the fighting.  But like most journeys it was worth it once we got to the destination.  One of ways that God showed His loving provisions to His children was through the bread that He sent daily from heaven.  It was similar to early morning dew on the ground.  Actually, the Israelites were the ones who named it manna which translates ‘What is it?’  They had never tasted anything like it before but it was all they had so gather they did.

I can relate to waking up each morning and trying to recognize a new normal.  The season when I would rise and remember that my daughter was missing…what is it?  The season when I would awaken to the newness of losing a parent and a sibling…what is it?  The season when I cared for my father-in-law at our home in his final walk with Alzheimer’s…what is it?

What is it in your life that is first on your mind in the morning and last on your mind at night?  What new land are you experiencing where the horizon seems unclear and covered in fog?  We may not yet recognize what is in our future, but we can remember Who is leading us to it. We can trust that we are being fed off the land where He has planted us.  We can have faith that He will be faithful in our circumstances.  We can open our mouths and receive the provisions from the hand of God in our new normal, and live with a spirit of deep gratitude.  We must go out and gather though or we might miss the feeding of the Lord.  When we focus on what we have in Him, we lose sight of what we lack.  So we awake each morning, we gather by spending time with God, and one day we realize we have reached the destination.  

"But thank God!  He has made up his captives and continues to lead us along in Christ's triumphal procession.  Now he uses us to spread the knowledge of Christ everywhere, like a sweet perfume" 2 Co 2:14.