“What is this?” That’s a question tourists to the Caribbean island of Antigua ask when handed a serving of pepper pot—a salty stew of okra and pig’s snout. This national dish of Antigua is not often an instant favorite for many visitors. But for homesick Antiguans living overseas, to find pepper pot at a dinner party would cause them to cry with delight: “What is this?”
“What is this?” can either be a cry of disgust or a cry of delight. The next time we get a dump of snow, will you say with a grimace: “What is this?” as you trudge outside with your snow shovel? Or will you chirp with delight, “What is this?” as you shout hurray for another day off from school and the freedom to hit the powder at Snow Bowl—that is until you get stuck in traffic on the way there and snarl: “What is this?”
“What is this?” is also a question we ask God—often with disgust because we think God should treat us better. As we continue the sermon series, Moses: Made for More, we’ll see how the Israelites felt this way. How did God deal with their attitude? He patiently turned their cries of disgust into cries of delight. In so doing, God showed the Israelites that they, and we, are indeed made for more—to experience his grace so that we may escape his judgment. (Read portion of sermon text.)
In our sermon series last week, we heard how God pulled off one of the greatest miracles of all time when he parted the Red Sea. A couple million Israelites crossed over on dry land and escaped the Egyptians. What followed was a beach party during which Moses led the Israelites in a victory song. He cried with delight: “The Lord is my strength and my defense; he has become my salvation… You will bring [us] in and plant [us]on the mountain of your inheritance—the…sanctuary...your hands established.” (Ex. 15:2, 17)
Like Dorothy and her companions in the Wizard of Oz who skip down the Yellow Brick Road with delight as they sing: “We’re off to see the Wizard!” the Israelites must have had a spring in their step as they paraded off the beach and continued their journey to the Promised Land. But what they thought would be a walk in the park turned out to be a marathon through the desert (Reed Lessing). Israelite cries of delight morphed into disgust just three days later when an expected watering hole offered no drinkable water. “What are we supposed to drink?” the Israelites grumbled.
Do you see any parallels between what the Israelites experienced and Jesus’ life? Just as God declared Israel to be his beloved firstborn by delivering them from Egypt through the water of the Red Sea, he declared Jesus to be his beloved Son at the Jordan River as Jesus stood in his baptismal water. Then where did Jesus go after that high point of being introduced as God’s beloved Son? Out to eat at a fancy restaurant with his disciples? Lead a parade down the main streets of Jerusalem? No. The Holy Spirit drove Jesus into the wilderness where, for the next 40 days, he would go without food while being tempted by Satan (Matthew 4)! That’s also where God led Israel after the Red Sea—into the wilderness for testing!
It’s that way with our lives too. We experience high points with our baptisms, confirmations, and at especially uplifting worship services like Christmas and Easter. But then we quickly go back to the humdrum of life where we experience one challenge after the next. This is all part of God’s plan. At Marah, which means “bitter” to describe the water and the Israelite attitude, we learn that “There the Lord issued a ruling and instruction for [Israel] and put them to the test.” (Ex. 15:25b)
The wilderness journey for the Israelites is what Spring Training is for baseball players. Through the challenges they would experience, God would exercise the Israelites’ faith in him so that they would learn again and again that they could fully trust God to do what was the best for them. And what did he do for Israel at Marah? God showed Moses a piece of wood he was to throw in the water to make it drinkable.
The Israelites moved on from Marah and found an oasis at Elim with 12 springs and 70 palm trees. The Israelites enjoyed a couple weeks of respite here before heading into the Desert of Sin. But again, it didn’t take long for Israel’s good mood to turn sour. The Israelites ran out of food this time and so they cried with disgust: “What is this?” Had Moses and Aaron brought them out into the wilderness to die of hunger? “We were better off in Egypt where we sat around pots of meat and ate our fill!” the angry mob exclaimed. But weren’t the Israelites forgetting something? They had been slaves in Egypt. How much sitting around had they really done? Not a lot I should think, because the Egyptians weren’t afraid to whip lazy slaves.
Israel’s murmuring and complaining was not just bad form; it was sinful. God didn’t owe the Israelites a thing. He could have let them be so that the Egyptian pharaohs eventually worked them to death. Sadly, Israel’s disgusted murmuring is often heard among us. “Can you believe all this snow?” Well, won’t this moisture help when fire season comes? “Another migraine? More back pain? COVID again!” Those are no fun, but aren’t you glad that you have a comfortable bed in which you can recover? “Another 12-hour day at work!” But isn’t it a blessing to have employment? No, life isn’t perfect, but it would be worse…much, much worse if God didn’t continually provide for us. Don’t lose sight of his blessings, and trust that he will continue to provide them at the right time and in the right amount. Psalm 106 serves as a commentary on the Israelite exodus and records these words worth pondering: “The waters covered their adversaries; not one of them survived. Then they believed his promises and sang his praise. But they soon forgot what he had done and did not wait for his plan to unfold.” (Psalm 106:11-13) Forgetfulness leads to fretfulness. Israel was regularly guilty of both sins, and so are we.
How did God deal with Israel’s latest cries of disgust? With amazing grace! God said to Moses: “I have heard the grumbling of the Israelites. Tell them, ‘At twilight you will eat meat, and in the morning you will be filled with bread. Then you will know that I am the LORD your God.’” (Exodus 16:12) Incredibly there was no rebuke! Instead, God actually sounded excited to provide for his grumbling people. And why not? Because of their desperate hunger, all eyes were now on him. When food was delivered, there would be no question where it had come from, and this would result in great praise and in the acknowledgement that the one true God was indeed Israel’s loving Lord.
And how exactly did God provide for two million people in the wilderness? God promised to “rain down” bread from heaven. And sure enough, when the Israelites went out the next morning, there were white flakes on the ground as if a giant box of cereal had spilled open. When they first saw it, the Israelites asked: “What is this?” It was a cry of curiosity that would quickly turn into a cry of delight when Moses explained that this was the bread God would provide until Israel entered the Promised Land. For the next forty years God never missed a delivery.
God may not rain down bread on us every morning, but he has promised to provide for our daily needs. This is a promise that God keeps in spite of our constant complaining of what we don’t have. What is this? What is this that God should be so patient and gracious with us chronic-complaining, serial-sinners! With his patient love, God turns our cries of disgust into cries of delight.
This manna, as the bread from heaven became known, was a super food. It not only sated Israelite hunger and provided all the nutrition they needed, it also exercised their faith. How so? Manna that had been gathered in the morning was supposed to be consumed by evening. No manna was to be stored overnight in Tupperware containers. The only exception was on Fridays when they were to collect enough manna for two days since there would be none to collect on the day of rest (our Saturday). In other words, on six days of the week the Israelites went to bed without a bite leftover to eat in the house. They had to trust that God would provide manna again the next morning otherwise they would go hungry. Moses would later explain: “[God] humbled you, causing you to hunger and then feeding you with manna…to teach you that man does not live on bread alone but on every word that comes from the mouth of the Lord.” (Dt. 8:3)
This was the verse Jesus quoted to Satan in the wilderness when he insisted Jesus take matters into his own hands and feed himself by turning stone into bread. As Jesus trusted that his heavenly Father would provide for him, God wanted the Israelites to trust God’s promise that there would be manna for them again in the morning. Sadly, not all Israelites believed this. Some tried keeping manna overnight, but it quickly rotted, and these Israelites incurred Moses’ wrath for their lack of faith.
If you’ve ever found yourself staring at a bare cupboard or at an empty bank account and wonder how you’re going to survive, fear not. God will provide the right amount at the right time. You might not get to eat steak or lobster, nor may you ever be able to scrape together much of a savings fund, but don’t listen to the financial experts who say that you “must” have a million dollars in your account by the time you retire or you’ll be miserable. Sure, we should be good stewards and should control our expenses now so we can save something for retirement, but God will provide for us even if we’re having to live from paycheck to paycheck. After all isn’t that how he provided for the children of Israel in the wilderness?
Manna was a super food in another way: it served as a picture of Jesus. After feeding over 5,000 from just 5 loaves of bread and 2 fish, Jesus explained that just as manna was a heaven-sent food, so he had come from heaven to feed the world (John 6). The difference of course was that those who ate manna grew hungry again. Jesus promised that all those who would eat him, that is, who would believe in him as Savior, would never go spiritually hungry. Our need for forgiveness and salvation is satisfied by Jesus.
So how is your taste for Jesus, the Bread of Life? Have you, perhaps, become like the Israelites who soon got tired of eating manna? Do you find it boring to hear about Jesus’ death and the blood that he shed to cleanse us from sin? Do you cry with disgust, “What is this?” when the sermon or home devotion touches on this theme yet again?
Or are you like those Israelites who thought they could store away some manna for later, and so you treat Jesus like an emergency granola bar in your backpack? “I know Jesus is important,” you say, “just not right now. I’ll get him out when I really need him like when I get cancer or have financial problems.” Jesus, of course, is always there for us—today’s sermon is about his patient love. But why would we want to shove Jesus into a back pocket if he is our loving Lord who has promised to care for all of our needs?
You’d think that after the miracle at Marah and now the miracle with manna, that the Israelites had seen everything they needed to see to be assured of God’s ongoing providence. But their cries of disgust, “What is this!” crescendoed to a fevered pitch when they arrived in Rephidim, not far from Mt. Sinai. The problem? They were out of water again. And this time Israel was ready to stone Moses to death for his seeming ineptness as wilderness guide. But Israel’s anger was really aimed at God as Moses pointed out: “Why do you put the Lord to the test?” (Ex. 17:2b)
Surely God would now punish the Israelites! No. In another act of grace, he again turned their cries of disgust into cries of delight. This time he instructed Moses to take the elders to “the” rock at Horeb (was this a well-known landmark, hence the definite article?). What God said next is so interesting. “I will stand there before you by the rock at Horeb. Strike the rock, and water will come out of it for the people to drink.” (Ex. 17:6) God could have simply said: “Strike the rock.” Instead, he made it clear to Moses “I will stand there before you by the rock at Horeb.” There is no indication that God appeared in a way that Moses and the elders could see him. But he wanted Moses to know that he would be there, in front of him as he struck the rock. Put that together with these words of the Apostle Paul: “[The Israelites] all ate the same spiritual food and drank the same spiritual drink; for they drank from the spiritual rock that accompanied them, and that rock was Christ.” (1 Cor. 10:3-4)
Oh my! Just as manna served as a picture of Jesus, this rock which Moses struck was also a picture of the Savior! While Moses should have beaten some sense into the Israelites for their constant complaining, God directed him to strike the rock instead. And what poured out? The blessing of water—and not just a little a dribble, but enough to quench the thirst of two million people plus all their animals. The psalmist Asaph wrote: “He split the rocks in the wilderness and gave them water as abundant as the seas; he brought streams out of a rocky crag and made water flow down like rivers.” (Ps. 78:15-16)
It’s worth noting that the Hebrew word “strike” describing what Moses did to the rock, is the same word used in Isaiah 53 to describe how the Messiah would be “stricken” for the sins of the world (Is. 53:4). How does God turn our cries of disgust into cries of delight? By treating us with grace. That is, God gives us the opposite of what we deserve. He gives us blessings instead of punishment because at the cross, he gave his Son, Jesus, punishment instead of blessings.
What we’ve learned today is that God does not take us out of the desert but he does provide for us while we are in the desert (Lessing). This truth is illustrated in the book of Revelation where the Apostle John records this vision: “When the dragon [Satan] saw that he had been hurled to the earth, he pursued the woman [the Church] who…was given the two wings of a great eagle, so that she might fly to the place prepared for her in the wilderness, where she would be taken care of…” (Rev. 12:13-14)
Yes, you and I are in a wilderness right now. We are pursued by Satan and his temptations. We also have to put up with the disappointments of life in a sin-filled world. But God lifts us up on eagles’ wings to protect and provide for us. But more importantly, he gives us his forgiving love—love that freely and generously falls on us sinners every morning, like manna in the wilderness. In regard to this forgiveness, do as God instructed the Israelites to do with the manna: “I am the LORD your God, who brought you up out of Egypt. Open wide your mouth and I will fill it.” (Ps. 81:10) Amen.
SERMON NOTES
(pre-service warm up). Due to the length of the sermon, Pastor will not read it in its entirety before the sermon. Do so now. Underline instances of Israelite grumbling, and circle instances of God’s grace.
What parallels are there between what the Israelites experienced in our text and Jesus’ life?
In the Desert of Sin, the Israelites ran out of food and cried: “We were better off in Egypt where we sat around pots of meat and ate our fill!” Their forgetfulness had led to fretfulness. Explain what that means.
God met Israelite grumbling with grace. In fact, he actually sounded excited to provide for his grumbling people. Why?
List at least four ways in which manna was a “super” food.
Jesus said: “I am the Bread of Life.” Unfortunately, how might we treat Jesus the way some Israelites treated manna?
(2 questions) Israelite cries of disgust reached a crescendo at Rephidim. What was the problem there? How did God direct Moses to fix the problem?
The rock at Horeb served as another picture of Jesus. How so?
We learned today that God does not take us out of the _____________ but he does ___________ for us there. How is this truth illustrated in the book of Revelation?
