First Mennonite Church
February 15, 2026
God Gives Manna
Exodus 16:1-30
It was only forty-five days (basically 6 weeks) since Israel left Egypt and the people had witness God’s power in many ways. God had poured out his judgements upon Pharaoh and Egypt, had opened the Red Sea for the Israelites to pass through on dry ground, and lately, had turned the bitter waters of Marah into fresh drinkable water for the thirsting people.
After God’s provision of drinkable water, Israel settled at the oasis of Elim, possibly to give them time to refresh and restrengthen. There were twelve beautiful springs and more than seventy date palms. However, the cloud of Yahweh started to move and Israel had to move along. But even after forty-five days, the Promised Land was nowhere in sight. The cloud was only leading toward more sand and parched land. All the food the Israelites had been bringing along was now gone; Israel was once again faced with a serious crisis. This time, the people saw themselves dying from starvation. And once again, the entire congregation of Israel raised their complaint against Moses and Aaron.
The people lamented having left Egypt, where they had to build houses for the Egyptians in exchange for food. There, they learned and were used to the rules of survival. There, food was secured by submitting to the rules of exploitation. But traveling through the desert there was no time and nowhere to produce or earn a morsel. In the desert, their grumbling stomachs and hunger pangs made them forget the hardship, slavery, and misery that led them to moan and cry out for help in the first place. in Exodus two, 23-25, say, the Israelites groaned in their slavery and cried out, and their cry for help because of their slavery went up to God. 24 God heard their groaning and he remembered his covenant with Abraham, with Isaac and with Jacob. 25 So God looked on the Israelites and was concerned about them.
God heard, remembered, and was moved to act in favor of Israel’s freedom. God heard their cries and moaning and sent Moses to lead them to the Promised Land.
When God hears, he acts. When God hears, he intervenes in the lives of those whose voice God hears.
So, once more, the congregation of Israel began to complain against Moses and Aaron, saying, “If only we had died at the hands of the Lord in the land of Egypt! Why have you brought us out here to die in this wilderness?”
You see, the Israelite would have preferred the security of food in Egypt even at the cost of slavery. They were used to a system, even if exploitive and oppressive, but one in which they knew how to secure them their daily sustenance. In the desert, the people were hungry and starving. They seem to have forgotten God’s provision of potable water the time they were thirsting. But, let us not rush and condemn them as faithless or catalogue them as a whiny people. Let us remember that the children of Abraham had lived in Egypt for 430 years. And as I said, they had grown familiar on how the system worked and they had learned how to survive in that environment of oppression. After having figured out how to survive and to secure their daily supplies in that harsh world of slavery, Moses came telling them about Yahweh and a covenant he had made with their ancestors. This God, Yahweh, was new to them. Could he be trusted? Will he deliver on his promises? Can he, once again, provide food in the middle of the desert? That was the test the congregation of the Israelites was confronted with in the wilderness.
It is true that complaints eat fast the patience of anyone. Ask any parent of young children or teenagers. It is true that complaints put under stress any good relationship or worsen the ones under stress already. And we can’t begin to imagine the stress Moses and Aaron had at the complaints of this multitude of hungry people. But as we see here and in other witnesses of Scripture, our God is not bothered by human complaints against him.
When Job’s illness prolonged, Job complained of God’s treatment to him (Job). Job directed his accusations against God as the culprit for his suffering. God did no rebuke Job for doing so. God came and dialogued with Job and then healed and restored his health and possessions. In the Psalm we read prayers of lament and complaints. (see Psalm 22 for example) When Jesus was on the cross, he cried, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” (Mark 15:34). Am I encouraging you to complain against God? No! But if you believe that God is not someone to be complaint at, I want to tell you, that is not the case. God hears, arises to act, and he is not bothered if your complaints are addressed to him.
Here the text does not tell us that Moses or Aaron prayed to God, but that God took the initiative in this situation. God said to Moses, “I am going to rain bread from heaven for you. Each day, for six days, you will have bread in the morning. Every morning the Israelites are to collect food for the day but on the sixth day they should collect food for two days because there will not be food on the ground on the seventh day. On the seventh day is the Sabbath day, a day of rest. In this I will test them if they can follow my instructions.”
God made quails come to the camp that evening and he rained manna in the morning. But, even when Moses had warned the Israelites not to gather more than they needed for the day, saving manna for the following day, some still did. The manna began to stink and had maggots in it. Even when Israel was told that on the seventh day no manna will rain on the ground, some still went out and were disappointed that there was no manna on the ground.
The story in Exodus 16 is about trusting in the provisions of God, and it is a story about Sabbath rest. Let us remember that the children of Israel had not rested for, who knows how long. Pharaoh would not allow them to take a day off from the production line. The children of Israel had been workaholics, not by choice but by imposition. They had learned that slavery equals to food security. But there in the desert, where God has offered to provide for them, the only requirement is to trust in the faithful providence of Yahweh. That was the test. Can they rest? Can they trust and simply obey God’s instructions? Can they stop collecting food for one day? Can they set a day aside only to contemplate the glory of Yahweh?
Let us remember that when God instituted the Sabbath day of rest for the Israelites here in Exodus 16, it came before God required it of them in the decalogue—the ten commandments. There God stipulates, “Remember to keep the Sabbath holy for the Lord.” (Exodus 20:8).
The root of the Hebrew word for sabbath means “to stop”–stop doing what you do during the other six days of the week. Our model for Sabbath rest (Sabbath stopping) comes from Genesis 2:2; when God finished the creative work, he “stopped” on the seventh day and rested. Our instruction for Sabbath rest comes from Exodus 16. God commanded that humans to stop, to put aside their daily chore of gathering bread, and to marvel at God’s glory and provisions for them.
In the wilderness, God forged a relationship with the people he freed from oppression and called to trust He will provide for their every need, not just for today, but for tomorrow as well.
Sabbath rest is a difficult concept in the twenty-first century world. How can we simply “stop”? What will happen to our jobs, our families, our sense of identity if we “stop” for Sabbath? And, what does it mean to “stop”? Stopping has to do with cessation, with taking time to contemplate our place within the created world. It means to stop and take time to give thanks to God for his salvation in Christ—our spiritual exodus from Egypt. It means to set aside time to give honor to God as Savior and Provider. It means focusing our hearts to reflect on the good provisions of God in our lives. God provides and will always provide.
We live in a world which in some aspects are much like the one Israel lived in Egypt. We have learned that the rules of survival mean to surrender our God-given energies to a system that does not allow Sabbaths of rest. It is a world where flourishing is an elusive dream for many, and where survival is for the strongest. It is a world where trusting in the God who feeds the birds feels like giving away our control of life. It’s a world where we are made to feel we cannot stop and take time to contemplate the glory of the Lord and much less to give him thanks. Some cannot stop for a moment, for a day.
The fear of stopping is embedded in the words of the Israelites’ complaints to Moses and Aaron, “If only we had stayed and died in Egypt . . ..” The belief “If only I can have this or that” has kept people slaves. The belief that “If only I could earn this much,” or “If only I work this hard,” has blinded people to see that life is more than material security and that everything, including our very lives come from God. That is why God gave the manna and quails to test if the people of Israel could trust and obey his instructions. God’s intention in providing Israel with manna and quails is as he said to Moses, “In this they will know that I am the Lord your God” (v. 12).
When you begin to feel that you are on your own to survive, remember how and why God provided manna and quail to the Israelites in the middle of the desert: That they may know that He is the Lord God who provides. When you are faced with difficulty, remember how the Lord has provided for you in the past and that he will not change. Amen!
Pastor Romero