Manna

Then the Lord said to Moses, “Look, I’m going to rain down food from heaven for you.
Each day the people can go out and pick up as much food as they need for that day.
I will test them in this to see whether or not they will follow my instructions.”
Exodus 16:4

About a month after their miraculous rescue from Egypt, the Israelites found themselves in a wilderness. Although they were free, they were frustrated. The cries that had echoed from their ancestors for centuries had been answered. They were no longer slaves, but freedom didn’t silence their hunger.

They were in between: no longer in Egypt, not yet in the Promised Land, and they forgot what God had done and doubted what He would do next. So God responded, not with rebuke but with provision. He told Moses, “I will rain down bread from heaven,” and He did.

Every morning, the ground was covered with a strange substance they called manna. The Israelites were told to gather just enough for that day. It was not to be hoarded or saved as any extra would spoil. There was no way to store up security. There was no backup plan. There was simply trust. This daily rhythm wasn’t only about feeding their bodies. It was about forming their hearts. God was teaching them dependence .

Fast forward generations, and we hear Jesus speak of this moment again. He tells the crowd that manna was a foreshadowing of Himself as the true bread from Heaven, a gift from God that comes down and gives life to the world (John 6:32-33). He goes on in John 6:48-51 saying,

“Yes, I am the bread of life!
Your ancestors ate manna in the wilderness, but they all died.
Anyone who eats the bread from heaven, however, will never die.
I am the living bread that came down from heaven.
Anyone who eats this bread will live forever;
and this bread, which I will offer so the world may live, is my flesh.“

When His disciples asked how to pray, Jesus folded in the same truth, “Give us this day our daily bread,” not weekly bread (Matthew 6:11). Yet again, we see no emergency storage. It’s daily bread. Over and over, we are invited to the same table, to the kind of trust the Israelites were called to because we were not created to be self-sufficient. We were made for daily dependence.

Unfortunately, many are missing the invitation.

Some of us are surviving on someone else’s manna, nourishing ourselves only by what is gathered from preachers, podcast hosts and the latest Christian voices. These voices are gifts intended to be supplements, but they were never meant to be your source. They are echoes, not encounters. You cannot build a deep relationship with God through someone else’s intimacy. There is no substitute for the secret place; no shortcut to the Presence. You are invited to the table, not just to observe someone else eating but to feast for yourself.

Others are trying to live on leftovers, old manna. You’re feeding yourself from a memory of what God said to you last week, last year or maybe even a decade ago, and while that word was real, it is now stale. Yesterday’s obedience doesn’t excuse today’s apathy. Yesterday’s fire won’t carry you through today’s wilderness. We must stop living off what He said in the past and be with Him now to hear what He’s saying today.

Friend, God is still speaking. He desires to form your heart as you build a daily rhythm of trust, but you have to go out and gather.

He will not force His way in and fill your jar with manna. He invites you to obedience, and He waits. Not at a distance, but with nearness that is always available if we will only slow down, be still and sit with Him.
We continue going to Him not because yesterday’s grace ran out, but because today’s mercies are new. Not because He changed, but because we need to.

You aren’t meant to live off echoes or memories. You are meant for encounter. You are meant for communion, for a present-tense faith with a present God and for fresh bread and living water.

Don’t settle for second hand spirituality.
You can’t thrive on someone else’s fire.
You can’t live on leftovers.
You won’t survive on stale revelation.

Manna still falls.
Mercy still meets.
The table is set.
Don’t snack on echoes.
Feast on Presence.
Come hungry.
Leave changed.

The Bread of Heaven is available and still breaks through the silence to meet us in the wilderness. All we must do is MAKE ROOM for Him. He is the treasure. He is the prize.