Exodus 16:15, commentary and pictures

When Israel saw the small substance lying fresh with the dew around their tents each morning they did not know what it was, and Moses told them it was the bread the Lord had given them to eat, to be gathered daily according to each person's need. It was food from heaven supplied by divine power alone and not by any human agent, as a token of God's mindful care for bodily wants and the means by which He tested whether they would walk in His law. Its double portion on the sixth day and preservation over the Sabbath showed the seventh-day Sabbath hallowed at creation was still binding before it was proclaimed at Sinai. Though it sweetly nourished body and soul for forty years, it was only temporal bread and those who ate it still died, pointing beyond itself to Christ the true living bread from the Father who gives eternal life. In withholding flesh and feeding them with angels' food God appointed a healthful, heaven-chosen diet to discipline them into correct habits of physical, mental, and moral strength. That daily gathering of fresh manna is the pattern for seeking fresh spiritual nourishment from Christ and His Word morning and evening rather than living on past blessings.

Meaning and Wilderness Setting

When the children of Israel saw the small unfamiliar substance lying on the ground they did not know what it was. Moses identified it for them as the bread which the Lord had given them to eat, God's provision for their daily food in the wilderness journey. They were told to gather it up and prepare it to be eaten, gathering an amount suited to each person's eating. That work of preparation involved labor which was to be done on the day before the Sabbath rather than on the Sabbath.

The bread descended with the dew and was laid fresh upon the ground every morning around their tents by miracle as God's daily provision. It fell from heaven around their tents in fulfillment of His sure promises, showing His goodness and power toward Israel. The manna continued to fall while Moses was away, and Israel was fed morning and evening by God's hand, so that His presence and care did not depend on Moses being with them. It fed them through forty years of guidance through the wilderness, and the generation who crossed the Jordan were accustomed to eating that bread from heaven, including Joshua and the old faithful sentinels whose lives of steadfast integrity then closed as a new generation came upon the stage of action.

The standing provision was given through Moses from the pillar of cloud as a lesson and was never to be forgotten but to be preserved as a memorial. Parents were to repeat it to their children when they inquired, as an exhibition of God's power. That exhibition stands together with the deliverance from Egyptian bondage that they might serve Him and keep His Sabbaths, the water provided from the rock, the capture of Jericho without human plan or hand, and the commandments of God.

Miraculous Provision and Testing

The bread was food from heaven laid fresh upon the ground every morning around the tents by a miracle of divine mercy alone, not obtainable from any human agent and not provided by Moses, as a token of God's love, merciful care, goodness and power toward Israel. In giving it He fulfilled His sure promises and showed that He is mindful of physical wants. Its giving illustrates His provision and work for the benefit of His people.

God is the giver of food and the source of provision for temporal needs, who gave the children of Israel manna from heaven when they needed it and who still lives and reigns. He guides His people and gives them skill and understanding for the work they are called to do and supplies what they need for that work. The manna was the means by which He tested whether the people would walk in His law during the wilderness journey.

When accepted, the portion was enough, sweet and nourishing for body and soul, but dissatisfaction brought worms in the manna, so that contentment with God's provision is a blessing while discontent is a curse. The food He designed for them was healthy and could be eaten freely, yet their dissatisfaction and desire for meat showed appetite controlling them, a course that displeased Him. In ingratitude, unbelief and distrust they hardened their hearts, loathed the heaven-sent bread, dwelt on imaginary evils, and accused Moses of killing them with hunger. Because they failed to trust after so many evidences of care and despised this provision, the Lord withdrew His protecting hand that had shielded them from surrounding dangers and permitted death to come upon them, to bring them to realize their ingratitude and to lead them to repentance and humiliation.

God could have supplied everything needed for religious service as He supplied the bread, but in His infinite wisdom He chose a plan requiring His people to cooperate with Him, with everyone doing something. Moral discipline depends on that cooperation, so as long as truth is progressive He claims a portion of what He has entrusted to men for that very purpose, laying the work equally on all according to their several abilities, with everyone to be his own assessor and to give as purposed in the heart. In this way each person shares in the work.

The verse assures that God can provide for His people in a time of trouble even by sending food from heaven, so they can trust wholly in Him for their needs. It proves He miraculously supplies food when it can be obtained from no other source. So the same God who fed Israel fed His prophet Elijah by miracle on a long journey, and provided a way for Joseph to preserve his own life and the lives of Jesus and Mary by fleeing into Egypt, meeting the necessities of their journey and sojourn there through the valuable offerings He moved the wise men of the East to bring to the infant Saviour. As Christ led Israel in the cloud and supplied heaven's bounty to meet bodily needs, His people are to care for both body and soul by sharing temporal necessities and spiritual food with others who have less.

Sabbath Law Confirmed

The unfamiliar substance Israel found lying on the ground was the bread the Lord had given them to eat, provided from heaven during the wilderness journey as the means of testing whether they would walk in His law. On the sixth day a double portion was given, and its preservation for the Sabbath demonstrated that the Sabbath law was kept before them throughout their forty years of wandering. Strangers who honored His Sabbath were also to share in that provision.

The miracle in the manna sustains the validity of the seventh-day Sabbath. That seventh day had been hallowed and sanctified by God at creation, and the miracle proved it still binding before its sacredness was proclaimed in the giving of the commandments on Mount Sinai in the very bosom of the Decalogue. The continuing manna was a sign of the Sabbath commandment, which had been given in Eden before it was proclaimed at Sinai.

Christ the Living Bread

The bread from heaven given in the wilderness sustained the body, but it was only a temporal gift. Those who ate it still died, and it did not secure immortal life. It therefore stands in contrast to Christ, the bread of life, who offers eternal life and will ultimately give immortal life to the body. Like the showbread, that wilderness bread pointed to Christ, the living bread who is in God's presence for humanity. Through Him both temporal food and spiritual blessings are received, as temporal and spiritual blessing poured upon God's people through Jesus Christ.

The manna pictures the heavenly food received in Christ. His words come home to the soul as bread from heaven, His flesh given for the life of the world, the living bread come down from heaven that a man may eat and not die but live forever. It is to be eaten daily for spiritual necessities just as food meets physical needs, and to be fed upon continually. Drinking of the Spiritual Rock and eating this manna daily brings conversion anew and a changed experience, with Christ formed within the soul as a well of water springing up unto everlasting life. As Israel was set free from the bondage of Egypt, so believers are set free from spiritual bondage, with chains of oppression broken and Red Seas of impossibilities opened before them, and God's people now are fed with this same heavenly manna and are to feast upon it continually with praise upon their lips.

That manna was bread from heaven given by God the Father, not by Moses and not obtainable from any human agent. It was a standing miracle of palatable food to satisfy bodily necessity, proving He is mindful of physical wants, yet it points beyond temporal, perishable bread to the true bread from heaven, the living bread that endures to eternal life, which God gives through the gift of Christ. The lesson is to have far more anxiety to secure that spiritual food by believing on Him whom God sent and coming to Christ than to secure physical sustenance. Feeding Israel with manna in the desert was a work only divine power could perform, and Christ did the same work when He made five barley loaves and two small fishes into food sufficient for thousands of hungry people, with all sharing in its benefit. The miracle proves Christ is divine and is the prophet Moses foretold who should come into the world.

Healthful Diet Appointed

When God brought Israel out of Egypt He did not give them flesh meat but fed them with the bread of heaven, angels' food, as their heaven-appointed food. He led them into the wilderness where they could not get a flesh diet in order to make them a separate people and reform their habits of eating, rather than miraculously providing the flesh diet they had known in Egypt. The gift was meant to educate and discipline and train them into correct habits, leading them away from their former diet to accept His restrictions because He knew what was best for them. Flesh was withheld as not essential for health and because of its harmful influence upon the human system, although He had permitted earlier generations to eat the flesh of dead animals knowing it would shorten life.

The food He designed for them was healthy and could be eaten freely, suited to their needs and better for them than the food they had craved in Egypt, with resistance to His restrictions helping to restore health. It was of a nature to promote physical, mental, and moral strength as part of an all-embracing education covering all habits of life and everything concerning their well-being under divine solicitude and law. It was given with the promise that bread and water would be sure and all sickness would be removed if they were obedient, to bring them back to live upon simple fruits, vegetables, and grains and to carry them into Canaan and establish them there a pure, holy, happy people. So it was that notwithstanding the hardships of wilderness life there was not a feeble one in all their tribes, and even after their long journey their physical appearance would bear the divine credentials with sickness taken away from among them.

The light God has given and will continue to give on the food question is to His people today what that manna was to Israel, which they were told to gather up and prepare to be eaten. It teaches diet reform and simplicity of living without flesh meats from simple, less expensive fruits and grains, with lessons in hygienic cookery as part of education. In the different countries of the world health foods suited to those countries are to be prepared, so those who cannot obtain expensive preparations need not live on an impoverished diet.

Israel craved the flesh-pots of Egypt and longed for Egypt's food, and mourned and wept and murmured and complained for flesh with appetite controlling them, a course that displeased God. They loathed the bread sent from heaven and took their case into their own hands as though they knew better than God what was best, and would not limit their diet to His chosen restriction. Because they were determined to have the flesh of dead animals He gave them the very diet He had withheld and sent quails, and murmuring against His chosen healthful diet and asking for flesh was rebellion speedily punished. Many died from eating meat to excess while the flesh was still between their teeth, and letting them have their desires brought instead of health and happiness dissension, sickness, and death. That experience is to be studied and obeyed now by giving up flesh meats, teaching that turning from God's light on health to self-chosen ways brings suffering, sickness, and premature death.

Daily Spiritual Nourishment

Israel was to gather fresh manna day by day, morning and evening, and that daily gathering sets the pattern for seeking fresh spiritual nourishment and divine enlightenment rather than resting satisfied with past blessings. The heavenly manna is to be partaken daily for spiritual necessities just as food meets physical needs, and drinking of the Spiritual Rock and eating this manna daily brings conversion anew and a changed experience, with Christ formed within the soul as a well of water springing up unto everlasting life.

As Israel received food from God, people are to be given fresh spiritual truth suited to their needs, with truth presented freshly and according to need. That manna is the fresh spiritual food God offers for the present time, and it must be eaten as He gives it and the same given to the people.

The manna God gave Israel is the Word and truth from a source above humanity that He still supplies by His own hand as nourishment for His flock. Those who teach must therefore study those truths and eat and drink them, put away fanciful human theories, empty the heart to receive light from God's throne, and feed the flock with that heaven-given food in its original power and glory. So given, it brings higher enjoyment and power, shows heavenly certainty against sophistry, causes capabilities to increase as the indwelling life expands, and teaches the church, enfeebled and defective though it is, as the object of His supreme regard under His guardianship.

To feed upon the heavenly manna as the sacred Word of God brought to the lips means to love the truth and practice its principles, receiving and treasuring it as spiritual food and not merely speaking about it. It means not treating the sacred as common while handling divine interests, not doing things deceitfully, and not merely talking pointed truth without loving and practicing it. The sermon is likened to this manna when it is received as a message from God, though its nature may not be recognized, and listeners who dismiss or criticize it fail to feed their souls on the spiritual nourishment they need. Eating it means receiving God's Word so that hungry souls are fed, with sustaining power in speaking, peace of God abiding in the heart, and a thankful heart full of praise, finding it more than meat and drink to speak the words God gives, an eating that fills the blessed Sabbath from early morning hours all through the day and continues constantly day and night. Such eating brings the education and instruction that is their right for the present time, while eating only what one chooses and holding to old set, stereotyped discourses instead of coming to the school of Christ to learn as a little child leaves labor empty rather than full of marrow and fatness, and shuts out the flooding light, power, love, grace and joy that come with the quickening influence of the Spirit of God and the life-giving power from on high.