Trusting God in the Desert

We come this week to our text right in the middle of Exodus sixteen, and here we looked on last week at this process of God shaping Israel in the desert, of God forming them as his people in the desert, and of him using this process. We also pointed to the importance of our understanding these things in light of progressive revelation, in light of the way that God reveals himself progressively through the scriptures, and we saw that in doing so, we don't fall into the trap of seeing ourselves as completely divorced from things like Exodus sixteen, into the trap of believing that somehow passages like Exodus sixteen are irrelevant to us. We saw in last week how Jesus himself used image directly from Exodus chapter sixteen in order to teach about his relationship to the believer, as this bread from Heaven, this bread of life. We saw earlier when we paused and looked at the Lord's Supper in light of the passover, how Jesus is that passover lamb, And how when we gather before the Lord's Supper we are remembering and also following through with the perpetual reminder of God's provision in and through the Exodus, that he gives a perpetual reminder for Israel and says that this is to be a forever thing, and that through the Lord's Supper we are keeping this forever thing. But now we see him not only in the Lord's Supper, but we also see him as this bread from heaven. We see him as the fulfilled of this type of God's provision for his people. In the midst of the desert, we also saw his presence with his people in the cloud. Today we look at the bread more carefully, and we look at the way that Israel interacts with God through the bread, and the way that God interacts with and shapes Israel through the giving of the bread. This would become important as later on Israel will be tempted to forget God as their provider. They would forget that God is the one who gives us this day our daily bread. How are they going to forget that? Well, They're going to come into a land and not be wandering in the desert anymore, and so they will forget this daily dependence. They will have agriculture, and through their agriculture, they will have cycles that are dependable, so that they know when the rainy seasons come, when it's time to plant, and when it's time to harvest, and they can plan their meals. They don't have to be dependent on God providing this food for them, permanent homes, not having to wander around aimlessly, the temple, not having to wait for this sign of the presence of God in the cloud, an army not having to be defended by a pillar of cloud and a pillar of fire, not having depend on God's supernatural deliverance, but depending on themselves and ultimately a king, a human being to whom they can look. And with all of these temptations, it's going to be important that they continue to remember the God who took care of them in the desert. And when they don't remember God, or when they remember God wrongly, they are tempted towards sin. And in fact they're worship for example, of bail and asheroth. This is about the God of the rains, the God who brings the crops, the God who brings agriculture. And part of their thinking was this, we serve this sort of desert nomadic god, and he can get us water out of rocks, and he can give us bread from heaven and provide us quail to eat. However, now that we've come into this land of the plains, this land of agriculture, there is another god, a pair of gods, the Bale and the Asherah, upon whom you depend when you're in this land. So in order to hedge our bets, we'll worship the God of Israel who got us out of Egypt. But we will also erect statues and monuments and idols to Bail and to Asherah, so that they can smile upon us and bring the reins and we can have what we need to eat. So again, their idolatry is rooted and grounded in this idea of forgetting that it is God who gives us this day our daily bread. But that was then, that's the simplistic thinking of Israel in the desert. That's the simplistic thinking of Israel when they come out of the desert and go into the plains and into the mountains, that certainly we don't do this. Certainly, there aren't things that have brought us away from having an attitude toward God that says, give us this day our daily bread. Really five year plan, your ten year plan, retirement plan, Ira, your four oh one ks, your stocks, your bonds, your mutual funds, your real estate investments, the equity in your home, your rental properties, your social security that's coming. All of these things tend to put us in a position where we forget that it is God who gives us this day our daily bread. Which is why when any of the things on the aforementioned list go south, we immediately get this sort of sky is falling mentality, because we, just like Israel, tend to forget that we are utterly dependent upon God, day in day out, and so we do need this reminder. We do need to see ourselves here in chapter sixteen, look with me, beginning at verse thirteen, we'll look at thirteen through twenty one. In the evening, Quayo came up and covered the camp, and in the morning they lay around the camp, and when the dew had gone up, I'm sorry, do lay around the camp. Let me start that again. In the evening quail came up and covered the camp, and in the morning de lay around the camp, and when the dew had gone up, there was on the face of the wilderness a fine flakelike thing, fine as frost on the ground. When the people of Israel saw it, they said to one another, what is it? For they did not know what it was. And Moses said to them, it is the bread that the Lord has given you to eat. This is what the Lord has commanded. Gather of it, each one of you as much as he can eat. You shall each take one omer according to the number of the persons, that is in each that each of you has in his tent. And the people of Israel did so. They gathered some more, some less. But when they measured it with an omer, whoever gathered much had nothing left over, and whoever gathered little had no lack. Each of them gathered as much as he could eat. And Moses said to them, let no one leave any of it over till the morning. But they did not listen to Moses. See a second, We heard that phrase before. Haven't we get used to it, because you're going to hear it again and again and again. They did not listen to Moses. Some left part of it till morning, and it bred worms and stank. Moses was angry with them morning by morning. By the way, that's another phrase you need to get used to. Moses was angry with them. We just kind of fill in the blanks. The rest of the way through, they did not listen to Moses. Something happened, and Moses was angry with them. Morning by morning they gathered it as much as each as much as he could, But when the sun grew hot, it melted. What do we learn from this? What do we see in Israel and in ourselves as a result of this experience with the manna? Three things I want you to see. First, I want you to see that God provides for his people supernaturally. God provides for his people supernaturally Verses thirteen to fifteen. Make this clear that in the evening quail came up and covered the camp, and in morning dew lay around the camp. And when the dew had gone up, there was this on the face of the wilderness, a fine flakelike thing, finest frost on the ground. People of Israel saw it, they said to one another, what is it? It's part of where its name comes from, by the way, for they did not know what it was. And Moses said to them, it is the bread that the Lord has given you to eat. There are two types of provision here. One I'd call providential provision. This is just God and his providence bringing them to a place and bringing about circumstances that provide for them, bringing about this abundance in this for example, with the quail. Listen to this from John Walton and Victor Matthews. Small plump migratory quail often come through the Sinai on their way north from the Sudan to Europe, generally in the morning or in the months of March and April. They generally fly with the wind and are driven to ground or water if caught in a crosswind. In their exhaustion, it is not unusual for them to fly so low that they can be easily caught. Quail looking for a place to land and rest have been known to sink small boats, and in the Sinai they have been noted to cover the ground so densely that some land on the tops of others. Quail just pile up on top of each other. So it's not that, you know, God sort of makes these quails appear ex nihilo. He doesn't invent quail out of nothing. But this is a migration, a normal migration of quail. But the problem is that the normal migration of quail is only during a certain period of time. And not nearly enough to feed well over a million people. So God, in his providence has brought them to a place where there is a food source, but providentially during this time, he provides it in such abundance that they can eat and eat regular early off of this food source. So again, it's not that it's unknown for quail to be in this area. It's known for quail to be in this area. It's not that it's unknown for the quail to cover the ground. It's known for quail to cover the ground, but in this magnitude it's unheard of, and with this consistency, it's unheard of. So God provides for them providentially. And we know that that's the way that God provides for all of us providentially. In his providence, everything that we have is provided for us. I don't care what it is that you have, what it is that you do, Everything that you have is a result of God's providential care for you. Yes, but I did this and I did that. Of course you did, but you didn't invent whatever you did it with, and you didn't give yourself the strength to do it. You didn't decide where you would be born. You didn't decide what technologies you would have at your disposal. Well, during this particular period in history. It is God and his providence who has done this for you. God cares for his people providentially. But not only is there this providential provision, but there's also the miraculous provision. That's where you get into the manna. The manna is not something seen there before or seen their sins. There are many who've tried to argue that the mana is one of a number of normal sort of occurrences in the desert. However, all of those things fail to satisfy. John Calvin notes that there are eight factors that exclude a natural explanation and demand that we see this as no less than a miracle in the desert. And by the way, it's important to note the difference between these two things. It's important to note the difference between God's providence and God's miraculous activity. We use that word miracle far too often, and by definition, if something happens all the time and it's part of the normal course of things, it is not miraculous. The example that I've used dozens of times from this very spot is childbirth. I love children as much as the next person, probably more. But childbirth is not a miracle. We know how it happens, and it happens all day every day. It is not a miracle. There has only been one birth that was miraculous, and that was the birth of Jesus Christ. Amen. Every other birth has been providential. Okay, it's been providential, not miraculous. Miracle. You know, missing a car on your way here, that wasn't miraculous. That was providential. When something is miraculous, it's not part of the normal course of things. Eight things, as Calvin knows, points to the man of being miraculous. Number one, it didn't appear before. Now you ever thought about that. It didn't appear before. Now. They've been in the desert for a while, but up to this point there hadn't been any mana So it wasn't Moses didn't say, hey, God wants you to know something. You know, this stuff that's been on the ground every day, You can actually eat that. See, that would have been providential. Amen. We've been walking around as funny thing, guys, I didn't even know this, but we've been walking around and there's this stuff on the ground and it melts when it gets hot. Right, here's what God wanted me to tell you. You can eat that stuff. The way it happened, it didn't appear before now. Number Two, it was not affected by weather or season. It's not affected by weather or season. This is not something that just appeared seasonally. This is something that wasn't affected by weather or season. Number Three, it was sufficient for the people. It was sufficient for the people, perhaps millions of people, And there was enough to do on the ground forming manna for these people to eat. Four. It was doubled for the sabbath. It was doubled for the sabbath. This is a natural occurrence. Number one. If it's a natural occurrence, doesn't make sense that it only happened six days out of the week. If it's just a natural occurrence, right, that makes no sense whatsoever. This was just a natural occurrence. People, Really, what natural occurres? Do you know? It only takes place six days out of the week and always doesn't take place on the same one day out of the week every week. That's not a natural occurrence. That's a supernatural occurrence. Five. If they preserved it overnight, it putrefied. Six, It followed them wherever they went, it followed them wherever they went. Seven, as soon as they entered a fruitful country, the manna ceased. Once they didn't need it anymore. It was gone. Once they came into the land that God promised them, it was gone. It's not there. It's not there today. For people who go wandering in the desert of the Sini, there's no manna for them. It was gone. And eight, the Sabbath portion did not decay. This is miraculous. Every morning, go collect it. Go collect all you can eat, but eat all you collect. Don't try to keep it until the next day. And they tried to keep it until the next day, but it's spoiled and went rotten, and there was worms. But what we're going to see next week is that on the Sabbath, God provides beforehand for the Sabbath, there's a double portion. There's miracle number one that there's a double portion, and that they're able to go get a double portion. Here's miracle number two. Any other day you keep it overnight, it goes rotten, but you keep it for the Sabbath, and it's good for the next day. This is miraculous provision. This is not just God's providential care. This is God's miraculous care for his people. This reminds both Israel and us that God is not bound by the circumstances that limit us. Amen, God is not bound by the circumstances that limit us. This is what they have to remember, This is what they have to be taught, because remember their entire lives. For all of these people, they've been in slavery and Egypt, and their thought had to be that God either was not listening to their prayers or that he was not as powerful as the gods of Egypt and therefore couldn't deliver him to deliver them. So what does he do through those ten plagues? He demonstrates that he's more powerful than the gods of Egypt. He could have done it in one plague, but he does it in ten in order to disabuse them of the notion that somehow the gods of Egypt are real and have any kind of real power. And then secondly, he takes them through the desert. He could have just brought them immediately into the land of Promise, but he doesn't. He brings them into the desert and they stay there for forty years, and God provides for them for forty years so that this generation and the next generation and every generation after it will know that God sovereignly and supernaturally cares for He is people. This is not normal. They are not normal. There is a difference between what God does for others and what God does for them. He is their children, We are his children. God's care for us is not like his care for others. And it's not because Israel was special, and it's not because we're special. It is because God has set his love on us as his people in order to display his glory. That's the only reason and explanation for it. This is what drives us to prayer and worship. This is what separates Christianity from other religions. You see, it's not it's not that we are appeasing God or controlling God. It is that God is sovereign, that he created the world, and that He sustains the world and everything in it, and we are thereby dependent upon God because of it. This is what drives us to prayer. This is what drives us to worship. What drives you away from prayer and worship self reliance. Self reliance, you know, one of the things that I like to do and go out to eat, and sometimes I remember, sometimes I don't, but our server comes. I just like to sort of break the ice for spiritual conversation and just ask, you know, we're about to pray for our food. Is there any way in particular that we could be praying for you? You know? The most common answer that I get to that question. There are some people who stop and they say, yes, you can be praying about this, this, and this. I can't. Yeah, I can't remember, you know, I can't tell you how many times God has just shown in his providence the blessing of this so many times. Hey, we're about to eat, we're going to pray for our food. Anyway in particularly we can be praying for you? Yes, I just got a call earlier that dot dot dot please pray for me. Yes. After work today, I'm going to be driving to go see my mother. She's sick and we don't know what's gonna be just at moments like that. But that's not the normal answer. The normal answer to we're about to pray for our food, is there any way we can pray for you? Is Nope, everything's okay. In other words, we only need prayer when things are not okay. When things are okay, I got this, I got this, I am in control, everything is all right. I'm managing it all. And I don't need God right now. However, if the wheels fall off and I run into anything that's too big for me, then I'll let you know and we can call on God. Folks, hear me in this, hear me in this. This is why regular family worship in your home is so important. This is why regular prayer in your home is so important. This is why calling our families together and going before God day by day is so important. Because if we're not doing that, then here's what we're communicating to our children. We don't need God. And all of a sudden, we're not engaging in family worship, we're not praying regularly, we're not calling upon God, and suddenly difficulty comes. We get a phone call and somebody sick, We get a phone call and somebody's died. We get a phone call and there's some tragedy in the family, and all of a sudden, we want to gather the family together and say, let's pray. What if you just communicated prayer is for when we need something. Prayer is for when things go badly. Prayer is for when we don't have this under control. That's what we communicate. But what does regular family worship communicate to our children? Regular daily family worship, daily devotions communicate to our children. We need God every day. I need THEE every hour. That's what it communicates to our children. Then the phone call comes and we pray, and it's not foreign to us. It's just who we are. And why is it who we are? It's who we are because we recognize that we are dependent upon God for our daily bread. May I ask you a question, sir, Are you leading regular family devotions in your home or are you communicating to your wife and to your children that you don't need God right now? Are you in prayer on a regular basis or are you showing your family by your actions that it's just not that important. Is it something that you've started and then you ran out of steam because it became too much of a routine for you. Because if that's the case, may I ask you why you still brush your teeth? That's a routine. Yeah. Well, if I don't do that, my breast starts to think, just to think. But what do you think happens to you spiritually when you're disconnecting from God like that, when you're acting as though it's not something that you need on a regular and ongoing basis. I am not calling upon you to do this because I believe that there's going to be a quid pro quote. I'm calling upon you to do this because I believe that God is worthy of it, and because I believe that your soul needs it, that your family needs it. I'm calling you to this because this is who we are. His mercies are new every morning, and we ought to thank Him for them every day. If we're not doing it, then what are we saying about what our family is based on. What are we saying about what's central to us and what essentral to us? What are we saying about the desperate need of our souls to feed on Christ and to be reminded of the Gospel day after day after day day. I'm not reminding you of this so that you can go home and be good. I'm reminding you of this because you're not good, and you need to be reminded how not good you are. You need the good news every day. Your family needs the good news. Every day. This is our daily bread. Are we reading the scriptures and feeding upon them? Again, I'm not telling you you need to do this so that you can be good. I'm telling you that you need to do this because you're not. Because you're not, and you need to be reminded of it. Your family needs to be reminded of it. Secondly, not only does God supernaturally, but he provides sufficiently sufficiently. Look at verse sixteen. This is what the Lord God has commanded. Gather of it, each one of you as much as he can eat. You shall each take an omer according to the number of the persons that each of you has in his tent. And the people of Israel did so. They gathered some more, some less. But when they measured it with an omer, whoever gathered much had nothing left over, and whoever gathered little had no lack. Each of them gathered as much as he could eat. Folks, don't miss this. They weren't just sustained. They were satisfied. Amen, They were satisfied. Gather as much as you can eat. God is not stingy, Amen, God is not stingy. This is one of the major fallacies of those outside of Christianity. See, we believe that outside of Christianity, there is this life of plenty, there is this life of abundance, There is this life of overflowing joy, provision, substance, everything else. But when you walk into Christianity, you walk into it with your head hung low, and you walk into it with a dour face, because everybody knows that when you become a Christian, it's the end of joy, it's the end of satisfaction, it's the end of overflowing abundance. And in Christianity, you're not really a Christian unless you're miserable. That's the great myth. That's not the God whom we serve. The God whom we serve gives to us in abundance. He is not stingy. He gives sufficiently. Notice some of these phrases, each one of you as much as he can eat. It says, some gathered more, some gathered less. Whoever gathered much had nothing left over. Whoever gathered little had no lack. In other words, compared to an Omer, he gives him this idea of an Omer, it's a daily ration of bread. You go out and gather an omer, you go out and gather it, and then when they measured it against the omer, what they found was that the people who had gathered a little more they didn't have too much, and the people who had gathered a little less they didn't have any lack. In other words, each person could gather what they needed, and there was enough for everyone to have whatever it was that they needed to be satisfied. This is how God provides for his people. And don't miss the significance of this. The desert is a foreboding place of scarcity and want. It has challenges in terms of food and water. This is why you don't go through the desert. You go through the desert, amen. And when you go through the desert, you want to make sure that you have enough supplies to go through the desert. And one of the difficulties in going through the desert is having enough livestock to carry the stuff you need, but not too much so that you then lose your supplies. So it's this balancing act. We gotta have enough water, but we can't overburden our animals and our people with carrying all the water. So how far can we get? Where's the next place that we can get water? Where's the next place that we can get food. This is how you go through a desert, folks. And yet God has his people in the desert, and they are satisfied every day. The desert is a challenge in terms of its harsh elements, and yet again they have clothing, and their clothing is sufficient. They're not burned and chapped by the sun because God cares for them in the desert, and his care is sufficient. Hence, God's providence shines all the more. When they go into the Land of Promise. It is as though God has given them this forty year history in order to say, really, you're worried. Now, you're worried in the land flowing with milk and honey, that the God who sustains you in the desert can't sustain you here. Again, saints, don't get arrogant with this, because this is you and this is me. God saves us, and then we worry about whether or not He can sustain us, and we worry about whether or not he can keep us. God saves us, and something happens, and all of a sudden, the God who could take you from death to life can't be depended upon to get you the rest of the way. This is our natural tendency, and this is why we need the desert and the remembrance of the desert. This is why we need to remember God's sufficient provision and supernatural provision in the person and work of Christ, that he provided Christ for us. That Christ is our bread, and Christ is most assuredly enough. He is the God man. He is God who wrapped himself in flesh. He is God who not only took flesh upon himself, but took upon himself, who took the penalty for sin upon himself, who died and rose again on the third day. He is God who has paid for the sins of his people. He is God who has rescued us from ourselves. How much more can he be dependent upon for sufficiency in our everyday lives. This is the measure message of the desert. God provides for his people supernaturally. God provides for his people sufficiently. There is nothing you need that God cannot supply. And the Christian walk is not about you wandering aimlessly in want all the time. Come to me, are you labor and they're heavy laden? And I will give you rest. This is what He provides. Thirdly, and only does God supply for his people supernaturally and sufficiently. But God supplies for his people and provides for his people daily daily. He's not far from us. Look at the next part of this. Moses said to them, let no one leave any of it over till morning. But they did not listen to Moses. Some left part of it till the morning. Again, leave it in your house, Not leave it on the ground. You only take from the ground what you need. And if you leave it on the ground, the sun comes up and it melts. Nothing to worry about, He's saying. Don't leave it in your house. Don't hoard it. Don't hoard it. Look at my barns. My barns are filled to overflow. It's awesome. I'm good. Now you remember that parable What does Jesus say, you fool tonight? Your soul is going to be required of you. What goods all that stuff that you stored in your barns? Don't store it over, he says. But they did not listen to Moses. There's that phrase. Some left part of it until morning, and it bred worms and stank, and Moses was angry with them. Morning by morning, they gathered it each as much as he could eat, but when the sun grew hot, it melted. This taught Israel a number of things that it also teaches us. There are a number of things that it teaches us on the positive and appropriate side, and if we don't think about it rightly, there are a number of things that it teaches us on the other side. Let me start with the first. On the positive side, this taught Israel discipline. They had to go gather the provisions every day. This taught them discipline. And interestingly enough, this is one of the things that we tend to forget in our relationship with God, that it does involve discipline, that it does involve us committing to some things regularly. You know, there's such an emphasis on this idea of you know, Christianity's not a religion, it's a relationship. And so we just sit back and we relax and we go with the flow, and it's just all about the you know, the moment and the here and the now and da da da da dah. And because of that, we move away from the idea of disciplining ourselves. The apostle Paul makes it clear in his Epistle to Timothy and elsewhere that he disciplined himself, and that we are to discipline ourselves. This was a way that God was teaching his people discipline, that daily they would go and gather. Secondly, it taught them humility. It taught them humility. How so well taught them humility because they had to go and gather what God provided, and whatever God provided was what they ate. In addition to humility and discipline, it taught them dependence. It taught them dependence. They had to depend on God. Go gather your food, only gather your food for today. Whoa what if? Here's the question, Here's why you store it over until tomorrow? What if God forgets us? And how many of us live like that? As though God would give his only begotten son to die for our sins, to redeem us and to save us, only to later lose track of us, to forget us. That is not our God. It teaches dependence. And the only reason you keep it over is just in case God for you. Maybe he won't forget us altogether, but maybe tomorrow it won't be enough, so I need to make sure that we have enough. And it also tested their faith in all of this. It tested their faith. However, with your hard hearts. With my hard heart, it can teach us other lessons. To the hard heart, you don't learn discipline, you learn to be discontent. Manna again you go from We get to live another day because in the midst of the desert God provided bread again to manna again. The heart also becomes resentful. Instead of humility and dependence upon God. We learn resentment because we don't want to be humble and we don't want to be dependent upon God. We want to be independent and proud and arrogant, which is why the heart then yearns for independence from God. But what is the difference. The difference in this list and this second list is a question of perspective. Do I see myself as a person in desperate need of a deliverer or do I see myself as a person who can do just fine on my own? And our natural tendency is the latter and not the former. My natural tendency is to see myself as a person who can do just fine on my own, and not as a person who's dependent upon God, not as a person who recognizes that I need God to give me this day my daily bread. But my natural tendency is to say I got this God, And if I run into anything I can't handle, then I'll call you. That's my natural tendency, and it's your natural tendency. And because that's our natural tendency, when we run up against this truth and this reality that we are dependent upon God, then it doesn't make us humble, it makes us resentful. What does that look like, I'll tell you what it looks like. You're going through your Christian life. And as you go through your Christian life, you experience a difficulty. And when you experience that difficulty, the disappointment, whatever it is, you go to your doctor and you get bad news. You overcome an area of sin in your life, and then you fall back into it. You have a relationship that becomes disappointing to you. Whatever it is, whatever it is, you go through it, and all of a sudden, the wheels fall off. Everything's bad. But God and his grace and his and in his kindness brings you through that situation. And the case of the physical ailment is a physical ailment. And all of a sudden you're in despair, You're despondent everything else, but God brings you through that, and all of a sudden, it's praise God. Here's my testimony. God brought me through. Or if it's something that has been holding you down, some kind of addiction, and then you fall and then all of a sudden, God gets you back up again and you gain victory again, and it's praise God, Amen, Hallelujah, Praise the Lord. It's good. Or if it's some kind of relational issue, there's a relationship that's harmful or hurting you or disappointing, disappointing you and God delivers you from that, or God heals that relationship all of a sudden, it's Amen, hallelujah, Praise the Lord. God is good. You're stronger for it. A year later, two years later, you're sick again, and all of a sudden, instead of saying, I know God, I'm dependent upon God every day. I was here before, I'll probably be here again. God took me by the hand and walked me through it before. God's going to take me by the hand and walk me through it again. Instead of that attitude, our attitude becomes one of resentment. I thought we'd settled this, God, I thought we were done with this. I thought this was over. I thought we were finished with this. I went through the sickness or whatever it was, and I learned something, and I got closer to you. And now all of a sudden, after teaching me my lesson and me getting closer to you, it happens again. What's wrong? Why don't you love me? See, this is the natural tendency. They hurt me again. I can't believe you let him hurt me again. I can't believe you let him disappoint me again. This is the natural tendency, and it is all rooted and grounded in self reliance. It is all rooted and grounded in the perspective that does not understand that when God said, when Jesus said to us, when you pray, say our Father, who are in heaven, holl loowd be your name, your kingdom. Come here will be done on earth that is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread. Give us this day our daily bread, he meant that. What he meant was that our prayer life was to be rooted and grounded in dependence. That we are constantly to remind ourselves that we are dependent upon God. You don't have it figured out, and you won't have it figured out because the Christian life is not something you figure out. It is something you walk through and are shaped by, and are formed by and conformed to the image of Christ by. Christianity is not something we use, something we become. Difficulty is life amen, and becoming a Christian doesn't mean that life becomes something other than difficulty. Becoming a Christian means that your difficulty becomes something that is less significant than the reality to which you now hold. That's what becoming a Christian means. Becoming a Christian doesn't mean I don't get sick anymore. Becoming a Christian means that when I get sick, like everybody else gets sick, I don't become afraid like those who have no hope, because I recognize that my life is hidden with Christ. Becoming a Christian doesn't mean that I never battle again with besetting sins. It means that besetting sins remind me of my dependence upon God and that my sanctification is not complete yet. Being a Christian doesn't mean that people don't hurt you or disappoint you anymore. But being a Christian means that you no longer put your hope in those people who hurt you and disappoint you. But your hope is in Christ, who has redeemed you, and who is a friend that is closer than a brother, who will never disappoint you. And He's the only one who won't disappoint you. And it means remembering that you disappoint God more than any individual has ever disappointed you. And yet by his grace, it is covered in his blood. So remember that when your fellow man disappoints you and falls short. All of this, all of this we learn from bread provided in the desert. Because this bread is not just bread. It is God's supernatural, sufficient daily provision for his people. And whether you're talking about the Old Covenant or the New Covenant, this is our relationship with God. And again these are not my words. These are Jesus' words when he says that he is the bread of life. He is the true bread that comes from God, the true bread that comes from Heaven. So that Christ is my supernatural, sufficient daily provision from God. I need Jesus. You need Jesus just like your body needs food to eat. Every day. You need Jesus. This is why we gather week after week. This is why we set before these ordinary means of grace again and again and again, because this weekly reminder is symbolic of the daily reminder that we need God. You're not okay, saints. You're not good enough. You're not strong enough, you're not smart enough, you're not righteous enough, You're not anything enough. But the good news is Christ is more than enough. Oh sinner, have you come into this room today depending on anything other than Christ as your daily bread? Have you dared to walk into this room depending on yourself to be good enough, depending on yourself to be righteous enough, depending on yourself to be wise enough, depending on yourself to get you from this day to tomorrow. Please please let that go. You can't get yourself out of this room on your own intelligence and your own righteousness apart from the mercy of God. Throw yourself upon his mercy. Cling to his mercy in the person of Jesus Christ. Repent of your sin, turn from it, run to Jesus, beg for God's forgiveness, and don't let him go until you have it, because that is indeed your only hope. You need Christ every day, every hour, every moment, and there will never be a moment when you don't need Christ. He is our bread. He said from heaven. Let's pray, Oh God, it is so easy for us to look at Israel in the desert and not see ourselves. It is so easy to look at Israel in the desert and point a wagging finger of condemnation because they failed again, because they didn't believe, again, because they didn't obey again, because they have to be rebuked again, because they have to be reminded again. But, oh God, would you help us see ourselves in this? Would you help us see that we too have been delivered, that we two have been provided for, and that we too have become self reliant, that we too have become arrogant, that we too are disobedient, that we two act as though we have no desperate need of you. And in your reminding, would you also remind us that there is good news? And the good news is that though we are faithless, he remains faithful. News is, though we've dropped the ball yet again, you are not depending upon us to carry it. The good news is that though we have become lazy and laxadaisical, that you do not slumber, and you do not sleep. The good news is that when you reprove and you rebuke your children. It is to conform us to the image of Christ. Grant by your grace, that we might receive it as precisely that, and that we might cling all the more diligently to the Cross. Grant by your grace, that those who have entered this room trusting in anything other than Christ, would flee to him, would cling to him, would trust in him, would hope in him, and in nothing and no one else. Gret This we pray, so that Christ might indeed have the fullness of the reward for which he died. This we ask in his name and for his sake. Amen.