Scripture: Exodus 16: 1-21; 31-35
Sermon: Manna: What’s That?
Topics: Grumbling, Manna, Enough
Preached: March 19, 2000; Sept. 18, 2016 vesper communion service
Exodus 16
The whole congregation of the Israelites set out from Elim; and Israel came to the wilderness of Sin, which is between Elim and Sinai, on the fifteenth day of the second month after they had departed from the land of Egypt. 2The whole congregation of the Israelites complained against Moses and Aaron in the wilderness. 3The Israelites said to them, ‘If only we had died by the hand of the Lord in the land of Egypt, when we sat by the fleshpots and ate our fill of bread; for you have brought us out into this wilderness to kill this whole assembly with hunger.’
4 Then the Lord said to Moses, ‘I am going to rain bread from heaven for you, and each day the people shall go out and gather enough for that day. In that way I will test them, whether they will follow my instruction or not. 5On the sixth day, when they prepare what they bring in, it will be twice as much as they gather on other days.’ 6So Moses and Aaron said to all the Israelites, ‘In the evening you shall know that it was the Lordwho brought you out of the land of Egypt, 7and in the morning you shall see the glory of the Lord, because he has heard your complaining against the Lord. For what are we, that you complain against us?’ 8And Moses said, ‘When the Lord gives you meat to eat in the evening and your fill of bread in the morning, because the Lord has heard the complaining that you utter against him—what are we? Your complaining is not against us but against the Lord.’
9 Then Moses said to Aaron, ‘Say to the whole congregation of the Israelites, “Draw near to the Lord, for he has heard your complaining.” ’10And as Aaron spoke to the whole congregation of the Israelites, they looked towards the wilderness, and the glory of the Lord appeared in the cloud. 11The Lord spoke to Moses and said, 12‘I have heard the complaining of the Israelites; say to them, “At twilight you shall eat meat, and in the morning you shall have your fill of bread; then you shall know that I am the Lord your God.” ’
13 In the evening quails came up and covered the camp; and in the morning there was a layer of dew around the camp. 14When the layer of dew lifted, there on the surface of the wilderness was a fine flaky substance, as fine as frost on the ground. 15When the Israelites saw it, they said to one another, ‘What is it?’ For they did not know what it was. Moses said to them, ‘It is the bread that the Lord has given you to eat.16This is what the Lord has commanded: “Gather as much of it as each of you needs, an omer to a person according to the number of persons, all providing for those in their own tents.” ’ 17The Israelites did so, some gathering more, some less. 18But when they measured it with an omer, those who gathered much had nothing over, and those who gathered little had no shortage; they gathered as much as each of them needed. 19And Moses said to them, ‘Let no one leave any of it over until morning.’ 20But they did not listen to Moses; some left part of it until morning, and it bred worms and became foul. And Moses was angry with them. 21Morning by morning they gathered it, as much as each needed; but when the sun grew hot, it melted……
31 The house of Israel called it manna; it was like coriander seed, white, and the taste of it was like wafers made with honey. 32Moses said, ‘This is what the Lord has commanded: “Let an omer of it be kept throughout your generations, in order that they may see the food with which I fed you in the wilderness, when I brought you out of the land of Egypt.” ’33And Moses said to Aaron, ‘Take a jar, and put an omer of manna in it, and place it before the Lord, to be kept throughout your generations.’34As the Lord commanded Moses, so Aaron placed it before the covenant, for safe-keeping. 35The Israelites ate manna for forty years, until they came to a habitable land; they ate manna, until they came to the border of the land of Canaan
This is the Word of the Lord
Thanks be to God
INTRODUCTION — GRUMBLING
What is more frustrating than feeding kids?
It’s not that kids aren’t hungry.
They always seem to be hungry, starving even.
But stick something, anything, in front of them other than pizza,
and their eyes squint, their noses wrinkle,
and out comes, “What’s that?”
Monday, suppertime:
“What’s that?”
“O, that’s rice. It’s good, really good. Billions of people in China and India eat this three times a day.”
No impact. The eyes are still squinted. The nose still wrinkled.
Tuesday suppertime:
“What’s that?”
“O that’s spaghetti, spaghetti with tomato sauce – it’s as if tomato
sauce was made to go with spaghetti. Millions of people in Italy eat
some form of this every day.”
No impact. The eyes are still squinted. The nose still wrinkled.
Wednesday suppertime:
“What’s that?”
“O these are tortillas. They’re filled with all kinds of good stuff –
chicken, cheese, (you decide not to mention any of the vegetables like onions or green peppers). Yeah, millions and millions of people in Mexico eat this every day.
No impact. The eyes are still squinted. The nose still wrinkled.
Thursday, suppertime:
“What’s that?”
“O, this is quiche. It’s full of stuff you like, really: eggs, cheese, some bits of ham. Yeah, real kids eat quiche.
(You hold your breath and hope the don’t notice the big hunks of broccolli – but the hunks of broccolli are too big to be hidden.)
“What are these big green things.”
O, that’s broccolli, it’s really good for you.”
The eyes are still squinted. The nose still wrinkled.
Beside the squinted eyes and wrinkled noses, there is sometimes a rumble or grumble — “Melissa gets to eat pizza everyday.”
Or “Cameron gets to have supper at McDonalds.”
Sometimes we can laugh – the things kids say can be pretty funny.
But other days, we simply want to pull our hair out in frustration. We give our kids what is best for them, and all they can think of is fast-food.
ISRAEL GRUMBLING
When it came to moaning and groaning, the people of Israel were experts. Earlier in the book of Exodus (6:9) we are told they were good at it because they had been slaves for so long they always saw the dark side of things. And so,
even after living through the wonders of the 10 plagues,
even after walking through the sea on dry land,
even after the bitter water of Marah was made drinkable, nevertheless, days into the journey they were convinced they were going to die.
Like most complainers, they knew how to exaggerate:
They exaggerated their hunger
and they exaggerated how good they had it in Egypt.
When we read this passage we can’t help but notice the word “grumbling” comes up again and again.
And we can’t help but catch a sense that already this early in the journey, Moses and Aaron are pretty sick and tired of it.
Hey, Moses says, “Who are we that you should grumble against us?”
To give it punch it is repeated in the next verse: “Who are we? You’re not grumbling against us but against God.”
GOD’S ANSWER — MANNA
How God answers their grumbling is, I think, funnier than the grumbling itself.
He manages to arrange a quail entre for supper, but the real surprise comes in the morning. The Israelites roll out of their cots and tents, and they see all this white flakey stuff on the ground.
They haven’t got a clue what it is.
They squint their eyes and wrinkle their noses and ask, “What’s that?”
And that is what the word manna means: “What is it?”
or as Thomas Cahill writes in his recent book The Gift of the Jews,
they name it “Whaddayacallit?”
Now commentators will try explain how this flaky white stuff came to be:
It was the natural secretions from certain insects
or it was the common resin from the tamarisk trees
or it was some sort of lichen that blew in with the wind.
But let’s face it, we really haven’t a clue what it was. It’s pretty mysterious stuff — thus the name: “Whaddayacallit?”
* There is almost a mirage quality to this “whaddayacallit.”
It would appear as dew in the morning but it would evaporate – disappear — once the sun rose in the sky.
* Also, it didn’t seem to matter how much you collected in the morning.
If you collected a lot, well, it wouldn’t be too much.
If you collected only a little, well, it would never be too little.
What amazing stuff.
* Try create an inventory, put it in your pantry, and it would be full of maggots and mold the next day – unless the next day was the Sabbath. Then it would be perfectly fine.
What wild stuff this “whaddayacallit” was.
But it wasn’t a mirage. It was a meal.
And it would be breakfast for Israel for forty years.
They would pound it and grind it, they would bake it and boil it.
And for forty years, they would eat it. It would nourish them and sustain them through the wilderness. Once they got into the promised land, it stopped coming – bang – just like that.
MONOTONY OF MANNA — OUR GRUMBLING
I once read by a certain article by Rev. John Holwerda. It was written in 1976 and had the title, The Monotony of Manna. In a way it’s a hilarious article. He basically writes that anyone who complains about boring sermons had better learn to keep quiet. If the Israelites could live in the desert for 40 years on a boring diet of monotonous manna,
well then you can certainly survive in the pew on a monotonous diet of boring sermons.
I’m not so sure that is the exact point of this passage but there may be some truth to this article.
There are always those who come to church
And count the number of times we have to stand up and sit down;
Or squint their eyes and wrinkle their noses at certain songs,
certain prayers, certain sermons.
We are a pretty polite group but we still know how to grumble:
Who hasn’t thought that things are more exciting in another church,
Or who hasn’t thought at one time or another there was a whole lot
more solid meat and potatoes in those services of years ago.
And yet, we come.
Why do we come?
Isn’t it because we are all, deep down, hungry.
In fact, isn’t it true that at times we are starving.
not physically but spiritually.
We know we are travelling through a worldly wilderness.
In this worldly wilderness things can get pretty blurry.
The wilderness is a place for mirages,
It is that territory between life and death.
It is easy to be confused about what is true and what is not;
It is easy to begin to wonder do I really believe;
It is easy to start questioning what is really meaningful in life and what is not.
Some say it is hope, faith and love which draw us together.
That is true, but don’t we also come because sometimes we feel
hopelessness,
Sometimes we feel our faith is draining away,
Sometimes we feel we don’t have the energy to love.
And isn’t it true that,
below the surface of the grumbling
we have about the songs we sing
or the sermons we hear
or the prayers we pray,
isn’t true that we come to church with a deeper set of grumblings – not so much with ministers,
or Church Council,
or the denomination – but with God.
For somewhere along the line we have issues with God:
We’ve been disappointed, hurt;
somewhere in this life journey we feel as if we’ve been abandoned,
rejected, now we’re lonely, empty;
At some point in our life, when we’ve seemingly needed God most, he
didn’t appear to be around.
We come to church taking our rumbling hungry heart
and lonely soul with us.
GOD ANSWERS US – WITH ENOUGH
The comedy of the covenant, as Frederick Beuchner puts it, is that God patiently and graciously not only puts up with a grumbling rabble like us, but that he lovingly gathers us to himself again and again.
The comedy of the covenant is that God does impossible things with an impossible people.
God has this way of surprising us, astonishing us, with his love.
God uses ordinary things to do the extraordinary.
Tonight he will place before us a meal.
Throughout church history people have wrinkled their nose and squinted their eyes at this meal and asked: “What is it? Whaddayacallit?”
For to all the world it looks like a pretty small meal – very little to eat, very little to drink.
But for those of us who see it by faith,
who hold it in faith,
who eat it in faith,
this is the body and blood of Jesus Christ, the bread of heaven.
Somewhere deep inside we know
it doesn’t matter whether we take a small piece of bread
or a large piece;
it doesn’t matter whether we drink a drop or a cup full.
Even if it is only a crumb and only a drop, what is it?
It is enough – enough strength, enough hope, enough
Enough to nourish thirsty souls and feed hungry hearts.
Millions and billions of people have eaten of this loaf
Millions and billions of people have drank from this cup.
We will do so soon with a certain amount of astonished joy:
For in so doing we are confessing that though we live in the wilderness,
we are on our way to the Promised Land.
Though we are living in this world,
We are not of it.
Though this world may see it all as a mirage,
we see it as a meal — the only meal that truly satisfies. Amen
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