1 ¶ And they took their journey from Elim, and all the congregation of the children of Israel came unto the wilderness of Sin, which is between Elim and Sinai, on the fifteenth day of the second month after their departing out of the land of Egypt.
The topic of the “wilderness of Sin” would make good preaching material.
2 And the whole congregation of the children of Israel murmured against Moses and Aaron in the wilderness:
Here’s the murmuring again.
3 And the children of Israel said unto them, Would to God we had died by the hand of the LORD in the land of Egypt, when we sat by the flesh pots, and when we did eat bread to the full; for ye have brought us forth into this wilderness, to kill this whole assembly with hunger.
The “flesh pots” would also make interesting preaching. God saved them from violent death, from thirst, and finally bread.
The first thing that God saves you from is the second death, then He attends to your physical needs; water, a type of the Holy Spirit, and bread, a type of the word of God, the Bible.
“Would to God” shows that most men would rather live in sin and die than be saved. They feel comfortable with their sin, and their misery.
4 Then said the LORD unto Moses, Behold, I will rain bread from heaven for you; and the people shall go out and gather a certain rate every day, that I may prove them, whether they will walk in my law, or no.
Here the law is mentioned before it’s given. He’s going to test them before He gives them the list of rules that will separate them from all the other decadent peoples of the earth.
5 And it shall come to pass, that on the sixth day they shall prepare that which they bring in; and it shall be twice as much as they gather daily.
This is the first indication that there will be a weekly Sabbath in the Bible. It is based on God’s own seventh day of rest seen in Genesis 2.
6 And Moses and Aaron said unto all the children of Israel, At even, then ye shall know that the LORD hath brought you out from the land of Egypt:
7 And in the morning, then ye shall see the glory of the LORD; for that he heareth your murmurings against the LORD: and what are we, that ye murmur against us?
The even is a type of rapture, and the morning a type of the Second Advent.
Murmuring against your Pastor is akin to murmuring against God although he is not God or any more godlike than you are. If you don’t like your Pastor or agree with him and praying for him hasn’t worked anything you need to realize that you need to leave the fellowship and not be a problem to God’s man in the pulpit. You sometimes need grace to get through things. The man that God has put in the pulpit through the voting members of the church should not be murmured against. If you are looking for a perfect Pastor or a perfect church you will never find it. If you want a better Pastor, pray for the one you have. Don’t murmur like these people did.
8 And Moses said, This shall be, when the LORD shall give you in the evening flesh to eat, and in the morning bread to the full; for that the LORD heareth your murmurings which ye murmur against him: and what are we? your murmurings are not against us, but against the LORD.
Don’t murmur against your spouse either. The most impossible thing a woman can think she can do is to change a man after she’s married him. It almost never happens.
9 And Moses spake unto Aaron, Say unto all the congregation of the children of Israel, Come near before the LORD: for he hath heard your murmurings.
There is no terror here as there will be later under the law. That is the difference between being under grace and the law. The law divides us from God. Grace draws us closer.
10 And it came to pass, as Aaron spake unto the whole congregation of the children of Israel, that they looked toward the wilderness, and, behold, the glory of the LORD appeared in the cloud.
11 And the LORD spake unto Moses, saying,
12 I have heard the murmurings of the children of Israel: speak unto them, saying, At even ye shall eat flesh, and in the morning ye shall be filled with bread; and ye shall know that I am the LORD your God.
13 ¶ And it came to pass, that at even the quails came up, and covered the camp: and in the morning the dew lay round about the host.
14 And when the dew that lay was gone up, behold, upon the face of the wilderness there lay a small round thing, as small as the hoar frost on the ground.
15 And when the children of Israel saw it, they said one to another, It is manna: for they wist not what it was. And Moses said unto them, This is the bread which the LORD hath given you to eat.
God is providing everything they need. He is showing them who He is by His provision.
16 This is the thing which the LORD hath commanded, Gather of it every man according to his eating, an omer for every man, according to the number of your persons; take ye every man for them which are in his tents.
17 And the children of Israel did so, and gathered, some more, some less.
18 And when they did mete it with an omer, he that gathered much had nothing over, and he that gathered little had no lack; they gathered every man according to his eating.
If you look at manna as a type of the word of God, then learn that if you gather much understanding of the word of God you won’t have any left over. If you gather little you won’t lack. God will give you what you need.
19 And Moses said, Let no man leave of it till the morning.
You gather the word of God daily. You are to read the Book of God every single day.
20 Notwithstanding they hearkened not unto Moses; but some of them left of it until the morning, and it bred worms, and stank: and Moses was wroth with them.
If the word of God is left unread then it can be a stinking thing, sitting there in your house perhaps keeping up a table leg. When you get God’s word you must do something with it and if you don’t you’ll go nuts. Show me a fundamentalist who has gone crazy and I’ll show you a Christian who has read and read the Bible, meditated on it, and yet won’t DO anything with it. Light rejected becomes lightning, said Dr. Ruckman.
21 And they gathered it every morning, every man according to his eating: and when the sun waxed hot, it melted.
22 ¶ And it came to pass, that on the sixth day they gathered twice as much bread, two omers for one man: and all the rulers of the congregation came and told Moses.
23 And he said unto them, This is that which the LORD hath said, To morrow is the rest of the holy sabbath unto the LORD: bake that which ye will bake to day, and seethe that ye will seethe; and that which remaineth over lay up for you to be kept until the morning.
Here is the first mention of the weekly Sabbath observance. No one before this knew about this sabbath.
24 And they laid it up till the morning, as Moses bade: and it did not stink, neither was there any worm therein.
Unbelieving scholars will tell you this is a plant but it sure must be an unusual plant to melt and to appear in this manner during these days.
A better possibility might be found here. Although it could be a rabbit trail.
Psalms 74:14 Thou brakest the heads of leviathan in pieces, and gavest him to be meat to the people inhabiting the wilderness.
And who might this leviathan be?
Isaiah 27:1 In that day the LORD with his sore and great and strong sword shall punish leviathan the piercing serpent, even leviathan that crooked serpent; and he shall slay the dragon that is in the sea.
And who might this dragon be?
Revelation 12:3 And there appeared another wonder in heaven; and behold a great red dragon, having seven heads and ten horns, and seven crowns upon his heads.
Revelation 12:9 And the great dragon was cast out, that old serpent, called the Devil, and Satan, which deceiveth the whole world: he was cast out into the earth, and his angels were cast out with him.
Something happened to this supernatural entity after God’s first great miracle for the Hebrews. We don’t quite understand how, in reference to eternity, this occurred. Very clearly, many commentators have the seven heads of the dragon in Revelation representing future kings perhaps of the European Union, but here is what the Bible says about the seven heads later.
Revelation 17:9 And here is the mind which hath wisdom. The seven heads are seven mountains, on which the woman sitteth.
This is clearly Rome, the seat of the paganized form of Christianity. Since, the serpent’s heads were broken before Christ, then at least some of these kings are not future or ones at the time of the fall of Jerusalem but represent fallen ones before the Exodus. Rome is the inheritor of the Babylonian religion. It is possible, perhaps, and I don’t know this to be true, but it would seem that either these references are to past events of great pagan kings of the Babylonian faith. Consider this verse.
Revelation 17:10 And there are seven kings: five are fallen, and one is, and the other is not yet come; and when he cometh, he must continue a short space.
My point is that what if these five fallen kings were existing before the creation of the Jewish people as a nation? The papacy is the sixth king, and the Beast of Revelation is not yet come. So, then, my point would be, that these kings might be types of rulers or institutions under which rulers obtain authority. The question I would have is this; what five pagan types of priest/king existed before the Papacy? Of course, when you are dealing with events in a timeless eternity my argument may be a moot point.
Remember, that after the time of the Exodus we begin to deal with the Age of great empires. There is Egypt, Assyria/Babylon (two parts of the same culture), Persia, Greece, and Rome. Each of these pagan empires has its own peculiar signature. It’s just food for thought.
25 And Moses said, Eat that to day; for to day is a sabbath unto the LORD: to day ye shall not find it in the field.
26 Six days ye shall gather it; but on the seventh day, which is the sabbath, in it there shall be none.
27 And it came to pass, that there went out some of the people on the seventh day for to gather, and they found none.
28 And the LORD said unto Moses, How long refuse ye to keep my commandments and my laws?
Obviously, God has given them laws before the law given to Moses on Mount Sinai. This is a lesson to Christians. Although we are not under the Law we are not lawless. God has given us instructions to live by.
29 See, for that the LORD hath given you the sabbath, therefore he giveth you on the sixth day the bread of two days; abide ye every man in his place, let no man go out of his place on the seventh day.
30 So the people rested on the seventh day.
This is where the idea of doing nothing on the Sabbath comes about and in order to collect manna that rabbinical tradition came about where you could only travel a specific distance on the Sabbath according to a couple of commentators I read.
31 And the house of Israel called the name thereof Manna: and it was like coriander seed, white; and the taste of it was like wafers made with honey.
32 ¶ And Moses said, This is the thing which the LORD commandeth, Fill an omer of it to be kept for your generations; that they may see the bread wherewith I have fed you in the wilderness, when I brought you forth from the land of Egypt.
33 And Moses said unto Aaron, Take a pot, and put an omer full of manna therein, and lay it up before the LORD, to be kept for your generations.
34 As the LORD commanded Moses, so Aaron laid it up before the Testimony, to be kept.
There is no tabernacle yet but there is some kind of place used as Exodus 24:4 shows that something has been built.
35 And the children of Israel did eat manna forty years, until they came to a land inhabited; they did eat manna, until they came unto the borders of the land of Canaan.
36 Now an omer is the tenth part of an ephah.
Every day a huge amount of this manna came down for forty years.
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