Egypt to Canaan (3): The Manna — Norman Crawford

I thank you for coming to the meeting tonight. I appreciate your interest to come on a night like this. I'd like to read tonight in Exodus chapter 16. And they took their journey from Elam, and all the congregation of the children of Israel came into the wilderness of sin, which is between Elam and the land of Egypt.

Israel Receives Manna in the Wilderness

And the whole congregation of the children of Israel murmured against Moses and Aaron in the wilderness. And the children of Israel said unto them, Would to God we had died, and notice this expression, 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. Then said the Lord unto Moses, Behold, 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.

Verse 9. And Moses spake unto Aaron, Say unto all the congregation of the children of Israel, Come near before the Lord, for ye have heard your murmurings. 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. And the Lord spake unto Moses, saying, I have heard the murmurings of the children of Israel. Speak unto them, saying, 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. And it came to pass that even the quails came up and covered the camp. And in the morning the dew lay round about the host. 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 hoarfrost on the ground.

And when the children of Israel saw it, they said one to another, It is manna. What is it? But they wished not what it was. And Moses said unto them, This is the bread which the Lord hath given you to eat.

This is the thing which the Lord hath commanded. Gather of it every man according to his eating, and Omer for every man, according to the number of your persons. Take ye every man for them which are in his tents.

And the children of Israel did so, and gathered some more and some less. And when they did meet 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.

And Moses said, Let no man leave of it till the morning. 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.

And they gathered it every morning, every man according to his eating. And when the sun waxed hot, it melted. 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. And he said unto them, This is that which the Lord hath said. Tomorrow is the rest of the holy Sabbath unto the Lord. Bake that which ye will bake today, and see that ye will see.

And that which remaineth over lay up for you to be kept until the morning. And they laid it up till the morning as Moses bade. And it did not stink, neither was there any worm therein. And Moses said, Eat that today, for today is the Sabbath unto the Lord.

Today ye shall not find it in the field. Six days ye shall gather it. But on the seventh, which is the Sabbath, in it there shall be none. And it came to pass that there went out some of the people on the seventh day for to gather, and they found none.

And the Lord said unto Moses, How long refuse ye to keep my commandments and my laws? See, for that the Lord hath given you the Sabbath. Therefore he giveth you on the sixth day the bread of two days.

Obey ye every man in his place. Let no man go out of his place on the seventh day. So the people rested on the seventh day, 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.

And Moses said, This is the thing which the Lord commanded. 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.

And Moses said unto Aaron, Take a pot. It doesn't tell him it was to be a golden pot. We know that Aaron did take a golden pot. Hebrews 9 tells us that. And put an omer full of manna therein, and lay it up before the Lord to be kept for your generations, as the Lord commanded Moses.

So Aaron laid it up before the testimony to be kept, 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.

Now an omer is the tenth part of an ephah. Numbers please, chapter 11 of the book of Numbers. And the mixed multitude that was among them fell a lusting. And the children of Israel also wept again and said, Who shall give us flesh to eat?

We remember the fish which we did eat in Egypt freely, the cucumbers and the melons and the leeks and the onions and the garlic. But now our soul is dried away. There is nothing at all beside this manna before our eyes.

And the manna was as coriander seed, and the color thereof was the color of bdellium. And the people went about and gathered it and ground it in mills or beat it in a mortar and baked it in pans and made cakes of it.

And the taste of it was as the taste of fresh oil. And when the dew fell upon the camp, this perhaps isn't as clear in Exodus chapter 16 as it is here in Numbers chapter 11. And when the dew fell upon the camp in the night, the manna, now look please in Numbers chapter 21 in verse 5.

And the people spake against God and against Moses, Wherefore have ye brought us up out of Egypt to die in the wilderness? For there is no bread, neither is there any water, and our soul loatheth it. They actually called it vile bread.

From Elam to the Wilderness of Sin

Last night we were looking at where the tree was cast into the waters and the bitter waters of Marah. Then we closed the meeting with them coming to Elam where there were 12 springs of water and 70 palm trees.

And we said very little about Elam, but if we try to cover every detail that's on the chart, I'm certain we're not going to get you out of the wilderness and into the land of Canaan before it's time for the meetings to be over.

And so we'll try to move on as God gives us help. There were nine stages of the journey between the land of Egypt when they left on the 15th day of the first month. That was the morrow after the Passover Sabbath.

They left the land of Egypt. There were nine stages in their journey until they came finally to Mount Sinai. And if you want to check those various stages of their journey, you can do it very simply for they're given to us in the exact order in Numbers chapter 33.

But when they left Elam, according to what we read in verse 1 of chapter 16 of Exodus, they took their journey from Elam. I think that's very important to notice that. They were not a wandering people now.

That was to be later in their experience in the wilderness. They were journeying. And of course, they were guided by the pillar of cloud and pillar of fire that led them in their journeys. They were a people who were led by the Lord Himself as they journeyed through the wilderness.

Now, Numbers chapter 33 and verse 10 tells us that the first place they pitched after Edom was on the shores of the Red Sea. Exodus 16 does not record that event, but Numbers chapter 33 and verse 10 tells us that when they left Elam, the place of refreshment that was a foretaste of Canaan and gave them hope for the future.

When they left Elam, they camped on the shore of the Red Sea. I wonder why they went back to the Red Sea. Well, the Red Sea was where God had brought them through the waters of death and brought them out on the resurrection side where they had sung the song of redemption.

And the Red Sea to them was a reminder of the truth of believers' baptism to be dead with Christ, to be buried with Him, and to be raised to walk in newness of life with the Lord Jesus. And God's people need constant reminders of the truth of baptism.

It isn't a once-for-all event in the life of Christians. It's something we should know by experience every day of our Christian life. But I would suggest to you that getting back to the Red Sea was like getting back to the cross.

For it was at the Red Sea that they had learned the power of redemption. They had learned what the blood really meant, that they were truly delivered from the bondage of Egypt. And I don't know any better thing for the child of God than to keep handy to the cross, to get back to Calvary, as the hymn writer said, where Jesus died.

Back to Calvary, there to abide, where for my sins He was once crucified. Let me get back to Calvary. And I tell you, in the experience of God's people, God often takes us back to Calvary, even if it's necessary to go by the Maris, where there's bitter experience, where there's disappointment and trial, even where there's persecution.

If it means that we learn again the sweetness of the tree, that's what happened to the McNamara. They learned again the sweetness of the tree. And many a time, God allows us to go through experiences that will only teach us the sweetness of the tree, that tree under which we sit down with great delight, and His fruit is sweet to our taste.

So God took them back again to the Red Sea to remind them of their deliverance. And throughout the experience of the children of Israel, the prophets of God were raised up to bring the people back to God.

Time and again, they took them back to the experience that happened at the Red Sea. Moses was now leading the people into a waste hauling wilderness. When they left Elam behind them, it tells us that all the congregation of the children of Israel came into the wilderness of sin.

You couldn't imagine a more forsaken, desolate, uninhabited land. It was a rough, torn, jagged, cruel country with absolutely nothing to sustain life. And Moses was actually taking them further away, not only from habitation of man, but he was actually taking them further away from the land of Canaan.

You remember we read the other night that they didn't go by the way of the country of the Philistines, which would be up here. God didn't want them to learn war so quickly. God took them down through this wilderness.

But actually, they're getting further away from the land. I don't know if the people knew that, but I'm absolutely certain that Moses knew it because he had lived 40 years in that desert and he must have known they were getting further away from the land.

The people began to murmur against God. It says they murmured against Moses and Aaron, but I think we'll be able to show you very clearly that they murmured against God. When I think of the faith of Moses to take these people into such a waste, such a desolate land, about 2 million people, 600 ,000 came out of Egypt who were men fit for war, 600 ,000 men who were 20 years of age and older.

And if you were to figure that at least that many women were in the company, and then you were to figure the children under 20 years of age that would be with them, even if you were very conservative, you'd find that there must have been at least 2 million of those people of Israel going out into a land where there was neither water to drink nor food to eat.

And the food that they had brought out of Egypt was now used up. Moses was truly God's servant. You know, I said the other night that we were going to say a little bit about Moses. And I don't want to spend too much time on it because we won't get finished what we've read tonight if I do.

Moses as a Servant Trained in God's School

But I was thinking today that, first of all, Moses was under the sentence of death. Hebrews 11 tells us that it was by faith that Moses' parents hid him for 3 months because they saw he was a goodly child.

It was an act of faith. And you know, that was one of the most remarkable acts of faith I know of in the Bible. As you read Exodus 2, it seems to be Moses' mother who was the chief actor. But the Spirit of God who knew the exact events as they happened in Hebrews 11 tells us it was Moses' parents.

So Amran and Jochebed, the mother and the father of Moses, acted by faith. When they took Moses, the little babe, and put him into the River Nile, the very place where the male children were being cast, that they might die.

They put Moses in the very place where the babies were dying that his life might be spared. I think if I had devised some plan for the safety of Moses, I would have taken him just as far away from that scene of death as I could get him.

As far away from the River Nile as I could get. But by faith they acted. And God honored their faith. And Moses became a servant of God. Such as there never has been until Jehovah's perfect servant stepped into humanity and walked here for God.

You say, are you sure of that now? God had many servants. Well, God tells us at the close of the book of Deuteronomy that he never had another servant like Moses. Now Moses went to God's school. He was under the sentence of death.

He was God's servant. But to be God's servant, he had to go to God's school. And of course, as you know, Moses first of all spent 40 years in the court of Pharaoh that he might learn to be something. And as Mr. C .H. Macintosh has said, I believe I read that a number of years ago in Mr. Macintosh's book, he took 40 years to learn to be something in the court of the king of Pharaoh.

And he took 40 years to learn to be nothing on the backside of the desert. And those 40 years in the desert were Moses' schooling. He didn't have to be in the wilderness to get a right to be the servant of God.

But he was in the wilderness that he might learn how he would serve God. And now God was bringing these very people into that very wilderness. Why? To give them a title to the land of Canaan. Not at all.

Their title to the land of Canaan was the blood of the slain lamb. God wasn't taking them through this wilderness to give them a title to Canaan. God was taking them through the wilderness for three reasons.

And I'll point them out to you very simply and perhaps you can remember them. The first reason God took them into the wilderness was that they might learn God and His faithfulness. They had many a lesson like that to learn and so have we.

They had to learn God and God's faithfulness. And then they had to learn their own hearts and their waywardness. And then they had to appreciate Canaan and its blessedness. And I assure you they appreciated Canaan far better after they had been to school in the wilderness.

God's school has classes that aren't very pleasant. Some of the subjects you wouldn't choose if you had a choice. But it's God's school and I don't know any substitute for it. I don't know any other kind of school that men can devise that will ever take the place of God's school.

I used to wonder sometimes when I was first saved if I was saved at all. I used to hear men preaching from Hebrews chapter 12 that whom the Lord loveth He chasteneth and discourageth every son whom He receiveth.

And I tried to look back in my own little experience and I couldn't remember any such experience of chastening. Of course, I don't have any problem now. After being saved for 36 years I can easily see that there have been some lessons in God's school that have been hard to learn.

But it's the school of God. Moses had gone to it and now Israel was going through it. You know, the other day I don't usually do this in a meeting but I picked up some statements about Moses' life. I've never seen this before and I'm sure you won't remember it after I give it to you.

But as the old Christian lady told Mr. Maxwell I hope it will be good going through. You know, in Moses' life there are some of the greatest contrasts that you read of in the Bible. And Mr. Haldeman has outlined them for us like this.

Moses was the child of a slave and yet he was the son of a queen. He was born in a hut and he lived in a palace. He inherited poverty and yet he enjoyed unlimited wealth. He was the leader of armies and yet he was the keeper of flocks.

He was the mightiest of warriors and the Bible says he was the meekest man in all the earth. He was educated in the court and yet he lived in the desert. He had the wisdom of Egypt, a little child. He was fitted for the city but he wandered in the wilderness.

He was backward in speech and yet he talked with God. He had the rod of the shepherd and he had the power of the infinite God behind him. He was a fugitive from Pharaoh and yet he was an ambassador from heaven.

He was the giver of the law and yet he was the forerunner of grace. He died alone on Mount Moab and yet he appeared with Christ in Judea. And Moses had the distinction of having no one come to his funeral.

No man came to his funeral, not one, but God buried him. Moses went to God's school and no wonder he was such a useful servant for God. But there's a secret about Moses. Moses spent time in the secret place with God and he knew well what that secret place was.

In fact, I'm not going to take time to try to do it tonight but I suggest to you that the writer of Psalm 90, who is Moses, the man of God, is also the writer of Psalm 91. He did go up the side to sit quietly in the secret place where the Most High shall abide in the very shadow of the Almighty.

Moses was a man who knew the sanctuary. He was in the secret place with God before he was in the searchlight of public opinion, before he was given that great privilege of leading the people of God. And of course, you know well, Moses sinned in striking the rock.

And yet, Moses did get into the land. I'm sure you'll agree with me that Moses finally got into the land. He didn't get into the land in the experience of this earthly people. He died here alone. But Moses got into the land nevertheless.

He was in the land with Christ. Peter, James, and John saw the Lord Jesus there on the mount. He was talking with Moses and with Elijah. So Moses got into the land alright. Now in Exodus chapter 16, Moses leads these people into this waste, howling wilderness.

And I marvel at the faith of a man who could take such a multitude into a place where he knew it would take not one miracle to sustain them, but it would take a miracle every day to even keep them alive.

Moses believed God. And with the pillar of cloud before him, he went forward confidently and God's people with him. But they murmured. They murmured against Moses and against Aaron. And we read tonight that they said, What to God?

We have died. Now listen to this if you will. By the hand of the Lord in the land of Egypt. Do you know what they were saying? They said we're going to die by the hand of the Lord now. Out here in this wilderness, we're going to perish by the hand of God.

Did you think it was only Moses and Aaron they were speaking against? It was God they were speaking against. Look at the next statement they made. It says in verse 3 of Exodus chapter 16, For ye have brought us forth into this wilderness to kill this whole assembly with hunger.

Who is the ye that brought them forth? Who brought them out of the land of bondage? Who brought them from the bitter bondage of Pharaoh? Who brought them through the Red Sea? It was God that did it. On that resurrection site of the Red Sea, they sang, The Lord hath triumphed gloriously.

It was God who brought them through it all. You know, I was impressed when I was reading this today in Exodus 16. While these people were saying, What to God? We have died by the hand of the Lord in Egypt.

Ye have brought us into this wilderness to perish. All the time they were saying it, the pillar of cloud was there in plain sight. The visible evidence of the presence of God with them. It was right there for them to see all the time.

I sometimes have a pretty good imagination. Maybe this didn't happen at all, but I pictured it happening. As they were murmuring and complaining against God and against God's servants, I dare say that they would dare hardly cast their eyes toward that pillar of cloud that would remind them it was the Lord who had brought them here.

This was God's leading. God had led them into this great waste, howling wilderness. I don't know what path you've had to take. I don't know what kind of trials and afflictions you've had to bear. But I can tell you this.

If you have trusted your soul to Christ and your life into the hand of God, and if you have trusted your soul to Christ, your life is in his hand. Whatever path he leads is right. It's for his glory, and it's for your good.

I'm often reminded of the words of Deuteronomy 6. God says to these people, it was for their good always. For their good. Yet they bitterly murmured and complained. Here in chapter 16 of Exodus, God says, I will reign.

And if God said, I will reign, fire and brimstone on them, I wouldn't have been a bit surprised. When you think of all the mercies of God that have been bestowed on them, 10 ,000 mercies are forgotten in one moment.

But don't we see an echo of our own hearts? The faithlessness of our own hearts is so plain to us. How many times we've experienced the merciful deliverance and grace of God. And how many times we've forgotten.

And how many times our faith has failed. And if not with our lips, at least in our hearts, we've complained against God. If God had said, I will reign fire and brimstone upon them and destroy them, I wouldn't have been at all surprised.

But look at the mercy of God. I will reign bread from heaven for you. Behold, He says, I will reign bread from heaven for you. God was ready to meet the need of His people. He hadn't brought them out of Egypt to perish in the wilderness.

They weren't going to die by the hand of the Lord in the wilderness. Many of them were going to perish in the wilderness. But it was going to be because of their own sin. The manna, of course, as you know, is a picture to us of the Lord Jesus Christ.

The Manna as a Picture of Christ and the Word of God

We don't have to use our imagination for that. The Lord Jesus said, Your fathers did eat manna in the wilderness and are dead. I am that true bread that came down from heaven. Whereof, if ye shall eat, ye shall never die.

So we don't have to use our imagination. We don't have to try to... You know, sometimes we who are gathered to the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, I'm not sure that you know this, but some likely do. Those of us who gather, as we do, in simplicity to the name of the Lord Jesus, we sometimes get accused of fanciful interpretations of the Bible, particularly of the types and the shadows of the Old Testament.

I think we should be very clear about the fact that if we're going to say a certain thing is a type, we want to be certain that it is a type. For instance, the manna is a type. The Lord Jesus gives us the authority for calling it a type.

He was that true manna. He was the true bread that came down from heaven. But Joseph is not a type. Oh, you say now, you're going to spoil a whole lot of good preaching if you say Joseph isn't a type.

No, Joseph isn't a type. Joseph has many things in his life that are illustrative for us of the Lord Jesus. There are many things in the life of Joseph from which we can draw lessons for the believer.

But I believe that if we're going to call a certain Old Testament truth a type, then we have to have New Testament authority for it. There's no question here that we have New Testament authority. I'm going to suggest to you first of all that the manna is a picture of the written Word.

It's an illustration for us of the written Word of God. And you know, there's many a lesson to learn here, but I have to move on very quickly so I'm going to try to point it out to you just as simply and as quickly as I can.

Now, first of all, it was a miracle. The manna was a real miracle. Just as the crossing of that Red Sea was a mighty miracle, and only the almighty power of God could ever have caused that miracle to happen.

Out here in the wilderness, the manna was a real miracle. It tells us that every person was to gather an omer. An omer is six pints. And if there were two million of these people, six pints per person would mean that they gathered as much every day as nine million pounds of manna, 4 ,500 tons.

And perhaps you can understand that better. 4 ,500 tons of manna a day. And there are boys who would try to have us believe that this manna that they ate in the wilderness was a kind of a thing that grew in a bush somewhere there, and they just happened to come across it and find it growing on the bush.

How was it that it was with them for 40 years? How was it that they were able to gather 4 ,500 tons of it every day? Do you know that if you put two million people into that desert today, that with all the modern means of communication, you likely wouldn't be able to supply them with food?

But God supplied them. It was a divine miracle. This blessed book that God has given from heaven, just as truly as the manna came from heaven, this is the word of God from high heaven. It's a miracle.

Every page of it has the imprint of the divine hand. Every page of it speaks volumes of truth to the heart and presses us with the great reality that God has spoken. That's a subject all in itself. And I couldn't begin to try to speak about it tonight.

But this manna that came down, in what manner did it come? It was a miracle. But how did it come? What was the manner of its coming? Well, first of all, it came down upon the ground. All they had to do was step outside the tent door and pick it up.

It was right there. But listen, there's a truth here. They could either pick it up, they could gather it, or they could trample it. It was right underfoot. It was all around them. It came down upon the camp and it was all around them.

So they could either gather it or trample it. I wonder what my attitude is toward the word of God. I wonder, has it been trampled in my life? This is a day of rebellion in the world. And rebellion is a popular thing today.

And it's expected of young people that they'll be rebellious. But I trust that that's not seen in any of us. Because we can trample the word of God as well as gather it. And of course, this manna had to be gathered by stooping.

It didn't grow on a tree so that they could reach up and pick it off. But they had to stoop down and they had to lift it up. You know well the truth that it's only those who humble themselves under the mighty hand of God who are exalted in due time.

And you know that God, God will never, never speak to a proud heart. But God can do something that no man can do. God can fill a broken heart. And I assure you that it's the branches that bear the most fruit that bend the lowest.

And those who humble themselves under the mighty hand of God and bow to the truths of His word subject themselves to the lordship of Christ, the sweetest fruits are seen in their lives. This manna was small and it was white.

It was pure. The Bible tells us that every word of God is pure. Thank God for the absolute purity of God's word. Not only is it pure but the effect in the life is purity. How shall a young man cleanse his way?

By taking heed thereto according to thy word. So you see, there are lessons to learn from the manna that remind us of the word of God. But not only were they to gather it, they were to eat it. That reminds me of the meditation of the word of God and I suppose there's nothing that's so lacking, nothing that's so needed today as this particular thing that I'm going to mention now.

The manna had to be eaten according to the persons. In each particular household, the manna must be eaten. They said, what is it? They didn't understand it. It was incomprehensible to them. But when they ate it, it tasted like wafers made with honey.

It was sweet to their taste. Jeremiah said, thy words were found and I did eat them. And thy word was unto me the joy and rejoicing of my heart. And then he picks out a particular statement from the book of Deuteronomy and he says, for I am called by thy name, O Lord of hosts.

Have you ever been glad of that? Have you ever been like Jeremiah and found that to be sweet to your taste? I am called by thy name. He's called his own blessed name upon us. Jeremiah just had a sweet morsel from the word of God that he was enjoying.

I wonder what I've eaten of the word of God today. It had to be gathered daily. We learned that as we read chapter 16 tonight. You likely know well that some of them even tried to keep it until the next day and it bred worms and it stank.

It had to be gathered daily and it had to be gathered first thing in the morning before other things came in. I believe that for the child of God, I don't know the order of your life and I don't know the order of your home.

And I believe that in your home you should read the word of God every day with your family. And I believe that it's possible to sit down with your family every day and find some time when the family can be together and read the word of God together and pray together with them.

But individually, have you been gathering the manna first thing in the morning? You know, I find out that if I don't spend the early hours in the morning and I know everyone doesn't have hours to spend, but if I don't spend the beginning of the day with God, God usually gets robbed the rest of the day.

First thing in the morning, they gather the manna. Do you give the word of God the first place? Do you gather the manna early every morning? There's a man that goes around and tells Christians they should read 10 chapters of the Bible every day.

The last time I heard about him, he was telling them they should read 20. Well, I assure you, you could read 10 chapters every day and not gather any manna. Or perhaps you could read 20 chapters. It would be far better if you read the smallest portion of Scripture and meditated on it.

If God spoke to you through it and if you carried it with you through the day, some gathered more and some gathered less. But what was gathered must be used. It had to be put into use. And what I get from the word of God, if I don't put it into use, I'll soon find that the source is dried up.

Why is it that we can read our Bible and get so little out of it? Be very careful who you complain about that to. I remember years ago, I made some kind of a statement like that to an older man when I was just a young Christian.

I said to him, I seem to be able to read chapters and not get much out of it. I'll never forget what he said to me. He said, If you don't put into use what God has already taught you, God won't give you anything more.

If I don't put into practice what I know, it's likely the source will dry up. And often as God's people, we get so little from the word of God because God has been speaking to us perhaps for years about something that we haven't put into practice in our lives.

So they had to put to use what they gathered. It was despised by the mixed multitude. We read that tonight in Numbers chapter 11. It was that mixed multitude who fell to lusting and they despised that light bread.

We read in Numbers chapter 21. So the manna was like the word of God in that it was a miracle. It was like the word of God in the manner in which it came down. It was like the word of God in the meditation of it, the eating of it.