From the Pastor's Pen, November, 2005:

June 2007 From the Pastor's Pen

“What is it?”

It’s kind of a running joke in our house: sometimes when a meal is placed on the table---maybe leftovers, or creative combinations of whatever’s on hand, or some new recipe---that’s the question that someone asks. I have two answers for that question. I either say: “it’s called ‘Be Quiet and Eat it,’” or I say, “Manna.”

You remember about manna, right? The story is told in the book of Exodus that when the Israelites had left slavery in Egypt, they complained because of the lack of food. And God provided “a fine, flaky substance” on the ground called manna. It was called manna because the Israelites asked the question when they tasted it, “What is it?” which in Hebrew is “man hu.” So the “what is it” stuff, which was really some kind of secretion from insects in that desert, but quite edible and nutritious, was called “manna,” literally, “what is it?”

Sounds nasty. Or less than what we’d expect in these days of all-you-can-eat buffets, and our food made exactly to order, and served in abundance. But what the Israelites needed to know about manna was that it was God’s provision for them. They got what they needed to live, enough for the day, every day. Maybe that’s what we need to learn from that story, too.

One of my favorite preachers is Barbara Brown Taylor, an Episcopal priest and college professor, who, by the time you read this, I will have been privileged to hear preach at the preaching conference I’m attending in Nashville. In her collection of sermons, “Bread of Angels,” she has one sermon about manna. She writes:

"If your manna has to drop straight out of heaven looking like a perfect loaf of butter-crust bread, then chances are you are going to be hungry a lot. When you do not get the miracle you are praying for, you are going to think that God is ignoring you or punishing you or worse yet -that God is not there. You may start complaining to heaven. And meanwhile you miss a lot of other things that God is doing for you because they are too ordinary - like bug juice- or too transitory like manna. If on the other hand you are willing to look at everything that comes to you as coming to you from God, then there will be no end to the manna in your life. When you go to bed hungry and you wake up to a fine, flaky substance on the ground you will say, What is it? And when someone says, It is the bread that the Lord your God has given you to eat. You will believe it and you will say, thanks be to God. Because it is not what it is that counts but who sent it."

The thing is, we’re not just talking about food here when we say “manna”. Manna is more than just the food on the table. It’s the ordinary, day-to-day life that God gives us: the people, the relationships, the ability to work, the capacity to feel joy and pain, the heart to praise God, the wonder of love. All of it is gift, as much a gift as miraculous food, provided daily to satisfy our hunger.

We make a mistake when we believe that what we’ve gotten in life is by our own hand. We’re so programmed to believe in a work ethic that we forget that God has given us that ability to work in the first place. We think that we’re pulling ourselves up by our own bootstraps, when God has made us able to, and to want to, pull. We imagine that we’re powerful enough to engineer our own lives, instead of recognizing each day for what it is a gift from God. Sometimes we appreciate the gift, sometimes we take it for granted, sometimes we try to hoard it, sometimes we forget who it’s from. But it’s still a gift, no matter how we treat it.

For some reason, manna was on my mind during my commute this morning. I was driving to Lansing, thinking about both what needed to be done at home, and what changes summer will bring to our life in the church here at First United Methodist Church. Programs take a break, the rhythm of church life changes, our lives become more centered in the outdoors, and many social and travel opportunities come up. There is still a lot that needs to be done, but it’s a different “to do” list. I stopped to think that I can worry about my role in all of it, and think (so wrongly!) that it all depends on me, or I can trust that God will provide---because God does, and always has. It was a manna moment---a time in which I reminded myself who it’s all about. God will provide for our church and its programs, as we work to share God’s love through worship, music, fellowship and Christian education. God will provide for us individually as we care for each other’s needs.

You can hear me say “God provides” and think I’m naïve, or have my head in the sand. But I believe it to be true. Everything we have is a gift from God. It’s when we forget that that we have trouble. It’s when we think that because God doesn’t hand us everything we want, or think we need, that we get cynical and claim that God is not providing for us. As Barbara Brown Taylor says, “you miss a lot of other things that God is doing for you because they are too ordinary.” It is exactly in the ordinary, the every day that we can begin to see God at work. And begin to say, “it is not what it is that counts but who sent it.”

As the season changes, as the rhythm of home life and church life change, may we know that God is at work in it all, providing for us, abundantly, today and every day, enough for what we need.

This summer look at life as a gift. Appreciate it for what it is. Celebrate, enjoy life, come to worship, and tell the people you love that you love them. It’s all a gift from God, provided for us out of God’s never-failing love and grace.

What is it?

It’s manna. Thanks be to God.

On the Journey with you,

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