During Lent, the children and young people of All Saints Parish are learning how they can respond to the problem of hunger, in their community and beyond. They will be reflecting on this story during class on March 4 (Lent 2):
A story about God feeding hungry people
(From Exodus, chapter 16)
Thousands of years ago, God's beloved people were forced to be slaves in Egypt. It was a terrible time for them. God knew how miserable they were, so God decided to do something. God convinced Moses to help get God's people out of Egypt. God convinced Moses that, with God's help, he could lead them to a new place - the Promised Land - where they would be free. In the Promised Land they would be able to live together as God's holy community.
Moses did what God asked, and with God's help, he and his brother Aaron and his sister Miriam got God's people out of Egypt. Together with God, they started a long journey across the desert to the Promised Land.
Deserts are dry, wild places. It is hard to find food when you are in the desert. The people of God began to get hungry. This made them tired and cranky. Pretty soon they started to complain. "We should have stayed in Egypt," they told Moses. "At least there we had something to eat. We're never going to make it to the Promised Land. We're all going to die out here in the desert."
God heard them and decided to do something. God said to Moses, "I know that my people are hungry. Tell them that I am going to feed them. In the morning I will give them bread, and in the evening I will give them meat to eat. Each day they should gather just enough food for that day - no more, no less. On the sixth day, they should gather enough food to last for two days because I want them to rest with me one day a week."
That night, before they went to sleep, Moses told the people what God was planning to do. He told them what God wanted them to do. He tried to convince the people to trust that God would deliver the food that had been promised.
Sure enough, the next morning when the people woke up they saw that everything was covered with a fine, flaky substance. "Man-hu?" they asked each other. (In Hebrew, the language they spoke, this means "What is this?") They tasted it and it was sweet and filling. Each family gathered the man-hu into jars, to eat during the day. Some people decided to take a little extra, in case there was no man-hu tomorrow, but their supply of food began to rot as the day wore on.
As the sun was setting, the people of God stopped for the night. Suddenly quails began to fall out of the sky. They gathered up enough for supper and roasted them over their fires. They were delicious! They tasted just like roast chicken!
Day after day, for 40 years, God fed the people with man-hu in the morning and roasted quail in the evening. The people recognized that God intended to keep God's end of the bargain by giving them food each day. Gradually they understood that they could trust God, and so they did what God asked. They gathered just enough food for each day - no more, no less. With their bellies full, the people began to trust that God would help them in other ways, too. God would help them when they were discouraged, or frightened, or sad. They could depend on God to help them when they were lost. It was good to have God to keep them company on their long journey. With God's help, they knew they would someday get to the Promised Land.
And it felt really good each week to take a day off and rest with God!
Questions to ponder:
I wonder if you have ever been really hungry. Did you get cranky and tired?
I wonder if you have ever had something new and different to eat. Did you like it?
I wonder what your favorite meal is. What would it feel like not to have it?
I wonder if you have ever felt discouraged, frightened, sad, or lost. I wonder if you told God about that.
I wonder how God talks with you.