What does the Lord give me that is like the daily manna that He gave the Israelites?
What can I do that is like gathering manna?
Think of other things, besides eating, that you do every day. Why do certain things have to be done daily to be effective? What do you feel inspired to do to seek daily spiritual experiences?
"Israel murmurs for want of bread and lusts for the fleshpots of Egypt—The Lord rains bread from heaven and sends quail for meat—Israel is given manna each day, except the Sabbath, for forty years.
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.
2 And the whole congregation of the children of Israel murmured against Moses and Aaron in the wilderness:
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.
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.
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.
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?
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.
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.
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.
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.
19 And Moses said, Let no man leave of it till the morning.
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.
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.
24 And they laid it up till the morning, as Moses bade: and it did not stink, neither was there any worm therein.
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?
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.
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.
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." (Exodus 16)
"We need an ongoing, daily infusion of heavenly light. We need “times of refreshing.” Times of personal restoration.
We gather this beautiful Sabbath morning to speak of Christ, rejoice in His gospel, and support and sustain one another as we walk in “the way” of our Savior.
As members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, we assemble for this purpose every Sabbath day throughout the year. If you are not a member of the Church, we welcome you most warmly and thank you for joining with us to worship the Savior and learn of Him. Like you, we are striving—though imperfectly—to become better friends, neighbors, and human beings, and we seek to do this by following our Exemplar, Jesus Christ.
We hope you can feel the sincerity of our testimony. Jesus Christ lives! He is the Son of the living God, and He directs prophets on the earth in our day. We invite all to come, hear the word of God, and partake of His goodness! I bear my personal witness that God is among us and that He will surely draw near to all who draw near to Him.
We consider it an honor to walk with you in the Master’s strait and narrow path of discipleship.
The Art of Walking in a Straight Line
There is an oft-repeated theory that people who are lost walk in circles. Not long ago, scientists at the Max Planck Institute for Biological Cybernetics tested that theory. They took participants to a thick forest and gave them simple instructions: “Walk in a straight line.” There were no visible landmarks. The test subjects had to rely solely on their sense of direction.
How do you think they did?
The scientists concluded, “People really [do] walk in circles when they do not have reliable cues to their walking direction.” When questioned afterwards, some participants self-confidently claimed that they had not deviated in the slightest. Despite their high confidence, GPS data showed that they walked in loops as tight as 20 meters in diameter.
Why do we have such a hard time walking in a straight line? Some researchers hypothesize that small, seemingly insignificant deviations in terrain make the difference. Others have pointed to the fact that we all have one leg that is slightly stronger than the other. “More likely,” however, we struggle to walk straight ahead “[because] of increasing uncertainty about where straight ahead is.”
Whatever the cause, it is human nature: without reliable landmarks, we drift off course.
Straying from the Path
Isn’t it interesting how small, seemingly insignificant factors can make a major difference in our lives?
I know this from personal experience as a pilot. Every time I started the approach to an airport, I knew that much of my remaining work would consist of making constant minor course corrections to safely direct the aircraft to our desired landing runway.
You might have a similar experience when driving a vehicle. Wind, road irregularities, imperfect wheel alignment, inattentiveness—not to mention the actions of other drivers—all can push you off your intended path. Fail to pay attention to these factors and you may end up having a bad day.
This applies to us physically.
It also applies to us spiritually.
Most of the changes in our spiritual lives—both positive and negative—happen gradually, a step at a time. Like the participants in the Max Planck study, we may not realize when we veer off course. We may even have high confidence that we are walking a straight line. But the fact is that without the help of landmarks to guide us, we inevitably deviate off course and end up in places we never thought we would be.
This is true for individuals. It is also true for societies and nations. The scriptures are filled with examples.
The book of Judges records that after Joshua died, “there arose another generation … which knew not the Lord, nor yet the works which he had done for Israel.”
Despite the astonishing heavenly interventions, visitations, rescues, and miraculous victories the children of Israel witnessed during the lifetimes of Moses and Joshua, within a generation the people had abandoned the Way and began walking according to their own desires. And, of course, it did not take long before they paid the price for that behavior.
Sometimes this falling away takes generations. Sometimes it happens in a matter of years or even months. But we are all susceptible. No matter how strong our spiritual experiences have been in the past, as human beings we tend to wander. That has been the pattern from the days of Adam until now.
Here’s the Good News
But all is not lost. Unlike the wandering test subjects, we have reliable, visible landmarks that we can use to evaluate our course.
And what are these landmarks?
Surely they include daily prayer and pondering the scriptures and using inspired tools like Come, Follow Me. Each day, we can approach the throne of God in humility and honesty. We can ponder our actions and review the moments of our day—considering our will and desires in light of His. If we have drifted, we plead with God to restore us, and we commit to do better.
This time of introspection is an opportunity for recalibration. It is a garden of reflection where we can walk with the Lord and be instructed, edified, and purified by the written and Spirit-revealed word of our Heavenly Father. It is a sacred time when we remember our solemn covenants to follow the gentle Christ, when we assess our progress and align ourselves with the spiritual landmarks God has provided for His children.
Think of it as your personal, daily restoration. On our journey as pilgrims on the path of glory, we know how easy it is to fall away. But just as minor deviations can draw us out of the Savior’s Way, so too can small and simple acts of realignment assuredly lead us back. When darkness creeps into our lives, as it often does, our daily restoration opens our hearts to heavenly light, which illuminates our souls, chasing away shadows, fears, and doubts.
Small Rudders, Large Ships
If we seek it, surely “God shall give unto [us] knowledge by his Holy Spirit, yea, by the unspeakable gift of the Holy Ghost.” As often as we ask, He will teach us the Way and help us follow it.
This, of course, takes a steady effort on our part. We cannot be content with spiritual experiences of the past. We need a steady flow.
We can’t rely on others’ testimonies forever. We must build our own.
We need an ongoing, daily infusion of heavenly light.
We need “times of refreshing.” Times of personal restoration.
“Rolling waters” cannot long “remain impure.” To keep our thoughts and actions pure, we have to keep rolling!
After all, the Restoration of the gospel and the Church is not something that happened once and is over. It is an ongoing process—one day at a time, one heart at a time.
As our days go, so go our lives. One author put it this way: “A day is like a whole life. You start out doing one thing, but end up doing something else, plan to run an errand, but never get there. … And at the end of your life, your whole existence has that same haphazard quality, too. Your whole life has the same shape as a single day.”
Do you want to change the shape of your life?
Change the shape of your day.
Do you want to change your day?
Change this hour.
Change what you think, feel, and do at this very moment.
A small rudder can steer a large ship.
Small bricks can become magnificent mansions.
Small seeds can become towering sequoias.
Minutes and hours well spent are the building blocks of a life well lived. They can inspire goodness, lift us from the captivity of imperfections, and lead us upward to the redemptive path of forgiveness and sanctification.
The God of New Beginnings
With you, I lift my heart in gratitude for the magnificent gift of new opportunity, new life, new hope.
We lift our voices in praise of our bountiful and forgiving God. For surely He is a God of new beginnings. The sublime end of all His labor is to help us, His children, succeed in our quest for immortality and eternal life.
We can become new creatures in Christ, for God has promised, “As often as my people repent will I forgive them their trespasses against me” and “remember them no more.”
My beloved brothers and sisters, dear friends, we all drift from time to time.
But we can get back on course. We can navigate our way through the darkness and trials of this life and find our way back to our loving Heavenly Father if we seek and accept the spiritual landmarks He has provided, embrace personal revelation, and strive for daily restoration. This is how we become true disciples of our beloved Savior, Jesus Christ.
As we do so, God will smile upon us. “The Lord shall … bless thee in the land which the Lord thy God giveth thee. The Lord shall establish thee an holy people unto himself.”
That we will seek daily restoration and continually strive to walk in the Way of Jesus Christ is my prayer. In the name of Jesus Christ, amen." (Daily Restoration By Elder Dieter F. Uchtdorf Of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles)
And here's the commentary entitled: "The Lord offers me daily spiritual nourishment.":
"Since we all need to eat, the Lord often compares spiritual things to food. Look for His spiritual lessons in the Israelites’ experiences with manna in Exodus 16. For example, what do you find in the Lord’s instructions in Exodus 16:16, 19, 22–26 that applies to your spiritual nourishment?
To discover other lessons the Lord may want you to learn from this miracle, ponder questions like these:
What does the Lord give me that is like the daily manna that He gave the Israelites?
What can I do that is like gathering manna?
You may find additional insights in one or more of these videos: “Daily Bread: Pattern,” “Daily Bread: Experience,” and “Daily Bread: Change” (Gospel Library).
Think of other things, besides eating, that you do every day. Why do certain things have to be done daily to be effective? What do you feel inspired to do to seek daily spiritual experiences?
See also Dieter F. Uchtdorf, “Daily Restoration,” Liahona, Nov. 2021, 77–79; “Daily Restoration” (video), Gospel Library."
What does the Lord give me that is like the daily manna that He gave the Israelites?
What can I do that is like gathering manna?
Think of other things, besides eating, that you do every day. Why do certain things have to be done daily to be effective? What do you feel inspired to do to seek daily spiritual experiences?
- drinking water
- doing exercise
- taking a shower
- changing my clothes
- brushing my teeth
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