Manna-It's what's for dinner

Exodus 15:22-16:36
Scholars have long debated what manna was. The miracle food that kept the Israelites alive for years in the desert. Plant lice, green shoots of certain lichens, honeydew from certain insects, even a certain type of mushrooms. Whatever manna was, it was probably around the Israelites the whole time. They needed only open their eyes to see it.
This passage is interesting to me today because of the instructive nature of God's responses. First, the Israelites are repeatedly told to trust God, that he will take care of them [He has "heard their complaining"!] They are told to follow his instructions precisely. They are told to take a day off every week. All foreshadowing the first Commandments. God is defining what it means to be "his people". Predictably, there is resistance to each of the parameters being drawn. Just as each of us has most likely resisted those same parameters at one time or another.
I went through a time when it was important to me to try to find the scientific basis behind manna: what it was, how it got there, what dietary niche it fulfilled.  I wanted to learn how God worked. Today I see that whatever manna "was" metaphorically, the bread by which God saves his people. And what is that "bread"? It is the gift of being able to trust God in my life, it is taking time off every day and every week to reflect on how God is moving in my life - and to open my eyes to see it. That bread can fill me spiritually as the manna filled the physical needs of the desert wanderers. Taste and see the goodness of God.

Paul Sannerud