Provision in the Wilderness

Use this curriculum to help you further engage with the sermon, the scriptures, and each other. Allow the Holy Spirit to bring things up to encourage and guide you so that you are always growing in your faith. If the Spirit leads you away from these questions and into conversation and prayer that encourages and points you to Jesus, go for it.

scripture

Read the following scriptures together: Exodus 16.

overview

God is a God of provision. He gives what we truly need – even when it comes in ways we don't expect. In the Old Testament, this is seen in the bread God sent from heaven, called manna. By this point, enough time had passed since Israel left Egypt that food was becoming scarce. And yet, even after God had freed them from slavery, parted the Red Sea, and defeated the Egyptian army, the people began to complain to Moses and Aaron. In His mercy and grace, God provided this miraculous bread and gave instructions for how it was to be gathered and stored. What he provided was unexpected yet exactly what they needed. A long-awaited relief for his people, and something entirely unfamiliar to a nation still learning what it meant to be free.

question 1

Is there an area of your life where you're struggling to recognize God's provision because fear or disappointment is shaping how you see it?

discussion

Read Romans 8:28. Israel didn't know what to call the bread, so they named it manna – "what is this?" It nourished and sustained them each day throughout their wilderness journey. It may not have been their first choice, but God provided, and it was enough. God is still providing for his children today. When the challenges of the wilderness come – and they will – we are often tempted to gather more than we need. Instead of trusting God, we try to take control, producing a kind of decay, much like the manna that rotted when kept beyond what was needed.

question 2

Where in your life does God's provision not feel like enough right now?

Read Luke 12:25. God instructed his people to gather manna for six days. On the seventh, they were to rest – a reintroduction of God's creational rhythm. Yet some still went out to gather on the Sabbath. There was nothing there. After years of slave labor, Israel struggled to enter the rest God had provided. In many ways, we are no different. We become discontent with the lives we've been given, so we keep working, striving, and grasping for more achievement, more security, more control. Instead of resting in God himself, we exhaust ourselves trying to gather what was never meant to be found outside of his provision.

question 3

What are you holding onto or striving for that might be keeping you from resting in what God has already given?

weekly application

In John's Gospel, Jesus declares that he is the true bread from heaven, given by God. Jesus was – and is – the unexpected Messiah. He is enough, and in him there is an abundance of rest.

Let us remember that God provides.
Let us reach for him today.
Let us rest in him always.