In this sermon, the preacher emphasizes the importance of putting God first in our lives. He refers to the story of the Israelites in the wilderness, where God provided manna for them to eat. The preacher shares his personal experience of prioritizing his faith while serving in the military, and how God always took care of him. He highlights the need for humility and obedience to God's commandments, using the Sabbath as a test of faith. The preacher also acknowledges the presence of unbelievers who refuse to believe in Jesus.

Turn your Bibles to Exodus chapter 16. We come up now to another lesson in our Desert Survival series, and this one is on the manna. And I'll confess to you that the Lord has just really blessed me this week in studying this. I've seen things in here that I've never seen before, and I'm not in the books. I'm not in many books in this study. But God just revealed to me some things about the Lord that I've never seen before, and it's just such a blessing. And my only concern is that I can communicate it to you, that you can get the blessing and see what I've been seeing, and that God can just bless your heart with it as He's blessed mine. I think probably what we might do is we might just sort of read through this thing, and I'll just give the comments on it as we go through it today. The whole chapter is good, and there's one main point, though, that we will make on the conclusion, and I don't want you to miss it. If you miss the conclusion, you miss the whole point of the message, one of those types of things. And I'll just get into that in a minute. Let's just go before the Lord and make sure that we have His direction in this. Father, thank you for this passage of Scripture on the manna. Oh, what a picture of Christ. What a beautiful thing you've done for us in sending Christ down to be our wilderness provision. And those that would feast on the Lord Jesus are those that would grow and spiritually abound and would survive in the desert. Lord, I just pray that you would reveal yourself to these folks today as you've revealed yourself to me. What a precious time I've had with you this week. And just thank you for revealing yourself in your Word. And my concern now is that I would just be hidden behind the cross and that Christ would be seen, that the Spirit of God would be the one that's doing the ministering now. Bless your Word, Father, in Jesus' name. Amen. I've titled this, Manna. What is it? It's your life. Manna means in the Hebrew, what is it? They come out and they saw the manna, and they said, what is it? Well, what it was, it was their life. And so I've titled that. You know, they saw no value in that manna until they learned that it was their life. If they didn't have manna, if they didn't eat the manna, they would die. It was everything they needed. It was their vitamin program. It was their protein program. It was their dessert. It was everything. They had it all there in the manna. And it's sort of like, we're getting into the fall calving season here. It's sort of like a little bucket calf. He comes in there, and he's been stranded. His mom died or something. And you've got this little bucket calf. And you first walk in with a bucket or the bottle, whatever. And you bump that thing on his head. And he doesn't see any value in that thing. But boy, when you get him plugged in, and once he finds out what's going on, he lives all day for you to come back in the evening to feed him. And then he lives all night for you to come back in the morning just to feed him. That's all he lives for, is for that bucket. Once he finds out that that's his life, he lives for it. Once they found out that the manna was their life, they live for it. And the manna was the type of Christ. And once we find out that Jesus is life, we live for him. We get up in the morning to live for him all day. And then we go to bed at night so we can get rested up to live for him another day. He is our life. Now, here's the proposition on this little message, and that's this. Christ is your wilderness provision. Christ is your wilderness provision. Use him, use him, and you survive. Abuse him, or either neglect him, and you die. It's just that simple. Christ is all. And we can abuse him by neglecting him. We do that by self-supply. When we try to supply for ourself what Christ has already provided for and promised to provide, we just shrivel up. And then also by misuse, and that's self-will. We will misuse our Savior when self-will is dominant in our life. I just jotted down some things. I've been thinking these things through, and I didn't really do real well on it. But everything that you need is in Jesus. And everything that you need in Jesus has been given to you in his Word. You cannot separate Christ from his Word. One of the things the Lord's been showing me is how it says the Word became flesh. The Word became flesh. The living Word took on a body. And when we get into John 6, we really get into some deep things. And I don't know how deep I'll go with you. Maybe tonight we can go a little deeper if you want to ask some questions about it. But we'll just see how far the Lord will let me take you this morning, into the deepness, the depths of Christ. You know, there are things that Paul had that he couldn't share with the Corinthians because they were carnal. They just can only go so far. And sometimes, I know I've shared some truths probably that maybe others didn't understand. And I know there's been many times somebody's shared something with me I didn't understand. But I know I wanted it. One of the things was Hudson Taylor when he shared his revival experience. I wanted that for 10 years. And it wasn't until last year that I found out what he was talking about. Now, I've got a question for you. Why did God feed them for 40 years in that wilderness? Do you know why? Why did He feed them for 40 years with a man in the wilderness? Good question, isn't it? Okay, stay tuned for the answer. Before we look at that answer, I want to just take you through Exodus 16. And let's just sort of do a Bible study, a quick one, on it. Look at verse 1. And they took their journey from Edom. You know what Edom represented? Back in the last chapter, you remember what it was we covered the last time I shared with you? It was the bitter experience of Merah. They came and there was no water, no good water. And God let them go through that so that He could show them that He was life. And then after that, they came to Elam. In verse 27 of chapter 15, they came to Elam. There were 12 wells of water. After the bitter experience of Merah, then came the blessing. So many times after the bitter experience of self, and God lets us go through the struggle of self, and we learn the dying to self, then we come to the blessing. Well, they did. They came to Elam. And now they're moving on to their third test. Their first test was no salvation. They came to the Red Sea. Their first test was there's no salvation. What are we going to do to be saved? The Pharaoh's army was behind us, the sea was before us, and God made a way. He parted it, showing them the death, burial, and resurrection of Christ. And then the second test, there was no water. They went three days into the desert, no water. The third test is no food. And actually, there's just a series of tests. And we're going to hit the highlights on these things in this series as we finish up on it. I don't know how long it'll take, but probably maybe not as long as we might think. Now, the third test is no food. Look at verse 2. And the whole congregation of the children of Israel murmured against Moses and Aaron in the wilderness. 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 through the fold, for you have brought us forth into this wilderness to kill this whole assembly with hunger. All right? There's the test. There's no food. How do they respond? They say, well, God's trying to kill us. He's brought us out here, and we're going to die in this wilderness. Well, that's true in this sense, that He was trying to kill the self-life. And one of the things I've been learning is that God allows the things to come into my life, and I don't like a lot of these things, but He's doing it to show self, and so that self will die. He wants the self-life crucified. Then notice verse 4 also. It says, Then said the Lord unto Moses, Behold, I will rain bread from heaven for you, 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 not. Now, I'll give you a hint. In this verse is the clue to the answer to our question of why did He allow them to go for 40 years in that desert and live on manna. There's a clue to it in this verse. Now, bread from heaven, what does that speak of? Let me tell you. We could go over to John chapter 6 and spend the rest of the morning and the rest of the day and the rest of the week in John 6 and a beautiful passage about the bread, but let me read you a couple of verses. 635. Jesus said unto them, I am the bread of life. He that cometh to me shall never hunger, and he that believeth on me shall never thirst. Slip down to verse 38. For I came down from heaven, not to do mine own will, but the will of him that sent me. You see that manna was a type of Christ. As the manna came down, so Jesus came down. That speaks of His incarnation. Speaks of His incarnation. John 1.14 says, The Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we beheld His glory as the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth. The Word became flesh. So Jesus was the manna. And then notice what He said. He says, You are to gather it up. Verse 4. The Lord said, I will reign bread from heaven for you. The people shall go out and gather a certain rate. What does gathering speak of? You've got to receive Christ in order to be saved. You have to receive Him if you want to go to heaven. One of the major problems with the church today in America is that people are in the church that have never received Christ. They're proud of their church. They're proud of their history and everything. But they're not proud of Jesus because they claim that they are saved because of all of the things that they have done for God. And they're not proud of the blood of Jesus that was shed for them. And they do not love Jesus. Now that's a major problem. I hope it's not a problem in your life. But before we're done, maybe God will show you some things today about yourself. The whole key to life is Jesus. He's all we need. This little thing I was going to read and I forgot about it. You know, if you're lonely, your need will be provided in Jesus. And everything Jesus will provide for you, He will provide through His Word. He will give you the promise, the assurance. If you're discouraged, the Word will give you encouragement. We get the encouragement from Jesus through His Word. The Word became flesh and this is His Word. Whatever Jesus would want to say to us today, He said in His Word. I believe if Jesus came down and appeared to us, all He would have to do is to stand there. Whatever He wants to say to us, He's already said. Nothing else needs to be said in this life. And I heard of a story, I read of a story of a man who I highly respect. And a man who is a holy man, a man that walks very close with God, how Jesus appeared to him. And if probably anybody else had said it, I might not have believed him. But I believe this man. And he said Jesus never said a word to him. But He just blessed him. He just felt His glory. Now, I'm not one that goes around and believes in a lot of visions and things, but I believe God can do that. But He never said a thing to him. Everything's been said. It's right here. Now, these people that say that God has spoke to them and they've got this new revelation and this new vision, the Bible warned us about that. About those that would add to Scripture and those that would subtract. And actually, we're having a whole influx into the Christian world of extra-biblical revelations. Visions and revelations and things where God's told me this and that. They just forget that Satan does a lot of that stuff. That's how he works. Now, they were to gather a certain rate. They were to gather a certain rate. Beautiful thing there is, Jesus says, My God shall supply all your needs, those riches in Christ Jesus. All you need, exactly in proportion to your needs, Jesus will provide it. Whatever I need, He is my provision just exactly as I need it. And as they gathered up the manna, as we get into this, as they gathered up the manna, it says, None of them lacked. You go over to Corinthians. None of them lacked. Each of them had exactly what they needed. And that's what Christ is to be to us. A perfect balance in our life. He's exactly what we need for life. If I'm afraid, He is protection. He is peace. If I need direction, He is my counsel. He's my guidance system. He's my guidance department. If I am sick, He is my healing. He is my help. If He doesn't want to heal the body, He at least heals my spirit. My wounded spirit. Because many times, through the sickness of Christians, He uses our testimony to reach others. One of my best friends in life, we sat in Shadron eating supper yesterday. While we were there, in Shadron with him, he shared about how his sister died. His sister died this summer. And one of the things that happened through her testimony was, some of the men from the church that came and among those men that came to pray with her, just I think a couple weeks before she died, she had cancer. One of the men said, I just heard your testimony. I think it was last week or the week before. And he said, when I came to church that evening, I was ready to go back home and kill myself. But after I heard your testimony, I got saved. And I came here with the men tonight to tell you that your testimony saved my life. We never do know what our weaknesses are going to produce. Jesus is all we need. Paul said three times to the Lord, he asked the Lord to heal him of some kind of problem. And they've argued over what the problem is and everything. You know, whether it was his eyesight or something else. But God finally said, that's enough. I don't want to hear anymore about it. My grace is sufficient for you. For my strength is made perfect in weakness. Then Paul said, well most gladly therefore will I rather glory in my infirmities than my weaknesses. That the power of Christ may rest upon me. So many people are so pushy against God. They're not content to be in His will. They want their will. Even in the area of the healing. We just can't take what God says to be our will. We just want to argue with Him. So he says, you go out and you gather up a certain race every day. Did you know that your spiritual life will be in direct proportion to your gathering in of Christ every day? We try to live off of the heat of yesterday's flame. But it just doesn't keep us quite as warm today as it did yesterday, does it? One of the true tests of a believer is he has a desire for the Word of God. I mean he has a real desire for the Word of God. Now I'm going to look you right in the eye and ask you, are you really saved? This may be one of the most powerful things that you're hit with today. Are you really saved? Can you get up in the morning and go through the whole day and never have a hunger to read the Word of God? I went through nine years of my life from the time I was ten to nineteen thinking I was saved, but I never had a hunger for the Word of God until I gave my life to Jesus. And then I found out I couldn't live without the Word of God. Why is it that people over in Russia will sacrifice their lives, are willing to risk their lives and their families to get the Scriptures? They risk their jobs, their health just to get a piece of the Scripture. And we in America won't even open our Bible and read it. I'll tell you why we won't do it. It's because we're not saved. This is one of the problems maybe in your life and in this church in America. We have a church of believers and unbelievers. Even to the point, I mean if you'd heard me, you'd have thought I was saved. And I haven't shared my testimony. They haven't heard this on tape or anything. It would shock a lot of them to think that I wasn't saved. Remember the youth group doing this and that? But God has really opened up my heart. And last year during Revival, you know what I had to do in the baptism area because I was never baptized. I thought I was saved at ten and baptized and I had John Lentz for baptizing because I realized that I was never baptized. For what was it, eighteen years the Spirit of God convicted me. It kept bothering me and bothering me about that. That I wasn't really saved. Let me tell you, if you're saved, you're going to love Jesus. If we don't have a love for the Word of God, if we don't have a love for this, then we don't have a love for Jesus. And that's what this Bible is saying. And when I get done, when we get to the conclusion, you're going to see that what I'm saying is scriptural. Now, He says you go out and you gather up a certain rate every day. Verse 4. You go out and gather a certain rate every day that I may prove them whether they will walk in their law or not. God can tell whether or not you love Jesus by how you treat His Word. How we treat His Word is how we treat Him. What we think of this is what we think of Him. Now look at verse 5. Man, I got into some stuff. I learned some stuff. It's right there. I wonder why I never saw that before. I knew some things about the law. But listen, you know, look at verse 5. Let me read it. 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. And Moses and Aaron said unto all the children of Israel, at evening, then you shall know that the Lord has brought you out from the land of Egypt. Do you know what is instituted in chapter 16 in verse 5? The Sabbath. When did the law come? Later on at Sinai. Sinai. Did you know that the Sabbath was instituted before the giving of the law? And did you know that we as Christians are still under the Sabbath ruling? Not Saturday, per se, because Jesus changed it to Sunday, the first day of the week, because of the resurrection. The principle of it is rest. And the principle of rest is worship. We'll get into that in a few minutes. But the Sabbath was instituted right here, before the law. The rest principle is instituted. And we as Christians have been violating this. Let me just read some things that the Lord impressed on me. Your life is to be God-centered. Right? Wouldn't you say that? Our life is to be God-centered, Christ-centered. And your testimony, my testimony to the world, is that God meets my needs. Right? Right. God meets my needs. Now listen to this. If the Christian, if I work, when I'm supposed to be worshiping, then what am I saying? If I work when I'm supposed to be worshiping, then I'm saying that God can't take care of my needs. And you know what God says about that? He called it idolatry. We have a form of Christian idolatry going on. Is it no wonder that John, the last thing John says, my little children, keep yourself from idolatry. Keep yourself from idols. If the Christian works when he's supposed to be worshiping, it's idolatry. And if I do that by my working, I'm saying to the world that I have to provide for my needs, that I won't make it on my own, that God can't get me through. And when we get into the details of this, it's just amazing. Chapter 16 and 22 on down to 26 is the details of this. Just beautiful things here. But we'd better keep going. Verse 6, he said, Moses and Aaron, all the children of Israel, at evening then you shall know that I am the Lord that brought you out of the land of Egypt. And God just said, I want you to know that I saved you and I can keep you and I can take care of you if you'll just believe it, if you'll just test me. I've shared this before, but I was really tested when I went into the Air Force because we worked 24 hours a day, 9 days a week. You know how it is. And you didn't tell them what your religious beliefs were. They told you. But I took it when I first got overseas, my first assignment, we only worked 48 hours a day. We worked 24 on and 48 off. And that was that. And I told my boss, listen, I'd like to go to church, but I don't want to be irresponsible or whatever. Listen, I'll make a deal with you. I didn't really say it like that, but I said, if you'll let me go to chapel, I'll stay close to the phone where if you need me, you call me, I'll be back in about 2 minutes. He says, it's a deal. You know that for 4 years I followed that principle with my bosses, whatever they were in the military, that I never did have to miss a chapel or a church service in 4 years. And then I applied that principle over the rest of my Christian life. If you put God first, He'll take care of you. But the devil, you know the Bible says the devil is a roaring lion who goes about seeking whom he may destroy. He will destroy me if I let him. He will. And he will push me right out the door if I let him. And he's pushing. All the time. He's pushing. Well, let's keep on going. And when you get over to these principles, I don't know if we'll get into them today in detail, but they're beautiful. Everything we need, He provides. But we try to do it ourselves. And the more we dig, you know, the deeper we get in the hole. Look at verse 7. And the morning, He says, then you shall see the glory of the Lord. Whenever they saw the manna come down from heaven, they saw the glory of the Lord. When we see Jesus coming down, we see the glory of the Lord. For that He heareth your murmurings against the Lord, and what are we that ye murmur against us? Now, Moses was really ticked off at the murmuring, but we're not going to pick all Moses here at this point. He really was upset by all that murmuring. But God expected it. Because God was putting him through the pressure. They were babies in Christ. He expected them to fail. He expected them to complain. I expect some of you to fail. I expect some of you to flop around and flounder and learn your lessons. And God has been teaching me, I don't have the right to condemn you, and I love you. And I'm looking back, I'm doing a lot better looking back now at my past life as I look at you. And I see how God was so patient with me, and how sometimes I haven't been patient with you. But I'm learning. I'm learning more. I feel like a new kid with a toy since Revival. I'm learning so much. But God expects us to fail. He expected Job to fail when he went through that thing. But when Job came to the end of himself, he was face-to-face with God and He made a new man out of him. And as you go through your trials, as you go through your trials, God expects us to fail, but He expects us to come back up again and learn from it and grow. And each time we're a notch closer to Him. And we've got our scars. Some of the things really leave us some pretty bad scars. Now, let's go on. Verse 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 fool, for that the Lord heareth your murmurings which you murmur against Him. And what are we? Your murmurings are not against us, but against the Lord. And that was true. But God wasn't mad at him. I want you to know, God loved him. He loves us. In verse 9, And Moses spake unto Aaron, saying to all the congregation of the children of Israel, Come near before the Lord, for He hath heard your murmurings. And then verses 10 on down to 14 is just the details on the manna coming in and how it came in. Let's pick up at verse 14. 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 hoarfrost on the ground. And when the children of Israel saw it, they said one to another, What is it? They said, It is manna. What is it? And Moses said unto them, This is the bread which the Lord hath given to you. It is your wilderness provision. Use it and you'll survive. Abuse Christ and you'll die. Again, in John 6, let me read you a verse or two again. John 6, 33. For the bread of God is he which cometh down from heaven and giveth life unto the world. It was Jesus. The manna was the type of Jesus. 34. Then said they unto him, Lord evermore, give us this bread. We want this bread. He said, Do you really want it? If you want it, you'll accept my son. You'll accept Jesus. Same thing with the woman at the well with the water. Verse 35. Again, Jesus said unto them, I am the bread of life. He that cometh to me shall never hunger. He that blameth on me shall never thirst. But I say unto you that you also have seen me and believe not. All that the Father giveth me shall come to me and him that cometh to me I will in no wise cast out. For I came down from heaven not to do my own will but the will of him that sent me. And he goes on down through it. Over in 48, this passage gets deep because we get into the passage that talks about the eating of the flesh of Christ. And maybe tonight we'll get into the depthness of that. But 48, he says, I am that bread of life. Jesus came out and said, I am the manna. I am the bread of life. 49. Your fathers did eat manna in the wilderness and are dead. He's talking about himself, the manna. And 50. This is the bread which cometh down from heaven that a man may eat thereof and not die. If you'll receive me and live by me you won't die. And they got all hung up on later on and thinking he was talking about eating his body because he says, if you eat my flesh except you eat the flesh in verse 53. And 58 he says, this is that bread which came down from heaven not as your fathers did eat manna. He says, I'm not talking to you about eating the manna physically but spiritually receiving me. They got all hung up on thinking he was talking about cannibalism. But he's talking about receiving me, receiving him. He says, if you'll receive me, live me, let me be your life. You know that as we get the word of God in we receive more Jesus. And you just can't get too much. You just can't get it in. Well, let's keep on going. Back to, meanwhile, back at the ranch. Chapter 16 of Exodus. And let's keep on going. Verse 15. When the children of Israel saw it, they said one to another, it is manna. For they knew not what it was. And Moses said to them, this is the bread which the Lord has given you to eat. This is the thing which the Lord has commanded. Gather of it every man according to his eating and Omer for every man according to the number of your persons taking it. Every man for them which are in his tent. And the children of Israel did so and gathered some more, some less. And they beat it out and they ground it and they would bake it and whatever. It was their provision. Whatever your need, Christ is your provision. For 40 years they lived off that manna. Now when you get down to verse 19. 19 through 21. Moses said, let nothing, no man, there's some details in this passage. I'm going to have to go over some of them, just bypass. But in 19, it says, Moses said, let no man leave of it till the morning. 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. Remember, Moses had a little temper. He's really angry. And they gathered it every morning and every man according to his eating and when the sun waxed hot, it melted. I don't have time to get into a lot of this, but let me just say a couple of things. You must feed daily on Christ. You must share daily of Christ. If I'm not feeding daily on Christ, then I will not be sharing daily of Christ. And what I got yesterday was good for yesterday, but I need fresh food every day. This is why the Christians in Russia and these countries, they will give their life, they will risk their life to get the word of God. It is more important to them than physically living. And we in America say we are Christians and we got Bibles all over our shelves. I've got a new Bible that I've had for over a year and I can't get myself to break it in. I just love my old Bible. It's full of all the things and notes that the Lord told me and Elmer's glue is holding it together. Jesus said man should not live by bread alone but by every word that proceeds out of the mouth of God. Only that which was consumed was usable. You see, just to know Jesus as our Savior is not going to give us much strength, but we've got to continually take in the word. Memorize it. Meditate upon it. Read it. And maybe tonight if you want to get some ideas on how to read, how to meditate, whatever. I've been doing a lot of these different things over the years and sometimes we miss out on some of these key things because Sunday morning we can just cover about 25% of the program. But we've got to be memorizing, meditating on it and reading it and then sharing it. Only that which was consumed was usable. Twenty-two through thirty-one is the rest of the Sabbath principle. And maybe I'll just hit a couple of things quickly on that. In verse twenty-two it says, And the Lord said unto them, This is that which the Lord has said tomorrow is the rest of the holy Sabbath. Unto the Lord bake that which you will bake today, and seed that which you have seeded, and that which remaineth over lay up for you to be kept unto the morning. And they laid it up to the morning as Moses bade, and it did not stink neither was there any worm therein. Twenty-three and twenty-four is the principle that we live by faith. When we live by faith, God makes our ends meet. But when we live by self effort, they never seem to meet. They never do. But when we live by faith, they always meet. And if they don't meet, it's not God's fault. We'll look and see that we're doing something wrong in our life. But they always meet. Twenty-five and twenty-six, Moses said, Eat that today, for today is a Sabbath unto the Lord. Today you shall not find it in the field. Six days you shall gather it, but on the seventh day, which is the Sabbath, in it there shall be none. You know what Jesus said about the Sabbath? I was thinking about that this morning as I was taking a shower and meditating on this passage. He said that the Sabbath is made for man. In other words, the Sabbath is for man's good, and not man for the Sabbath. God didn't make man to go over and run and do all these little rituals and rules like the Jews got all hung up on. He says, No, God made that Sabbath for you so you could rest. And why do you want them to rest? So they could worship. And so whenever they did not rest and they went and did their other deals and they got into a lot of trouble for it by the way too. They got into problems. They got tired. Their crops didn't make it. They just didn't crop and didn't meet. He says, I gave you this time so you could enjoy me. And I would take care of that slack. I've watched some of the ranchers down here in the sand hills as year by year in the last 15 years. I've just watched a lot of them. Watch those that would put God first and those that felt like they had to work and do their hay and serenity and everything. That principle has never failed all the way back from this time. They keep getting farther and farther behind. Now they got the same problems down there, but that principle has never failed. It's a scriptural principle to put God first. Now let's keep going. 27, 28 on this. When it came to pass that there went out some of the people on the seventh day for together and they found none. You know what that's saying? You always have unbelievers. There's always those that will not believe Jesus. He says don't do it, and they go and do it anyway. Always unbelievers. A key point. 28. And the Lord said unto Moses, how long refuse you to keep my commandments and my laws. For see that the Lord has 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. And this was all before the law. I don't have time to get into a lot of the details on this, but it's really good. It goes back to Hebrews 4. Hebrews 4 you can get into some of the New Testament heart of this doctrine on the Sabbath. Then 29 and 31 God says just relax. Enjoy me on this day. Enjoy me. And rest up. It's been a hard week hiking through this desert. It's been a hard week this week, picking things out of people's teeth. Enjoy yourself. Relax today. Relax. You know what? We are losing the privilege to enjoy the Lord because we're violating it all around America. Christians are letting the unsaved dictate new work laws and things where they can't do it. 29. See for that the Lord has given you the Sabbath. 30. So the people rested on the seventh day. 31. And the house of Israel called the name thereof manna. 32. And it was like white and the taste of it was like wafers made with honey. It tasted awful good. 33. Now, we're down to something. Why 40 years of the same thing? Turn over to Deuteronomy 8, if you will. Deuteronomy chapter 8 is the key to this passage. Deuteronomy chapter 8, verse 1. And all the commandments which I have spoken shall you observe. He's rehearsing with him again to do that you may live and multiply and go in and possess the land which the Lord swear unto your father. He's talking about going in now and getting the Canaan land. Verse 2. Deuteronomy 8, 2. And thou shalt remember all the way which the Lord thy God led thee these 40 years in the wilderness. Why? To humble thee and to praise thee and to approve thee. Those two reasons. That's why he did it. To humble them. You know, it's very humbling to not be able to provide for yourself, isn't it? It's very humbling to not be able to get out and work. Very hard for some people to be humbled that way. But that's what he's trying to say. I want you to see that you need me. You can't live without me. I'm going to let you do it six days. You can go out and do it. together, but I want you to see and never forget by the Sabbath rest that you need me. And look, he says, to prove. What do you want to prove? To prove thee. To know what was in thine heart whether thou would keep his commandments or not. The Sabbath was just a test to see whether or not they would believe him or not. So he proved them. How? By letting them go hungry. You know what Jesus said? Jesus went through 40 days and 40 nights without food. You'd be hungry, wouldn't you? After 40 days, they say you get hungry after 40 days fast. The hunger comes back. It goes away after a few days after you start. What did the devil come to Jesus and say? He knew that he was hungry now. He says, why don't you turn these breads into stone? And what did Jesus say? Man, it is written. Where was it written? Right here. It is written, man shall not live by bread alone but by every word that proceeds out of the mouth of God. The believer is to live off the words of Jesus. Now let's keep going in the passage. To prove thee, verse 2, right in the middle, to know what was in thine heart whether thou wouldest keep his commandments or not, verse 3, and he humbled thee and suffered thee to hunger and fed thee with manna, fed them with Christ which thou knewest not. They didn't know it was Jesus. They didn't know that this was talking about Christ. Neither did thy fathers know that he might make thee know that man doth not live by bread only but by every word that proceeds out of the mouth of the Lord doth man live. If I won't live off the word of God then I'm saying to the world that Jesus isn't my life. If I don't crave it then I'm saying Jesus isn't my life. Now that may be a little hard to swallow. But Jesus said it. Man shall not live by bread only. You know, we'd rather give up our Bible reading than miss breakfast. We'd rather give up our meal. If we really love Jesus then miss our prayer time. But we get it reversed so many times. We've got time to eat but we don't have time to pray and get in the Word. All we're saying is to Jesus you're not that important for my life. You know, our lives stink. Our lives are a struggle. Our lives have no glory to it. No glow. No power. Because Jesus isn't our strength. Selfless. And that's what he's saying. Look at verse 16. Verse 16. Who fed thee in the wilderness with manna which thy fathers knew not. They didn't know it was Jesus. That he might humble thee. That he might prove thee to do thee good at the latter end. All of that was to do them good. All of it was to do them good. As they gathered manna for food, we are to gather the Word of God for food also. How do they do it? Daily. A certain rate. Each man in proportion to his need. For me, I need so much time in it for my daily substance. For you, you need so much time. I have heard of some that would pray eight hours a day. Some need to pray four hours a day. Some need to pray. Whatever God would lead them into, they would do it. Jeremiah said, thy words were found and I did eat them and thy words were unto me the joy and rejoicing of my heart. For I am called by thy name. Man shall not live by bread and loins. 1 Peter 2.2 Peter said, As newborn babes, he says, one of the evidences of a newborn spiritual person is a desire for the Word of God. As newborn babes desire the sincere milk of the Word that you may grow thereby if, so be you a taste that the Lord is gracious. If you really got saved, you are going to desire the Word of God. Powerful stuff. 1 Corinthians 10.3-5 The scripture says, that they ate, they did all eat the same spiritual meat and did all drink the same spiritual drink. Talking about the manna and the water out of the rock. For they drank of that spiritual rock that followed them, and that rock was Christ. But with many of them God was not well pleased for they were overthrown in the wilderness. How many of that crowd that lived off that manna for forty years made it into the promised land? Just two. Moses would have made it but he was disobedient. He was overthrown in the wilderness by his sin. I just wonder will we make it? You read 1 John 5, 3 and 4 about the overcomers. The overcomers are those that stick to Jesus. Stick very close to Him. 1 John 5, let me read that and we're going to close up. For this is the love of God that we keep His commandments and His commandments are not grievous. For whatsoever is born of God overcometh the world and this is the victory that is born of God overcometh the world even our faith. How do you measure faith? You measure faith by how however much that faith goes to God and says I need you. I don't know about you but God is saying you've got to do this every second. I've got to be conscious of my need of Him every second because once I become self-conscious I get into trouble and God showed me I'm an awful rascal. I can't trust myself. Let's bow for prayer. Lord, you revealed to us Christ what we do with Jesus we're each accountable to you for it. Lord, you've told us now that He is our wilderness provision and He