“Then Moses and the sons of Israel sang a song to the Lord” (context see Exodus 15:1-21). Miriam concluded the song with the famous lines: “Miriam the prophetess, Aaron’s sister, took the timbrel [tambourine] in her hand, and all the women went out after her with timbrels and with dancing. Miriam answered them, “Sing to the Lord, for He is highly exalted; The horse and his rider He has hurled into the sea”. These acts by God through a mere man, Moses, is by far the greatest appearing by God in the earth until Jesus Christ. God called Moses the most humble man on the face of the earth. “(Now the man Moses was very humble, more than any man who was on the face of the earth)” (Numbers 12:3). Like Christ, who only did what the Father told Him, Moses simply followed the Word of God to the letter. The result was the crippling of the greatest nation on the face of the earth at that time. As God had said Egypt the nation never reached her former glory and He made open show of the Egyptian gods before the world.
The Israelites marched 3 days without water. Moses led Israel from the Sea, and they went out into the wilderness of Shur where they found no water. When they came to Marah, they could not drink the waters for they were bitter; [Heb Marim] therefore it was named Marah [bitterness]. So in the first of the many times they were displeased with Moses, the people grumbled at Moses, saying, “What shall we drink?” Then he cried out to the Lord, and the Lord showed him a tree; and he threw it into the waters, and the waters became sweet. The wood that Moses tossed into the water did not have a magical effect on the water; it was simply a symbolic act in anticipation of God’s working a miracle (like Moses lifting his staff over the sea” 14:16) Today the oasis at Ain Hawarah [formerly Marah] has only bitter water. The Lord spoke to the people there about obedience. “And He said, “If you will give earnest heed to the voice of the Lord your God, and do what is right in His sight, and give ear to His commandments, and keep all His statutes, I will put none of the diseases on you which I have put on the Egyptians; for I, the Lord, am your healer” (Ex 15:26-27). Then they came to Elim where there were twelve springs of water and seventy date palms, and they camped there beside the waters (Ex 15:22-27). The Lord was their protector, as Christ is ours today. The only thing He required was obedience.
As they continued to march in the desert wilderness once again the whole congregation of the sons of Israel grumbled against Moses and Aaron. As unbelievable as it sounds, after the miracles they had witnessed, the sons of Israel said to them, “Would that we had died by the Lord’s hand in the land of Egypt, when we sat by the pots of meat, when we ate bread to the full; for you have brought us out into this wilderness to kill this whole assembly with hunger”. The meat they ate in Egypt was no delicacy; the Egyptians threw the salted meat into one pot. So once again God answered their grumblings. “Then the Lord said to Moses, “Behold, I will rain bread from heaven for you; and the people shall go out and gather a day’s portion every day, that I may test them, whether or not they will walk in My instruction” (Ex 16:2-4). Moses said: “This will happen when the Lord gives you meat to eat in the evening, and bread to the full in the morning; for the Lord hears your grumblings which you grumble against Him. And what are we? Your grumblings are not against us but against the Lord” (Ex 16:8).
So came the birth of manna, the bread from Heaven, that God provided for His people. It was described “a fine flake-like thing, fine as the frost on the ground” (Ex 16:14). When the sons of Israel saw it, they said to one another, “What is it?” [Heb Man hu, cf v 31] for they did not know what it was. And Moses said to them, “It is the bread which the Lord has given you to eat”. God had a detailed plan for the distribution of the manna. He said: ”Gather of it every man as much as he should eat; you shall take an omer [6 pints] apiece according to the number of persons each of you has in his tent. When they measured it with an omer, he who had gathered much had no excess, and he who had gathered little had no lack; every man gathered as much as he should eat. Moses said to them, “Let no man leave any of it until morning.” But they did not listen to Moses, and some left part of it until morning, and it bred worms and became foul; and Moses was angry with them. On the sixth day they gathered twice as much bread, two omers for each one because the Sabbath occurred on the 7th day where there was no work allowed. God made sure that when they gathered twice as much it didn’t spoil” (Ex 16:15-22). The house of Israel named it manna, [man] and it was like coriander seed, white, and its taste was like wafers with honey. A jar of the manna was kept throughout the generations and it was kept in the Holy of Holies with the Ark of the Covenant in the temple. Christ may have referred to this manna in His Lord’s prayer: “Give us this day our daily bread” (Matt 6:11). Even more, in the Kingdom Age, it meant the living word of God that would provide sustenance. As God said: “He humbled you and let you be hungry, and fed you with manna which you did not know, nor did your fathers know, that He might make you understand that man does not live by bread alone, but man lives by everything that proceeds out of the mouth of the Lord” (Dt 89:3).
The Israelites journeyed to Rephidim where once again there was no water. The people rose up against Moses. Moses was so frustrated at the people that he said: “What shall I do to this people? A little more and they will stone me” (Ex 17:4). “Then the Lord said to Moses,… “ you shall strike the rock, and water will come out of it, that the people may drink.” And Moses did so in the sight of the elders of Israel. He named the place Massah [test] and Meribah [quarrel] because of the quarrel of the sons of Israel, and because they tested the Lord, saying, “Is the Lord among us, or not?” (Ex 17:5-7).
At this point we should take a step back and understand what God was doing with the Israelite people and how it relates to us today. The Israelites were being tested on necessary ingredients for a successful walk with God—obedience, testing and suffering. The Lord had delivered them from a land of oppression into a land ruled by God. He knew they were to enter a Promised Land flowing with milk and honey, Today we are entering into the Kingdom of God. The process for entering both are essentially the same. We are continually tested by God whereby we learn obedience. In those tests we learn obedience. It was the same with Christ. It was said of Christ: “Although He was a Son, He learned obedience from the things which He suffered” (Hebrews 5:8). Christ was not born with perfect obedience—He had to learn it by sufferings (testings) just as we must learn it. Hebrews 12:6–8 says: “FOr those whom the Lord loves He disciplines, And He scourges every son whom He receives.” “It is for discipline that you endure; God deals with you as with sons; for what son is there whom his father does not discipline? But if you are without discipline, of which all have become partakers, then you are illegitimate children and not sons”. 1 Peter 4:12-14 says: “Beloved, do not be