What is it?

Don’t you hate those morning when you wake up tired? You went to bed tired and yet the night just brought tossing and turning. Even more frustrating is that there isn’t a good reason or a specific “thing” you can put your finger on that causes you to drag in the morning…

I had one of those mornings…since Monday. I was trying to ail it through house cleaning (helps), stopping and reading books with the kids (helps), remembering to feed myself (so-so), and reading my bible…I’ll be honest, it didn’t instantly help Monday through Wednesday. But today it at least sparked a hope.

Exodus 16. The gist is that the Israelites, after much oppression in Egypt, are finally on their way to something greater – the Promise Land. Shortly into the trek they are already complaining,

“Why didn’t God let us die in comfort in Egypt where we had lamb stew and all the bread we could eat? You’ve brought us out into this wilderness to starve us to death, the whole company of Israel!”

They so quickly forgot that they were forced to make bricks without any straw and work endless hours. Oh and that little part where they were slaves. Just say’n.

Anyways, so they are complaining to Moses and he’s like (paraphrase), “Dear God, what do I do with these people? You give me the courage to get their sorry tails out of Egypt. I told you I couldn’t. You told me I could. We did it. Yadda yadda. And now, look… They don’t give a hill of beans anyways. Help me out Lord, grasping for straws here!”

So God said to Moses,

“I’m going to rain bread down from the skies for you. The people will go out and gather each day’s ration. I’m going to test them to see if they’ll live according to my Teaching or not. On the sixth day, when they prepare what they have gathered, it will turn out to be twice as much as their daily ration.”

And so Moses and his trusty brother-side-kick Aaron say to the people,

“This evening you will know that it is God who brought you out of Egypt; and in the morning you will see the Glory of God. Yes, he’s listened to your complaints against him. You haven’t been complaining against us, you know, but against God.”

The people are happy and yet still greedy. They gather more of this  flaky “bread” (they call it manna which means “what is it?”)

than they were supposed to and when they do that it turns all smelly and wormy. And Moses gets pretty grumpy (like most leaders/parents do when they have given wisdom and it isn’t followed). So Moses says to them that they aren’t following instruction and the only time they are supposed to gather more than the day’s rations is the day before the Sabbath (day of rest).

Eventually the people catch on. They learn that if they gather too much it just turns to worms anyways. And if they don’t gather enough when God does say so then they are starving on their day of rest (doesn’t sound like the ideal situation).

So what does this have to do with a grumpy morning(s)? This…

Basically I gathered (tee-hee) that God is saying, “follow my instruction on what to gather and how much and leave the rest.” This is hard for me. I am a do-er. I am a get-er. I am an achiever. But I am tired. Physically, yeah a bit (can’t seem to finish a book to save my life the last few nights, I look like a drooling nut hanging half way off the bed with the lights still on, book on my chest, and my glasses half off while the dog scratches away at my feet and I hear my dear husband gently put things back in order so I can officially be tucked in). But more spiritually I think is the tiredness. Its part of life, its part of being a Christ-follower, its a cross roads.

I am not sure what exactly I am supposed to “leave” and what to “gather” but I am getting the point (thanks God) that the direction comes from Him and I need to tune into that more.

The Israelites … well let’s just say that they ate manna for 40 years, the very next chapter they are complaining about water, and a good bit of them (including dear Moses) did not get into the Promise Land ’cause they chose not to follow God’s instruction.

Here’s to catching on to His instruction sooner rather than later.