Sabbath and Sensitive Hearts

Exodus 16 describes God’s gracious provision of bread from heaven for his people while they sojourned in the wilderness. It is a chapter that highlights God’s amazing grace to feed his people even as their attitudes reflected a certain dullness in their hearts towards God’s character and actions. Connected to God’s gracious supply of bread in Exodus 16 is God’s gracious supply of rest on the Sabbath. The focus of this chapter is not on the Sabbath, and interestingly this chapter simply assumes familiarity with the concept of a Sabbath rest. When read from a believing point of view, these verses point to an important observation: while the Sabbath regulations are developed within the context of the Mosaic covenant, the Sabbath concept is independent of God’s covenant with Moses. Naturally, after many generations of slavery in Egypt, which was anti-sabbatical, it makes sense that the Sabbath would gain greater significance in Scripture, but the Sabbath was not created after the exodus nor is it abrogated in the new covenant. As we will see later, there still “remains a Sabbath rest for the people of God” (Heb 4:9) even after the coming of Christ.

With that said, I will take the rest of this reflection to present God’s gracious supply of rest in Exod 16:22-30 and to connect it with the rest of the chapter. In v22, the morning-by-morning routine of collecting roughly 2 quarts of manna per mouth is interrupted. If the great leveling of supply and demand that is described in vv17-18 had a supernatural source, then the break in the routine that is described in v22 would have come as a surprise to the people (even though YHWH had previously told Moses (v5) that a double portion would be collected on the sixth day).[1] Thus, the chiefs of the people turn to Moses for instruction on what to do with this double portion of bread from heaven. From an unexpected double provision of manna comes the unexpected supply of rest that is described in v23.

While the morning-by-morning routine taught the people to rely on God for their daily bread, the break in the routine taught them that man does not live by bread alone, even bread from heaven. Something greater is given to them, namely a weekly day of rest, a day that is set aside for YHWH. Because a sanctified seventh day was more important than a morning-by-morning routine, the part of the double portion of manna that was laid aside overnight did not spoil (v24). Here, then, was an opportunity for the people to open up their schedule for some quality spiritual time without suffering since they did not also have to gather their bread that day.

But it seems that for God’s people, even new habits die hard, and at least some of the people picked up their baskets on the seventh day and headed out to harvest some manna (v27). Of course, because God is true to his word, they did not find any manna but instead found themselves to be illustrations of the people’s deafness and dullness towards God’s amazing grace. Once more, God says through Moses that the seventh day is a gift to them, which means that it is not a burden to rest. It is evidence of God’s glory that he would supply what they need so that they could enjoy what he gives. This section ends by noting that the people eventually enjoy their weekly holiday (v30).

These verses teach us that we must have a certain sensitivity to the gracious breaks in the morning-by-morning routines that define much of our lives. The Lord’s Day, Sunday, is the new covenant fulfillment of the Sabbath rest that God gives to his people and that is set aside for him. We would do well taking stock of whether we unthinkingly or unreflectively plow through the Lord’s Day carrying out our daily habits. At the very least, we must set aside the time for corporate worship, but we would do better setting aside the whole day to worship God and to rest, to revel in our salvation and to reflect on the greatness of our God.

[1] If the leveling of supply and demand was more administratively achieved, i.e. those who had gathered more manna gave up their excess to those who had gathered less after everyone had regathered and measured their harvest, then v22 simply describes the people’s dependence on Moses to receive instruction for how to care for and prepare the excess manna. Given that the people have been demonstrably deaf to Moses’ instructions and God’s word so far, I’m inclined towards the supernatural option. Either way, the point remains that the morning-by-morning routine is interrupted and prompts attention to God’s gracious supply of rest.