As most of you know, on Wednesday nights we have prayer, worship, and Bible study followed by dinner. For myself I am finding that Wednesday night is the highlight of my week spending time with my sisters and occasionally brothers in prayer and meditation on God and his ways.
Followed by some yummy dinner that my sisters make. I don't make a lot of dinner but I do on occasion go to the Churches chicken and pick up a big feed of chicken for us, that's the best cooking I can do. Well last Wednesday night was kind of unusual. It was the day after the American election. So, we had some interesting things to talk about. It doesn't matter which side of the equation people are on it was still a healthy debate. And then we had dinner, which had both pork and shrimp in it. I know that I still horrified my Filipino and Korean sisters with the fact that I don't eat shellfish or pork, and all I can say was that my political opinion was not the same as theirs. So let me just state right now that I very rarely talk about politics because it is a divisive issue and so I choose to focus on Christ. But through the course of the evening is it interesting to see how my dietary issues and political issues we're an issue. I got thinking about this subject, and all the issues that seemed to swirl around it.
When I think about the start of my dietary practices, I am brought back to a church that I fellowship with that's part of our BGC that's called SSSMF. This is a church that outreach is to Jewish people that have become Christians. I'm very happy that God called me to fellowship with these people for a time, and in doing so allowed me to look at the scriptures from a Jewish follower’s point of view.
Needless to say, there's some differences between the way they look at it and the way a modern North American might look at it. People in that fellowship still follow the rules in Leviticus 11 and Deuteronomy 14. In these chapters and you can read it for yourself later, God Clearly teaches his way to eat, what is clean for you to eat, and what is detestable to eat.
After reading these two chapters my thoughts are brought back to Genesis and the garden of Eden. Where Adam and Eve are given the first instructions. These instructions were from God of what to eat and what they could not eat. They could eat from every tree of the garden except for the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. And then I thought about how Satan came into the picture. And I started to think about the whole issue, was the issue really about some fruit?
Well, I think Satan answers this question, he didn't really talk about the fruit he talked about the word of God. He twisted what God's words were when he said to Eve did God really say that?
I think this question clearly confused eve, and in the confusion, she took her focus off what God said and focused on to something else which was the fruit. She noticed that the fruit was indeed pleasing to look at, must be good to eat! And so, Eve and Adam partook of some of the forbidden fruit thus starting the whole theme of the Bible of God bringing us back to complete fellowship with God. Again, I don't think the major issue in this is the food we stick in her mouth, but the words that God has for us that we stick in our hearts and mind.
In Exodus chapter 16 we see the story of God feeding the people with quail and manna. This happens right after they leave Egypt. They started their wandering through the desert and they became a very hungry. And in doing so they began to grumble against Moses and Aaron. And they said it would have been better for us to stay in Egypt we we had lots of meat to eat and lots of bread. In this I can't help but think that God brought them out and let them become hungry. He wanted to teach them that he had something new for them to eat and that they were not to continue to eat the old food that was in Egypt.
This is a direct example for us, that when God brings you out of your Egypt that he will have new food for you to eat. I am not talking about physical food, but I am talking about spiritual food. So, when the congregation was hungry, he brought down the mana from heaven. He gave them the instructions that they were to gather only one day’s worth. On the 6th day they were to gather 2 portions one for the 6th day and one for the Sabbath.
This is what I think God is exactly looking for. We are to start to learn how to rely on him and his provision both physically and spiritually and emotionally. All of this happens daily, and with a daily relationship with the living God. God provides for all these things because he wants you to know that he is our heavenly Father our God.
So, with the Israelites God provided quail in the evening that covered the camp and in the morning, there was a dew that laid around the camp. When the dew had evaporated there is a flakelike substance, fine as frost on the ground. When the Israelites saw this, they said what is this? For they did not know what it was, and Moses said to them it is the bread the Lord has given you to eat. And God commanded them to gather it up, all that they could eat! But when they disobeyed God and gathered up more than one day worth of mana, the mana would rot and worms would be in it. This was God's way of showing that when he provides, he's providing for today for our daily food. And just like the Israelites God provides for our daily food, but by faith we rely on God to provide our food for tomorrow. God showed that he was faithful in this that he provided for the Israelites for 40 years and none of them went hungry.
But what is our food today that God gives us? We know that in scripture God says that he looks after the birds of the air and all the living things so he loves us much more than them so how much more will he provide for us! So, I think today the issue is not the physical food that God wants us to rely on him for, which he says he will provide. But also, God wants us to rely on him for our spiritual food that we need every day. So, what is this food?
“Jesus said to them, my food is to do the will of him who sent me and to accomplish his work”
“But he answered, it is written man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God”
Here we can clearly see what Jesus says is the food we should eat from every day. This food is both residing in God's will for you that day, and from consuming the words of God that we find in the Bible. It is obvious what Jesus is saying here is not physical food.