Each morning everyone gathered as much as they needed, and in the heat of the day the rest melted. However, on the sixth day of the week, everyone gathered enough to have four liters, instead of two. When the leaders reported this to Moses, he told them that the Lord had said, “Tomorrow is the Sabbath, a sacred day of rest in honor of me. So gather all you want to bake or boil, and make sure you save enough for tomorrow.”
The people obeyed, and the next morning the food smelled fine and had no worms. “You may eat the food,” Moses said. “Today is the Sabbath in honor of the Lord, and there won’t be any of this food on the ground today. You will find it there for the first six days of the week, but not on the Sabbath.” A few of the Israelites did go out to look for some, but there was none.
Memory verse: Today I am giving you the laws and teachings of the Lord your God. Always obey them, and the Lord will make Israel the most famous and important nation on earth, and he will bless you in many ways. Deuteronomy 28:1-2.
Have you tried multiplying zero by any number? I tried it and every number comes back with zero. This is the situation with a lot of people! Every additional training, certificate, skills, continuous prayer and fasting seem like it’s yielding no result. This is really frustrating and can make life unbearable, mostly if you start with little numbers like one and you assume that’s because the numbers are low, but then continue to increase the numbers even until one thousand and it returns zero. The intense effort and hard work, even when a different approach is attempted resulting to zero can almost make one loose complete hope. But often times when things don’t add up, it is because something is wrong somewhere. We are missing out on a simple instruction or trying to improvise where there is no answer.
Progressing on our discussion from yesterday’s devotional, the Israelites complained, and God gave them an instruction, a very simple one. You will have enough to eat but just for one day.
This meant I will provide for you daily so don’t you bother about tomorrow for I have also made provision for tomorrow, which will be visible the next morning. On the sixth day, I will however make provisions for two days, so you will only be allowed to save on the sixth day.
These instructions were very simple, but there are two instances where some people did not get what they had hoped for. The first were those who stored food they were not supposed to store, Exodus 16:20 Some of them disobeyed, but the next morning what they kept was stinking and full of worm and the second set of people were those who went out on Sabbath day but found nothing, Exodus 20:26 A few of the Israelites did go out to look for some, but there was none.
Some people will look at those set of people and say they failed, then tag them as failures but is that really the case?
The reason why it looks like a failure is because the world seems to have a generic name for everything and by the standard of the world, that is failure! But it is not failure to God because He has already made His position clear. We sometimes apply the standard of the world to our lives and use that in deciding success. We also sometimes fail to get clarification on instructions leading us to continually waste a lot of time and effort that will never produce God’s desired result.
The most important result is that which God is involved in and the clear path to achieving that is only if we diligently follow God’s instructions without taking any short cuts. The time to re-evaluate is now! why does it look like you are failing ?
PRAYERS:
- Father I thank you for a wonderful word from your throne
- Thank you for your Holyspirit the comforter who comforts me
- Help me to obey your instructions to the letter, and to become a success in all doings
- I renoucne the spirit of failure and disobedience to divine instructions in Jesus name.
- Help me from today to be a comforter to others who need my support
- Fill me with your Holyspirit Lord and let my life be an expression of your grace.
- Forgive me of all my shortcomings O Lord and let your mercy prevail over judgement
- Thank you Lord for answers to prayers, in Jesus name I pray, Amen.
