The first thing that the children of Israel needed in their journey through the wilderness was the thirst-quenching water and the cooling shade. After this, what they needed very much was food to satisfy their hunger. Therefore, the next thing that was supplied for their life necessities was manna, the heavenly bread.
Manna is a type of Christ (John 6:31-35, 48-51, 57-58). As the real manna, Christ was sent by God the Father that God’s chosen people might live by Christ. Although the children of Israel had had their exodus from Egypt, they were still Egyptian in their constitution. They needed to change their constitution that they might become materials for the building of God’s habitation. God gave them manna to change their diet that they might become a new constitution through their eating. Today Christ has come from God to be our real food, and God has changed our food from something worldly to Christ Himself. We need to eat Him that He may enter into us organically to become our inner constituents that we may be built as God’s habitation.
In the wilderness God gave the children of Israel nothing to eat besides the manna. According to Numbers 11:6, the people said that “there is nothing at all but this manna to look at.” This indicates that, besides Christ, God did not give us anything as our food supply. Christ is the unique food given to us by God.
Manna was the food which God rained from heaven for His chosen people; it was the heavenly food to sustain and supply them for their existence. This is a type of Christ as the bread of life sent from heaven by God the Father (John 6:35, 51) to be man’s life supply in the form of food that we may eat Him and live.
From Exodus 16:13-14 we see that manna came with the dew: “In the morning there was a layer of dew around the camp. And when the layer of dew lifted, there upon the surface of the wilderness were fine round flakes.” This small, round thing was manna. Numbers 11:9 also says, “When the dew fell on the camp at night, the manna would fall with it.” According to the Bible, the dew signifies daily grace, the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ. Psalm 133:3 mentions “the dew of Hermon / That came down upon the mountains of Zion.” The dew of Hermon signifies grace which comes down from the heavens. According to Lamentations 3:22 and 23, God’s mercy, like the dew, is fresh every morning. Mercy in the Old Testament eventually issues in grace in the New Testament. Grace is God reaching us. When God reaches us in a positive manner, full of mercy and compassion, He becomes grace to us. Manna coming down with the dew signifies that Christ as our heavenly bread of life comes to us through grace.
Exodus 16:21 says that the children of Israel “gathered it morning by morning.” The fact that manna came in the morning indicates that it gives us a new beginning. We may also say that every new beginning brings us fresh manna. If we desire to enjoy Christ as the real manna, we must be prepared for a new beginning. Furthermore, whenever we enjoy Christ as our daily food, He brings us a new beginning every day.
Manna was something small, signifying the smallness of Christ. Christ was a descendant of David, a descendant of a royal family. However, He was born in a manger, and He was raised in the home of a carpenter in a small, despised town. This indicates that the Lord did not make a display of His greatness. Rather, He preferred to be small in the eyes of man.
According to John 6, the crowd wanted to enthrone the Lord Jesus as a king, but He fled from man’s exaltation of Himself. The next day He returned and presented Himself as the bread of life, which was as small as the manna (v. 35). He did not want to be a king; He wanted to be food that we may receive Him as our life and life supply. As the real manna, Christ is small enough for us to take in, digest, and assimilate.