Today's daily devotion

God’s Proving Ground

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.”—EXODUS 16:4 MSG

It seemed like such a simple test. The directions were clear; the time frame was easy enough to handle. No study for the exam was needed. All the preparatory work was done.

Yet many failed.

With God fighting the battle, the people of Israel had escaped the tyranny of Egypt. Now they were a free people—but faced with nothing to eat, they wouldn’t live to enjoy it. Or so they thought.

God told Moses that He would provide bread, manna from heaven. All the people had to do was gather it up each morning. A specific amount—no more, no less. And therein lay the test: Would the people follow the specific instructions each day? Or would they allow greed, laziness, or unbelief rule their response?

God has promised to provide our every need—strength, wisdom, ability, daily bread. But many of us fail when it comes to appropriating the gift. We allow greed (desiring more than we need), laziness (trying to cut out the necessary exercise of prayer and the food of God’s Word), or unbelief (“I need to help God out or it won’t be enough”) to keep us from His promises.