Manna... The Bread of LIfe

It occurred to me that Judaism is not the antecedent of Christianity for John 1 tells us that Christ was with God at the creation. Hence, the true religion has always been Christianity. The Old Testament Patriarchs who had faith, had faith in Christ! After having this thought, I read from church father Ignatius in his letter to the Magnesians A.D. 110:

"Christianity did not base its faith on Judaism, but Judaism on Christianity, in which every tongue believing in God is brought together."

Ignatius is credible. He knew and spoke with the Apostle John. Although his words are not canon, since he was martyred fro Christ, he was surely a spiritual presbyter of Christ.

Prior to this, many years ago, it occurred to me that the Old Testament is all about Christ! God had a plan all along. That plan was Jesus, Christ in the flesh. As such the Messiah spoke to righteous men throughout the ages. When Adam spoke to God in the Garden it was Christ. When Noah had faith, it was faith in Christ and his salvation. When Abraham had faith, it was faith in Christ. Who is the Messiah? Who is the Christ? He is the Word, soon to be born of a virgin and named Jesus!

To understand the concept that Christ IS the Son of God, it's best to understand the Trinity; the Father, Son and Holy Ghost.

Tertullian, about the year A.D. 200 explained the trinity best: God who defies definition in his awe is called God, Son of God and Spirit. He is without name. He says that he is "I AM WHAT I AM". God is how we refer to the majesty which encompasses the Cosmos, a Greek name for God. The entire expanse is God because he's omnipresent. Tertullian compared him to the sun which shoots out rays of light. (This analogy is good because God is light; Shekinah!) The sun itself represents the Father and the rays the Son of God and Spirit. The rays of the sun are as much sun as the sun itself, but the rays are distinct. They are of the sun and are no less sun than is the sun. The rays shine forth and light mankind. The rays are what man sees, but they emanate from the sun. Just as the sun is a metaphor for God, the rays are metaphors for the Son of God and the Spirit of God. The rays are just as much God as is the sun, yet the rays are of the sun just as the Son of God is of God. Hence, the Son of God and God are one and the same! Likewise, the same metaphor can be used for the Spirit of God.

Therefore, since Holy Scripture tells us that man cannot look upon the face of God, represented by the sun, we can look upon the light emitted from the sun, the Son of God as represented by the sun's rays. Likewise, when God spoke to man, it was the Son of God speaking. It was he who was to be Jesus! Many instances in the Old Testament we have the Son right there in different manifestations, appearing to, speaking with, withstanding alongside and even wrestling with man!

All Old Testament scripture points toward Jesus and is a story of the Son of God here on earth, dealing with mankind and providing fellowship and faith! Yes, Christianity preceded Judaism and that faith comes short of salvation. Only by Jesus can one enter the kingdom of God and they don't have to have the faith of Abraham, that faith that the Son of God dwelt with man all along! Yes, Christianity is the antecedent of Judaism!

The Jewish nation, under Moses had just left Egypt where they lived as slaves. God delivered them from enslavement which represents sin, as does Egypt itself. God delivered the Jews from sin! As the Jews came into the wilderness actually called "Sin", they began to grumble. They believed they would have been better off as slaves in Egypt (representing bondage to sin). God provided the freedom to the Jews at the cost of the firstborn of every Egyptian. They were the blood sacrifice, blood being necessary for atonement. The firstborn of the Jews were saved by sprinkling of the blood on the doorposts. This represents the saving blood of Jesus and the wooden door frame the cross of Jesus.

The "glory of the Lord" came to Aaron in the wilderness. That Glory was the Son of God who was later born of a virgin and named Jesus. The Glory of the Lord provided meat (quails) and a type of bread (manna) to save the Jews from starvation! This manna (bread was what they called it) was the "bread of life" and was from the Son of God!

Exodus 16:14 "And when the dew that lay was gone up, behold, upon the face of the wilderness there lay a small round thing, as small as the hoar frost on the ground. 15 And when the children of Israel saw it, they said one to another, It is manna: for they wist not what it was. And Moses said unto them, This is the bread which the Lord hath given you to eat."

Exodus 16:31 "And the house of Israel called the name thereof Manna: and it was like coriander seed, white; and the taste of it was like wafers made with honey."

The manna was described as tasting like wafers flavored with honey! This was not only a staple, but a great-tasting food. The Son of God provided!  (No wonder many churches use wafers for the Eucharist!).

The Encyclopedia of Judaism says about manna:

"Exploration in the Sinai peninsula has revealed in fairly recent times a food that strongly resembles the biblical manna. Myriads of insects that cover the trees, particularly the tamarisk, secrete drops of liquid up to the size of a pea that crystallize and have a sweetish taste. Roaming Bedouin use it as food. It must be gathered early in the morning before the ants devour it. These characteristics accord with the biblical description of manna. "

The Jews were saved from perishing in Sin by bread supplied from "the glory of God", the Son of God! Moses in writing the Book of Deuteronomy said:

Deuteronomy 8:2 "And thou shalt remember all the way which the Lord thy God led thee these forty years in the wilderness, to humble thee, and to prove thee, to know what was in thine heart, whether thou wouldest keep his commandments, or no. 3 And he humbled thee, and suffered thee to hunger, and fed thee with manna, which thou knewest not, neither did thy fathers know; that he might make thee know that man doth not live by bread only, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of the Lord doth man live.

The manna, the bread of life, pointed toward salvation by belief in Jesus. Just as the Jews were destitute (in Sin) and needed salvation from perishing (in the Wilderness), Jesus, the Bread of Life saves man from perishing.! What a picture. Moses saw that picture. He (and Joshua) knew that he was standing again on Holy Ground! We see below that after Joshua took over for Moses and they escaped Sin, who appeared again:

Joshua 5:

11 And they did eat of the old corn of the land on the morrow after the passover, unleavened cakes, and parched corn in the selfsame day.

12 And the manna ceased on the morrow after they had eaten of the old corn of the land; neither had the children of Israel manna any more; but they did eat of the fruit of the land of Canaan that year.

13 And it came to pass, when Joshua was by Jericho, that he lifted up his eyes and looked, and, behold, there stood a man over against him with his sword drawn in his hand: and Joshua went unto him, and said unto him, Art thou for us, or for our adversaries?

14 And he said, Nay; but as captain of the host of the Lord am I now come. And Joshua fell on his face to the earth, and did worship, and said unto him, What saith my Lord unto his servant?

15 And the captain of the Lord's host said unto Joshua, Loose thy shoe from off thy foot; for the place whereon thou standest is holy. And Joshua did so.

Joshua, after being saved from perishing along with his "household", there appeared unto him a man with a sword, the captain of the host of the Lord. This "man" again was the "ray of the sun", the Son of God, to be called Jesus. We know that because Joshua fell on his face and worshiped! The ground on which he stood became holy because he was standing in the presence of God, the Son of God!

For continuity, we're to look at the New Testament. John tied together all the "loose strings" This isn't just my idea, but the Apostles came together and wrote about it under John's signature:

John 6:30 "They said therefore unto him, What sign shewest thou then, that we may see, and believe thee? what dost thou work? 31 Our fathers did eat manna in the desert; as it is written, He gave them bread from heaven to eat. 32 Then Jesus said unto them, Verily, verily, I say unto you, Moses gave you not that bread from heaven; but my Father giveth you the true bread from heaven."

Jesus said that Moses was not the giver of what they called "bread" (manna). God provided. Moses didn't save them. God (The Son of God) saved them. God (The Father) "giveth you the true bread from heaven". That "true bread", not just called "bread" and not the "real saving bread", but the real thing, Jesus, came from the Father in heaven!  You see, Moses and Joshua knew Jesus! They saw Him, talked with Him and was delivered by Him (Jesus) 1200 years before he was born of a virgin! Jesus identified himself. He made it clear that he is the "bread of life", the real McCoy, as pictured in the Exodus:

John 6:35 "And Jesus said unto them, I am the bread of life: he that cometh to me shall never hunger; and he that believeth on me shall never thirst."

Jesus said two things with one expression, "I am the bread of life". By saying "I am" he names himself as God. By saying "bread of life" he's calling himself Savior, the Son of God, Jesus! The manna in Sin represented the true bread of life, Jesus Christ! Jesus made a difference in the manna, not true bread, and himself, the "True Bread":

John 6:48 "I am that bread of life. 49 Your fathers did eat manna in the wilderness, and are dead.50 This is the bread which cometh down from heaven, that a man may eat thereof, and not die."

The manna (called bread) came down from heaven. The Jews lived for a season, but died. Moses even died, not being allowed to step forth on the Holy Land, Canaan, a picture of Paradise, a land of milk and honey! However, Jesus, "is the bread" and he too came down from heaven, but unlike so-called bread which allowed man to die, Jesus, the true bread, will provide eternal life! That's our hope. Jesus saves! 

How is it "that a man may eat thereof"? We partake of Jesus. We accept his atonement for our sins. That he delivers us from sin (not Sin), and that by faith in his body and blood we are saved; our bodies and souls! We remember that Jesus saved us from perishing in hell (not the Wilderness) by his vicarious death on the cross (not the door frame):

1 Corinthians 11:23 "For I have received of the Lord that which also I delivered unto you, that the Lord Jesus the same night in which he was betrayed took bread: 24 And when he had given thanks, he brake it, and said, Take, eat: this is my body, which is broken for you: this do in remembrance of me. 25 After the same manner also he took the cup, when he had supped, saying, this cup is the new testament in my blood: this do ye, as oft as ye drink it, in remembrance of me.

Here we have Jesus, using the bread so that we'll remember that his body was broken for us that we might be saved. The bread represents the Son of God (aka Son of Man) in that God took on a human body and he died in our place! He called himself the "bread of life" and that's what he did with his body. He saved us! When we take Communion (The Lord's Supper), if we accept his sacrifice, we honor the "bread of life"! That Bread of Life was crudely represented 3200 years ago to a million Hebrew household by manna from heaven. It was given by the Son of God for the posterity of his people so that they might see him in human form, as Jesus!

The Son of God appeared in the cool of the garden, in the burning bush which was never consumed, as a man with a sword, as a cloud, as Shekinah, in the firey furnance, and wrestling with Jacob, along with many other contacts. Finally, the Son of God appeared just as we are. As Jesus. He felt what we felt, finally! He was tempted as we are. He understands us. He feels for us and he saves us, Step forth into Paradise: if we'll only eat of the Bread of Life!

For me an my household, we choose Jesus, the Bread of Life.