334 SE Tecumseh Road  P.O. Box 5  Tecumseh, Kansas 66542  (785) 379-5005  Fax - (785) 379-5061

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No more manna! Joshua 5:9-12  Admit it. If you had to eat the same food day after day, year after year, you’d complain and grumble – wouldn’t you? The Israelites, while wandering for that long period of time, had manna to eat – lots of manna. While they were glad to have sustenance, they also remembered days when they had better food variety. In spite of the fact that during those days they were slaves of the Egyptians, the food was better. (Well, maybe – we do have a way of romanticizing and distorting the past.) In a little known musical, In The Beginning, the people come to Moses and complain: Please, Moses, get us some other food to eat. We’re sick and tired of manna casseroles!  During WW II, there was not enough food for people in The Netherlands. Many went hungry, as food sources were controlled by the occupying army. My family was fortunate, inasmuch as we generally had enough to fill our bellies, even if the food was much the same day in and day out. We ate lots of brown beans for which my uncle, a carpenter, had bartered with farmers. We had occasional vegetables from my grandfather’s garden. We ate vegetable soup - mostly broth – for which people stood in line at the community soup kitchen. Born in 1943, I was an infant and baby throughout those last years of the war, so my knowledge comes from family stories of hardship, deprivation, and fear. No doubt the family, and all the people, grumbled and complained a great deal. No doubt they grumbled to God about the loss of freedom and independence, the loss of life, the absence of ample and varied foods.  In Joshua we read about the end of the seemingly endless manna. The people are gaining their freedom and independence, and: they ate the produce of the land, unleavened cakes and parched grain. ….they ate the crops of the land of Canaan that year. (5:11-12, NRSV) CELEBRATION! When the allied forces liberated The Netherlands, their airplanes dropped provisions by parachute. Food that had not been seen in years came dropping from the sky! Real food, including canned meats! Not only that, but even treats! Imagine: chocolate bars coming from the heavens!!!  Exultation. My first childhood memory, at age 2 ½, is leaving my grandparents’ home to return to our own house in the city of Haarlem. On my lap was a tin box, filled with crackers, cookies, and other goodies! The wagon was pulled by a white horse, and it took us back to our home.  Each of us relates to the plight of the Israelites through our personal experiences and lenses. We eat the crops of our land each day, without the manna. Come to think of it, there’s a connection to the Passover story, the Easter story, to being made free through God’s saving grace. Easter people, celebrating and exulting. It’s worth pondering these things at this time of Christian pondering and introspection, this time of Lent. - Pastor Piet - March 18, 2007: 4th Sunday in Lent  (Please read the scripture passage in its entirety)