Level 3
Lesson 8: God Provides

Long, long ago a great host of people went on a long journey through the wilderness. It was bare and stony. Very few trees grew there and it was very hard to find enough grass for the flocks and herds, for the people had sheep and goats and donkeys and oxen.

Not only that, but there was very little water. There were scarcely any streams and very few wells. No one could get a drink, as you can, just by turning a tap.

The people who went on this journey were called the Children of Israel. Their leader was Moses. The same Moses we read about last time who helped the shepherdesses draw water for their flocks. This was also the same Moses whose mother put him in a cradle-boat, or ark, among the rushes by the River Nile.

Now Moses was an old man, and he was God’s servant. He was taking the Children of Israel to the Land of Canaan. Sometimes they were very, very hungry, and then they grumbled at poor Moses.

Moses prayed to God to help them, and God helped them. The next morning, when the fathers and mothers and boys and girls woke up, they saw something small and round like seeds, and a lot like hoar frost on the ground.

“What is it?” the people asked one another.

Moses said, “It is the bread which God has given you to eat.”

So the people gathered it in baskets. Then they ground it in hand-mills, or beat it in a mortar, and baked it in pans and made cakes of it.

And so the people had food to eat. They called this food Manna.

One day they had no water to drink. Their water-pots were empty and the country was dry, hot and hard. They went three days and found no water.

Then they came to a place called Marah where there was a stream. Full of joy they tasted the waters—but found them bitter.

The people grumbled very loudly, saying to Moses, “What shall we drink?” He prayed to God to help him and God showed him a bush, which, put in the water, sweetened it. So the people were able to drink, and to fill their water pots for the next part of their journey.

And Moses and the people thanked God for His gift of water and food.