Daily Manna · Day 165 · June 14
Meat in Due Season
“The eyes of all wait upon thee; and thou givest them their meat in due season.”
Jesus taught us to pray, "Give us this day our daily bread." The surprising word in that request is "daily." It does not ask for a stockpile or a year of security. The psalm behind it says the same thing in another way: "The eyes of all wait upon thee; and thou givest them their meat in due season."
Follow that idea and you find it running through the whole of Scripture. Manna fell every morning, and when some people kept extra to cover the next day, "it bred worms, and stank." Elijah was fed by ravens at a brook, "bread and flesh in the morning, and bread and flesh in the evening." Then the brook dried up, and God sent him to a widow who had only "an handful of meal in a barrel" left. Moses told Israel that God "suffered thee to hunger, and fed thee with manna," and the reason he gave was "that man doth not live by bread only." Each of these was real provision, and none of them was a supply anyone could sit on.
That is what "in due season" admits, and it should be said plainly. There is a stretch of time when the eyes are looking up and the hands are still empty. The psalm does not pretend otherwise.
The danger lies right there in the wait, because that is where people stop looking up and start reaching sideways. Israel wished they were back in Egypt within weeks of walking through the sea. Abram had God's promise of a son and ten years of waiting in Canaan, and then he took the shortcut Sarai suggested, through her servant Hagar. Genesis follows the trouble that came from it for chapters. In a long wait, the risk is almost never that God forgets to open His hand. The risk is that you get tired of holding yours out, and grab whatever is within reach.
So keep your hand open and keep looking up. The timing is His to set, and the very next verse promises what happens when it comes: "Thou openest thine hand, and satisfiest the desire of every living thing."
Daily Manna runs on a two-year cycle. The year two reading for day 165 is Fifteen Years (2 Kings 20:5).