Lent 4 C - Joshua 5:9-12

Joshua 5:9-12

Forty years of “what is it?” manna and now finally something new! Time and again in their wilderness wanderings the children of Israel lamented of their meager fare. “We remember the fish we ate in Egypt at no cost—also the cucumbers, melons, leeks, onions and garlic. But now we have lost our appetite; we never see anything but this manna!"” Complaining of the poverty of their present they forgot the pain of their past as the memory of fish and fruit failed to recall the disgrace of Egypt. In reality the real no cost meal was the manna God provided. The fish and fruit, the no cost meal in Egypt, was paid for by slavery and harsh treatment. Of course those who complained never did get off the manna diet and dying in the desert their only comfort must have been the hope that their children would see the land they had lost by doubting the promise. That hope did not disappoint as Joshua and the children of disgrace are set free and manna is taken off the menu in the land of milk and honey. When in our wilderness wandering we lose our appetite and in misremembering the past we long for something that never was God calls us back to faith through a no cost to us meal that cost God’s life. Sustaining us in our weakness God provides bread and wine that is body and blood for the journey until manna is taken off the menu and we sit down to dine at the forever feast.